Review of Omega Doom (1996) by Green P — 09 Nov 2008

Despite it being made in 1996, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the rather naffly named "Omega Doom" was a product of ten years earlier with its post-apocalyptic cyber-gothic feel. But despite that, and a few cheesy lines here and there, I think it's a small piece of genius.

With no humans in this story of a land devastated by android wars where pockets of robots are still fighting it out amongst the ruins, the plot centres around Rutger Haur's soldier robot entering the rubble of a town where two factions of robots - one a race of female cyber-Goth assassins, and the other reminiscent of a gang of outlaws from a Western - are poised in the middle of a standoff.

Omega Doom - Haur's character - teams up with a disembodied robot head (who has several failed and incredibly slapstick attempts throughout the film to find a suitable new body and legs) and plots to break the standoff.

It's a film where, like Bladerunner and the much later I,Robot but without the laziness of the CGI effects, robots try to come to terms with and reflect upon their human-ness. Omega Doom is a small scale film shot in a small-scale environment with the bare minimum of locations, but this gives it a theatrical edge and works for it very well.

The lack of CGi means actors having to do old-fashioned "robotics" to look like androids, something that they carry off very well, and a few shards of metal make up protruding here and there with the occasional spark, is surprisingly effective to make them seem wholly non-human.

I often think that the lower-budget movies (Albert Pyun was faced with serious budget cuts while making this) carry a lot of atmosphere the big productions can't pull off as the director is forced into a closer relationship with the characters and setting to enable oit to do what he wants without being able to simply throw money at it.

Omega Doom is a great film for sci-fi B-Movie buffs or fans of early cyber-goth.