GROUND RULES (1997)

(Additional review material provided by my Dad, who wandered in and was so entranced by this film’s awfulness, he couldn’t leave)

Welcome to the year 1997. Hong Kong will revert to China, TITANIC will rule the box office, and in California, there will be Guys On Dirt Bikes With Metal TracBall Claws Trying To Throw A Metal Sphere Into A Hole On The Back Of A Speeding Dune Buggy While A Bunch Of Schmoes Watch It Live On Closed-Circuit TV In Shitty Strip Mall Sports Bars-Ball, or Battle Ball for short.

Thus explains the game in GROUND RULES, a film by Patrick G. Donahue, creator of the goofy action classic KILL SQUAD (1982). This mess stars Sean Donahue (Pat’s son), the ever badass Frank Stallone and forever creepy Richard Lynch. The sport is called Battle Ball but every one in the film just refers to it as “the game” most of the time.

It’s probably just as well since calling it Battle Ball constantly would only make the movie more stupid than it actually is. Stupid is not a bad thing. With the no-budget and general lack of any original ideas (it took four people to write the script), stupid is all this movie has to propel it along.

Within the first few minutes, we have plenty of motocross action, a dune buggy flipping every time someone scores a point by lobbing the ball in the hole on the back of it, terrible crowd reaction shots and porn star extras picking up extra scratch by walking around taking book from horny, drunk non-actors. Did I mention the guy who fights back against some goombahs (their boss, Case (Lynch), wants to take over the dude’s bar) by grabbing a hockey stick, jumping on his desk, then slipping on his desk calendar, making him fall backward off the desk and into his chair, which proceeds to roll right out the window and onto the hoods’ car below?

Stupid is all this movie has and it knows it. Jack, (Sean Donahue) wants to ride in “the game” so bad, he’s a mechanic for bad guy Case’s team, where he’s bullied by dirty rider Rick (Frank Stallone). He applies to ride with a team run by Blue, an old drunk guy resembling Joe Eszterhas, who owns a shitty sports bar in a strip mall. When Rick takes out Blue’s best rider, Matt, during a game and renders him a paraplegic vegetable, Jack is in. From there he makes it his mission to bring Rick and Case down “because they’re ruining the game.”.

There’s a terrible subplot involving a U.S. senator involved with Case that doesn’t make sense, a horrible love interest Jack never kisses until the end (they always hug, whichprompted my dad to ask, “Why doesn’t he kiss her or fuck her or something?”) and some of the worst acting I’ve ever seen. Ever. And I’ve seen a lot.

That said, there’s some pretty good stunts including a car jumping another car and shearing the top off, a couple of people run over and bounced across the hood, roof and trunk and the same Battle Ball race repeated over and over. Now when anything gets too boring during the race, Donahue cuts to consumer video cameras that are placed around the track that miraculously shoot 35mm film which gets broadcast to the bars. There seems to be only two bars that cater to Battle Ball, which I find hardly appealing enough to corrupt a U.S. senator (as well as bring him down in one of the worst sub plot wrap-ups I’ve ever seen), much less provide a steady stream of revenue that requires killing folks. To be fair, it’s implied that the crooks have muscled a lot of other people out of their bars. They just didn’t have enough money to show it.

Poor Richard Lynch is a long way from INVASION USA, playing a germaphobe gangster in a white suit. Frank Stallone looks right at home as the bad boy biker and Sean Donahue…well, he should stick to professional stunt work. Cue cards have more presence.

The best part of GROUND RULES was near the end when Richard Lynch is dragging Donahue behind an S.U.V. while the love interest Sharon is running behind them yelling “Jack, I love you!” My dad turns to me and says, “They sure didn’t have no money for this thing, did they?” They probably could have used more talent then money, Pops.

By the way, the print I saw optically fogs out the scene where the paraplegic vegetable gives the finger. I thought you should know.