This film has a crew making a movie in a abandoned prison. The problem is one of the prisoners is still there and he is angry.This had Lyle Alzado playing the psycho. This guy was awesome but his career got cut short when just four years after making this he died of brain cancer. The whole concept of the film is cheesy but you still watch all the mayhem. One scene has Lyle chasing someone with a jackhammer which is the scene depicted on the cover. They don't show how much air hose he has or explain even why a working jackhammer would be left at the prison but it doesn't matter. He also likes to eat hair (maybe the person still had that Body On Tap shampoo that was enriched with beer). Overall he played a good nut job. Playing the director was Anthony Perkins who was always whining and grabbing his head. His best scene was when he sizzled and popped on the electric chair.A fun little film. Put your mind in neutral and enjoy.

Ivan Moser (Alzado) is an evil rapist/murderer who is in prison and about to receive the death penalty by electric chair. The authorities start the proceedings, but then a prison riot breaks out, diverting their attention. They assumed they fried Moser...but they were wrong! Meanwhile, a movie company begins shooting a film in the abandoned prison where Moser was. Seems like a smart idea. The movie is called "Death House Dolls" and is a women-in-prison flick. Edwards (Perkins) is the forever-frustrated director, and David Harris (Rohner) is the screenwriter and ideal 80's coolguy. His girlfriend Susan Malone (Foreman) is also working on the film. Harris wants to capture the utter realism of the prison experience, despite the fact that he's working on what seems to be a lightweight exploitation film, so he ends up butting heads with Warden Karsh (Mahoney) who was there on the night of the riot. But Harris also ends up getting some good info from local chef Fingers (Kristin). Will Moser, who has been presumably living at the prison for the past 18 months, we know not how or why, end up killing everyone in sight? When we saw the VHS box cover for Destroyer, with a hulking, oiled-up Alzado brandishing a giant drill of some sort, we thought "how can we lose?" - maybe it's our frame of mind, or maybe it's due to lack of research on our part, but we thought Destroyer was an action movie. Hopefully one where Alzado "Destroys" the baddies. Not such a bad assumption, but an incorrect one. Destroyer instead is a dreary, inane slasher with problems as seemingly endless as the vast corridors a lot of the movie takes place in. What the movie has going for it are its individual characters. Alzado was great as the psycho killer who's usually shirtless, Jim Turner is noteworthy as the techie on the film named Rewire, and David Kristin steals the movie as Fingers. The warden, the janitor Russell (Anderson), the young couple portrayed by Rohner and Foreman - who previously were together in April Fool's Day (1986) - a far more entertaining horror film - together, pretty much any of the individual personages were good, it's just that the writing and structure of the movie were slow, bleak, and not up to par. And nothing is worse than when they try to be funny. We blame the writers and director, not the actors.The movie also falls into the typical trap of making the warden supposedly unlikable because he's an authority figure, but the screenwriter dude supposedly sympathetic because he's so cool and the warden's not. Rohner, who has kind of a Johnny Depp meets Charlie Sheen kind of vibe, does indeed have awesome hair (there's even a fairly substantial scene where he's washing his hair) - but we were rooting for the warden. There's also a pretty surprising lack of Alzado - like a lot of movie monsters, you don't see a lot of him until the end of the movie. There should have been less Anthony Perkins directing the movie-within-a-movie and more Alzado on a rampage. While Deborah Foreman never looked closer to Belinda Carlisle than she does here, Alzado was never closer to John Matuszak than he is here. They have similar builds and facial hair. Maybe it's a football thing.As for the boxcover that so entranced us, it can proudly go into the "we pasted the main star's head on someone else's body and hoped no one would notice" file. As for the movie itself, it's not action, and it's not very horrifying. The individual characters are good, and there maybe a few decent lines here and there, but it's unlikely too many people will come away very satisfied from Destroyer.

"Destroyer" is a low-budget 1988 horror film, with slight touches of comedy here and there. It stars ex-football player Lyle Alzado (R.I.P -- never been a huge football fan), 80s actress icon Deborah Foreman, and Norman Bates himself, Anthony Perkins. It sort of plays off of the ideas of late 80s supernatural thrillers, which involved supernatural revenge. (Much like "Shocker", "Prison", and "The Horror Show.") In this case, our killer is not necessarily supernatural, he is more pumped up. It's a fun movie. Yes, it has its issues, it is not perfect, but it still makes for a fun watch when you need to take your mind off of things. Lyle Alzado does a GREAT job for his original profession at being an NFL lineman. He is incredibly scary and ruthless in scenes, and....we'll just say you wouldn't want him chasing you. Deborah Foreman & Clayton Rohner do a solid job as our main hero & heroine, acting-wise.Problems with the movie: I think Lyle Alzado could have been incorporated more into the movie, and when he was there, in a more violent, destructive way. In the movie, he kills people with mundane tools. A jackhammer, blow torch, hanging, and off screen decapitation. Nothing that would involve super-human strength as the poster and plot suggest. I also think certain characters should have had more screen time, AND more actions and events they performed. (Including Anthony Perkins, who is fun as the sarcastic director, but his scenes are limited. Rewire, the comic relief, is also someone who should have had more screen time.) Overall, without spoiling anything; "Destroyer" is a fun watch if you like low-budget movies and movies that are fun. It has issues, and it is not to be dissected. Just watch it for fun, take it for what it was made on, it's a fun time.7/10

This movie is worth watching (and buying) for one reason: Lyle Alzado!! Of course he plays a maniacal killer-who would expect otherwise? One of his best lines: Girl about to be killed-"Why?" Alzado (with a confused, quizzical look)-"Why not?" Another great scene is when Alzado clothes-lines the guy off his motorcycle, smashing the windscreen for effect! Classic! OK it's not fine cinema, but it is entertaining and interesting if you are an Oakland Raiders fan. Compare to John Matuszak in North Dallas Forty, Caveman, and Weird Science. Too bad those two never worked together on film, they could've provided some over-the-top bad guy scenes in plenty of B action flicks.