| Tank Girl | |
|---|---|
Theatrical release poster |
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| Directed by | Rachel Talalay |
| Produced by | Tom Astor |
| Screenplay by | Tedi Sarafian |
| Based on | Tank Girl by Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett |
| Starring | Lori Petty Ice-T Naomi Watts Malcolm McDowell |
| Music by | Graeme Revell |
| Cinematography | Gale Tattersall |
| Editing by | James R. Symons |
| Studio | Trilogy Entertainment Group |
| Distributed by | United Artists |
| Release date(s) | April 7, 1995 |
| Running time | 104 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $25 million |
| Box office | $4,064,495 |
Tank Girl is a 1995 science fiction action film loosely based on the Tank Girl comic book created by Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett. It was directed by Rachel Talalay and stars Lori Petty as Rebecca Buck, aka the eponymous Tank Girl, who had originally appeared in the UK comic magazine Deadline.
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The film takes place in a dystopian 2033, after a comet has hit the Earth, altering the climate and turning it into a wasteland. There has been no rain for over 11 years. Water is extremely scarce, and what little is available is controlled by the Water & Power (W&P), led by Kesslee (Malcolm McDowell). Water & Power are opposed by the almost mythical "Rippers," a mysterious group that no one can find. Tank Girl, a.k.a. Rebecca (Lori Petty), is a member of a small outlaw group that has set up their own water well in the basement of a house. Learning of the well, W&P attacks, killing most in the house and taking Rebecca and a young girl named Sam. Imprisoned, Rebecca is repeatedly brutalized by Kesslee, who wants to break her spirit. Between intellectual jousts with Kesslee, Rebecca befriends her neighbor cellmate, a mechanic who works on W&P's vehicles.
W&P takes Rebecca to the desert, where they have found a Ripper "subgate," an entrance to their underground lairs. Kesslee has his right-hand man, Sergeant Small (Don Harvey), inject Rebecca with a tracking device and then forces her walk onto the subgate; if the Rippers kill her, no big deal, but if they don't, their location would soon be known. However, while she walks into the subgate, the Rippers attack, massacring the W&P soldiers and mortally wounding Kesslee (Keslee is later reconstructed as a cyborg and remains in control of W&P). Rebecca and her fellow fugitive (Naomi Watts) steal a tank and jet, becoming Tank Girl and Jet Girl. They head out to rescue Sam, who has been sent to a brothel. Along the way, they find another "outlaw", who allows them to use her workshop to disguise their W&P vehicles. Tank Girl and Jet Girl reach the city Liquid Silver where Sam is being held. They rescue Sam, but are discovered sneaking her out. The owner of the club known as "The Madam" attempts to stop them, but TG and JG take her hostage and force her to sing "Let's Do It, Let's Fall in Love" for the club. The song becomes a musical scene, but it is cut short by W&P. They take Sam, leaving TG and JG to rescue her once more.
Tank Girl and Jet Girl are determined to get the Rippers help for their next rescue attempt. After wandering the desert, they discover the Ripper hideout, a buried bowling alley. The Rippers turn out to be genetically enhanced super-soldiers, infused with kangaroo DNA, created by a scientist named Johnny Prophet. Prophet was ordered to destroy the Rippers, but he spared their lives. The Rippers' main objective is to take down W&P because they believe everybody should have water. Tank Girl befriends and develops a romantic relationship with a slightly dim-witted Ripper named Booga (Kober), while the Ripper Donner is attracted to Jet Girl. The two girls are promised membership in the Ripper society after they complete a task. Tank Girl and Jet Girl go to a W&P factory where they trick W&P employees into thinking they are photographers putting together a "Men of Water and Power" calendar. They pose the men around a bunch of crates photographing them and immediately sending the pictures back to the Rippers' hideout. Figuring out crates are filled with guns, Tank Girl and Jet Girl are told to bring the cargo back to the Rippers. Once the guns are back at the Ripper hideout, the Rippers open the crates, planning to destroy the guns. But they discover most of the crates are filled with dirt, with one holding the corpse of their beloved creator, Johnny Prophet.
Enraged, the Rippers agree to assist Tank Girl and Jet Girl in their mission to rescue Sam and bring down W&P. Breaking into groups, Tank Girl assaults by land while the Rippers and JG infiltrate the hangar bay by air. They reunite briefly and during a shootout, one of the Rippers is killed, enraging the others and sending them on a killing spree of W&P personnel. Jet Girl goes after Sgt. Small, who tries to escape in a plane. She finishes him off while Tank Girl confronts Kesslee, who has put Sam in "The Pipe", a tube that gets narrower near the bottom, trapping the victim inside. He also slowly fills the tube with water to drown her slowly. Tank Girl and Kesslee battle, but she discovers his new cybernetic body. A few rounds of beer fired from her tank slows him down, plus a large amount of water dumped from above disables his gears; she finishes him off with a sharp needle that pulls all of the water from a victim's body.
After rescuing Sam, the group reunites in an animated epilogue. As Tank Girl drives a water-skiing Booga to the edge of a waterfall, she tells Jet Girl to shut up when attempting to warn her of the danger, and both Ripper and woman happily plummet off the edge as the film freezes and the credits roll.
Rachel Talalay, longtime producer of John Waters, had fallen in love with the comic after receiving an issue for Christmas one year from her stepdaughter, and set out to make "the ultimate grrrrl movie."[1] Although the resulting film has a considerable cult following along with the far more widely acclaimed comics, Talalay has complained that the studio interfered significantly in the story, screenplay and feel of the movie.[2][3][4]
The Rippers were also changed in the movie from a group of ordinary (albeit talking and a bit mutated) kangaroos to a new race of genetically-modified supersoldiers with spliced kangaroo DNA. The makeup effects were created by Stan Winston's studio, who reportedly loved the project so much that they cut their prices in half.[5][6]
The film received mixed to negative reviews from critics and had disappointing sales at the box office. It only grossed $4 million on a $25 million budget.[7] The film holds a 42% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 33 reviews (14 positive, 19 negative).[8]
Roger Ebert gave the film 2 out of 4 stars. While praising the film's ambition, he stated the film's manic energy wore him down: "Whatever the faults of "Tank Girl," lack of ambition is not one of them. Here is a movie that dives into the bag of filmmaking tricks and chooses all of them. Trying to re-create the multimedia effect of the comic books it's based on, the film employs live action, animation, montages of still graphics, animatronic makeup, prosthetics, song-and-dance routines, scale models, fake backdrops, holography, title cards, matte drawings, and computerized special effects. All I really missed were 3-D and Smell-O-Vision."[9]
In the wake of poor box office gross, Deadline collapsed, having apparently taken huge gambles on Tank Girl. Alan Martin and Jamie Hewlett have since spoken poorly of their experiences in creating the film, calling it "a bit of a sore point" for them.[10] Hewlett said, "The script was lousy; me and Alan kept rewriting it and putting Grange Hill jokes and Benny Hill jokes in, and they obviously weren't getting it. They forgot to film about ten major scenes so we had to animate them ... it was a horrible experience."[11]
| Tank Girl Original Soundtrack | |
|---|---|
| Soundtrack album by various artists | |
| Released | March 28, 1995 |
| Genre | Alternative rock |
| Label | Warner Bros./Elektra |
| Professional reviews | |
The music consultant who assembled the soundtrack for the film was Courtney Love.[12] Talalay originally wanted Elvis Costello to do the cover version of "Let's Do It, Let's Fall in Love", but he declined, and the song was instead performed as a duet by Joan Jett and Paul Westerberg of The Replacements. Devo recorded a new version of their song "Girl U Want" specifically for the film.
The soundtrack album was released on March 28, 1995 on Warner Bros./Elektra Records.
The comics themselves, in keeping with their experimental and often metafictional nature, commonly featured "soundtrack suggestions", like The Vaselines, Senseless Things, and The Pastels.
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