DEFCON-4 (1985)

Two men and a woman circle the globe in a satellite armed with a nuclear device. The third world war breaks out, and a few months later the satellite crashes. They survive the crash but one... See full summary »

Directors:

Paul Donovan, Digby Cook (as Digby C. Cook)

Writer:

Paul Donovan

Stars:

Lenore Zann, Maury Chaykin, Kate Lynch

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Lenore Zann	...	J.J.
Maury Chaykin	...	Vinny
Kate Lynch	...	Jordan
Kevin King	...	Gideon Hayes
John Walsch	...	Walker
Tim Choate	...	Howe
Jeff Pustil	...	Lacey
Donna King	...	Alice
Alan MacGillivray	...	Boomer (as Allan MacGillivray)
Florence Paterson	...	Mrs. Boyd
Karen Kennedy	...	WWN Newscaster (as Karen Kenedy)
Ken Ryan	...	Newscaster
Geoff Harrington	...	Vicious Trooper
Al Foster	...	Oldster
Hugh Orr	...	Squad Leader

Storyline

Two men and a woman circle the globe in a satellite armed with a nuclear device. The third world war breaks out, and a few months later the satellite crashes. They survive the crash but one man gets killed by survivors and the other man gets caught. The woman stays by the remains of the the satellite but is soon caught by evil punks who have taken power.

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Plot Keywords:

canadian science fiction | gagged | canuxploitation | post apocalypse | survival | 

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Taglines:

The last defense. The last hope. The battle for the future of the world has begun.

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Genres:

Action | Sci-Fi

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

Canada

Language:

English

Release Date:

15 March 1985 (USA)

Also Known As:

Condição de Defesa

Filming Locations:

Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

Box Office

Budget:

CAD1,750,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$210,904, 17 March 1985

Gross USA:

$1,057,064

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$1,057,064

Company Credits

Production Co:

New World Pictures, Salter Street Films International

Technical Specs

Runtime:

88 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

A film infamous among sci-fi fans for misleading artwork, as the painting used on the poster and video/DVD boxes bears no resemblance to anything that occurs in the actual film.

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Goofs

Although the iconic movie poster gives the title as DEF-CON 4, it actually appears in the film's credits as DEFCON-4.

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Quotes

Vinny: What kind of areolas does she have? Pink, brown, or red?

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Crazy Credits

[Prologue title after credits] It is the day after tomorrow. The ultimate nuclear defense system has been perfected. Security has been achieved. Global conflict is now unthinkable.

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Connections

Referenced in Best of the Worst: Our VHS Collection (2019)

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Soundtracks

When Johnny Comes Marching Home
(uncredited)
Lyrics by Louis Lambert (as Patrick Gilmore)
Traditional melody
Performed by Lenore Zann and Florence Paterson

User Reviews

Two Nifty B Movies In One That Got Better With Time

Let's get it out of the way first thing: The critics of the 80s like Leonard Maltin and Siskel/Ebert who sadistically maligned DEF-CON 4 as a wretched exercise in scum & sleaze were WRONG. I agree with another comment stating that this movie was unfairly dismissed at the time of original release. Yes it's tacky, low budget and amoral -- perhaps one of the most amoral movies of the Reagan years of home video rental. For that reason alone it actually stood out from the pack by actually daring to present it's viewers with exactly that which it aspired to. Unlike the Mad Max films or even the Italian ripoffs of the genre Max created, DEF-CON 4 has no presumptions about being a parable, having any kind of a message or examining some sort of social phenomenon. It is about nuclear war and the resultant breakdown of our North American collective society, and like those prospects it isn't pretty, easy to stomach or even make sense of.

In actuality there are actually two B movies in one here: A pretty taught little SNEAKERS/WARGAMES ripoff about a nuclear war triggered by "accident" after Lybians hijack a shipment of cruise missiles and shoot one into Russia. It doesn't detonate but manages to push east/west tensions to the breaking point, the Russians nuke America and the Americans retaliate. Instant global apocalypse, and a demonstration of one of the prevailing nightmares of the Cold War. This sequence of events is ingeniously staged by having the three person crew of a secret orbiting weapons platform observe the exchange and agonize over how to react. Should they launch? Should they go back to earth? Eventually their satellite's computer is hijacked by an unseen entity who prompts an impromptu landing somewhere near the coast of Canada, sparking the second of the two B movie scenarios that becomes a post apocalyptic thriller centered around a makeshift totalitarian regime dominated by the prep school brat of an Army general who recruits other brats, arms them with machine guns, and herds the surviving populace into a ramshackle town comprised mostly of junk.

One of the astronauts encounters a survivalist hilariously played over the top by veteran character actor Maury Chaykin, who steals all of his scenes with a blase attitude ("Just get in your rocket ship and fly off to Central America."), his home made converted front end loader tank contraption, and a kilt. He also has a teenage schoolgirl boarded up in his basement, the less said about which the better. His character is the only one in the film who emerges as an actual person, and when the story shifts it's emphasis away from his fate it looses that central core of interest. In any event the astronaut strikes up a deal with the survivalist for the space capsule's food supply and the female astronaut still on board, leading to their capture by the renegades and a series of bizarre scenes of social chaos that seem to have been inspired by Spaghetti Westerns.

I will admit that the film is a bit of a mish-mash, and hard to keep track of because it changes gears so quickly. At one minute it's a high tech space thriller, the next a grim survivalist tale, then social satire and finally a big, stupid shootout. But in all fairness it's only the final twenty minutes or so that loose their footing in absurdity, with the main detraction being the role of the Army brat dictator kid, who's grip on the surviving populace is never fully explained. Why are the others following his lead? Since nobody bothers to tell the audience, the kid remains a caricature rather than a character, and the final conflict between the astronaut and him remains something of a contrivance rather than a believable series of events. The ending is also annoyingly empty of any kind of meaning at all, with the movie more or less simply being over at some point. You know, whatever.

But if anything the movie has actually gotten more poignant over the decades since it's creation: We now live in a world where middle eastern fanatics do indeed shape global events & have shown themselves capable of inflicting apocalyptic events. We've also seen events like the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina where social order has completely broken down, resulting in the kind of mind boggling escapades depicted in the latter part of the film. It's no longer just an escapist nightmare/fantasy to suggest that what is being depicted in the film might actually happen, and the filmmakers should indeed be congratulated for pretty much getting the look of the apocalypse right ... though I do think that people would have found more opportunities to wash their faces & would think that ammunition for firearms would be a bit more of a rarity.

The long and short of it is that DEF-CON 4 is not the unwatchable disaster that many might have potential viewers believe. It's a grim, grimy, somewhat distasteful endeavor for sure, but then again so was the prospect nuclear combat toe to toe with the Ruskies. Don't knock the film for having more or less gotten the aspect of what that might mean correctly.

7/10