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Even without the comparisons to a ‘great infection’ or a ‘great virus’, the movie EMPIRE OF ASH seems to dive deep into the horrors of a post-apocalpyse world. After all, it was made at a time when VCR programmers were shooting their shot at putting something out post-apocalypse. It gets worse when we take into account that the murder and torture of civilization seem to be done by a group of gun toting cult followers. Meanwhile, there is a small crowd trying to find an answer to the strange and harrowing disease that seems to be tearing America apart. Admittedly, these statements could be called too extreme, but the movie does have daunting predictions in it. But hey, at least we have Joe Biden, am I right?
Empire of Ash pretty much consists of isolated scenes put together. There also appears to be no connection between the various ideas, hence it includes a collection of beats just waiting to be fit into the main action and sci-fi theme. Similar to Aliens (1986) and The Terminator (1984), it features star wars but on a dramatically cheaper and dreanfier polished scale.
Empire of Ash do not shy away from any inspiration they can find and even The Rolling Stones are not free from their teacherily practices. This is evident in John Wednesday and David Park’s soundtrack cut, “Gonna Get Some,’ which sounds awfully close to ‘(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction’ with the shouty ‘get some!’ refrain.
Those flaws aside, it’s still written with an energy that borders on the comical, and this unoriginality combined with a complete lack of anything resembling character development is where the film falters. The crux of the film’s narrative deals with Melanie Kilgour’s Ripley-lite Danielle and Thom Schioler’s Kyle Reese-like soldier Orion, who are looking for Danielle’s sister. In relatively New Idaho (which in actuality, happens to be an unexplored part of British Columbia), the two of them are crossing the ifuturistic wasteland. While, neither Kilgour nor Schioler exhibit that exaggerated zeal or confidence most people possess or believe is needed in attempting to engage a psychotic preacher Frank Wilson (alongside his fanatical followers), they do comically well as ‘tough’ heroes. The strong, woman with an edge named Baalca played by the dazzling Michele Chiponski takes the crown as the best of the bunch.
Empire of Ash, however, has an exceptional delight in its presentation. Directed at a brisk pace by M Michael Mazo and Lloyd A. Simandl, their ‘talent’ (as the word is understood in the faintest sense) always clowning around in the woods, everyone from Judas Priest fan club shooting pseudo guns and setting things on fire, has a captivating charm that’s hard to resist. Empire of Ash is not a sophisticated film, and it doesn’t need to be. Empire of Ash is full of snotty punk energy for instance, the frantic ‘grab the camera and shoot’ style of Nathaniel Massey’s jerky style of cinematography is incredibly overwhelming, but somehow fitting. For example, most of the shots in Empire of Ash seem to have been done by just strapping the poor cameraman to a country road speed and pointing the camera at the random stuntman running toward the camera. This gave these moments a believable danger and excitment. There are several actions that seem dangerously foolish and make one question the safety of all those involved, but my word, the viewing is simply delicious.
The same can be said for the movie’s sequel from 1989 – rather because it is the exact same movie.
Produced by Simandl and John A Curtis’ Canadian B-movie outfit, North American Pictures, Empire of Ash proved so successful that, astonishingly, the pair of them re-released it a year later as ‘Empire of Ash II’. Whether people were dupended by this ruse is unknown, but Simandl and Curtis’ non-existent ‘sequel’ did result in North American putting together a sequel properly, the equally entertaining Empire of Ash III (1989), together with British video-era maverick John Eyres. To further increase the confusion, both Empire of Ash and Empire of Ash III were released on tape in the United States by David A Prior’s Action International Pictures, who changed their names to “Maniac Warriors” and “Last of the Warriors,” correspondingly. In UK, however, we only got the first movie which was released through VHS in 1989. The movie was once again spotted in DVD bargain bins circa 2006 thanks to Manchester’s short-lived label 23 Century. Well…kinda: despite 23 Century packaging it as Empire number one, the disc’s were actually documents of Empire of Ash III.
And as a cherry on top Empire of Ash III is currently the only chapter from the Empire series that can be rented on Amazon Prime… Under the title ‘Empire of Ash 2.
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