Disclaimer: Contains spoilers!
Plot Summary: A computer expert must battle wits with a wizard in a series of challenges to free his fiance from the wizard's clutches.
Review: You know, maybe I have seen this film before; a lot of the scenes felt vaguely familiar, and I have watched like a million movies at this point so there's that to consider. Anyway, like the others among this marathon, there are a bunch of alternate titles to this film so figure that shit out. As for the story, it's not quite how you'd imagine. You would think it's probably like a cheesy game of "Dungeons and Dragons" come to life, but it plays out more like an anthology tale. Each segment has different crews working on them, and everything is pulled together through, mostly, shoddy editing. I understand why they went for this approach, but, at the end of the day, it appears more like a means to pad out the endless opening and closing credits. If you take away the credits we are looking at an hour long movie. Seriously, come the fuck on. The cheesiness is high, and entertaining to boot, but it's not as enjoyable as "The Outing."
You know the story is going to be corny as hell right when you meet the main character, Paul. Being some kind of badass computer programmer, Paul has magically created an A.I. called "X-CaliBR8" that can do pretty much anything. Let's put it this way, this computer can do anything Google, Microsoft, and Apple are doing now except all Paul has to do is verbally say what he wants. Computers really could do whatever a writer wanted them to do in the '80s. Paul also has created a DBZ scouter out of his glasses or something. What, no "it's over 9000!!!" jokes? Paul has a girlfriend, named Gwen, whom he proposes to just as this wizard-ish guy, named Mestema, transports them to a different dimension. Mestema is played by Richard Moll so you know that performance is going to be as over the top as possible. Honestly, I have no idea why any of this is happening except that Mestema confuses technology with magic and sees Paul as a worthy adversary to amuse his immortal boredom. There's something about Mestema being the devil, but I don't know what they're talking about.
Mestema challenges Paul to a series of obstacles in order to free Gwen, but it's okay since he gets to keep his magic computer to help. This is where the different segments come into play as Paul is teleported to different scenarios he must overcome. They squander this opportunity, however, since they spend mere minutes in some of the challenges. Considering that ridiculously short running time, you would think they would utilize their time better but nope. Despite this, a few of the things Paul must battle are interesting and somewhat creative; others are plain stupid and nonsensical. For example, Paul fights a giant statue that comes to life through stop motion animation; it looks cheap, but I appreciate the gesture and imagination. On the other hand, one of the longest segments involves Paul running around an '80s city trying to stop a serial killer; that does not mesh well with the D&D imagery. After the sixth challenge (at least I think it was 6), Paul finally loses and Mestema appears to have won, but Paul challenges Mestema to a one on one brawl without any assistance from magic. As you may predict, the fight is super lame and Paul wins through shenanigans. He and Gwen are sent back to the real world, and that's pretty much the end. Uh, was this meant to be a TV show pilot or something? What the hell?!
Overall, this is along the same cheesy lines as "The Outing" except it lacks the charm and has a slew of problems "The Outing" avoided. This isn't to say the film is bad, but it had a lot of potential that was not capitalized on for the most part. I really loved the gauntlet style of obstacles to overcome, but they should have kept them within the D&D theme rather than branching out all over the place. There were random bouts of nudity as well which was odd to me considering this movie was allegedly PG-13; I know the rating was new at this time but really? All bullshit aside, this would have made for a better TV show special or whatever. I can't quite place my finger on it, but something is surely amiss in this production that stops it from being memorable. I'd say it's just barely worth a view but could have been awesome if the vision, I imagine they had, was fully realized.
Notable Moment: When Paul delivers the infamous, "I reject your reality and substitute my own," line.
Final Rating: 5/10
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