After a devastating nuclear war most of the land has become contaminated by radioactive fallout. Only several scattered patches of land known as "survival zones" remain untainted. Rugged, hard-working farmer Ben Faber (forcefully essayed by dour, husky, pudgy-faced "2001: A Space Odysey" star Gary Lockwood) resides on one such area with his gutsy wife Lucy (lovely Camilla Spav), willful teenage daughter Rachel (comely brunette knockout Zoli Marki), adoring son, and feisty old buddy Uncle Luke. The Faber's peaceful existence gets jeopardized when a vicious horde of scummy, black leather-clad cannibalistic bikers led by the highly intimidating and intelligent Bigman (coolly underplayed by big, brawny, hirsute George Eastman lookalike Ian Steadman) stop by and lay siege to their house. Fortunately, nice guy itinerant loner Adam Strong (a likable turn by handsome, muscular Morgan Stevens) comes to the Fabers' aid.The shopworn premise, basically just another rough'n'tumble post-nuke survivalist take on a classic Western movie scenario (the Fabers are clearly patterned after early settlers, with Strong as a heroic roving troubleshooter type and the bikers substituting for marauding Native Americans), doesn't promise much, but luckily the uniformly sound performances, unusually complex, well-drawn and even plausibly human characters, a welcome element of genuine humanity, Percival Rubens and Eric Brown's smart, surprisingly thoughtful and introspective script, a few unsettling oddball touches (Bigman has a severed doll's head affixed to the top of his motorcycle helmet), Rubens' capable direction, a sturdy theme which addresses how a man ought to fight for what's his and stand up for what he believes in (Ben refuses just to let the bikers destroy his farm without putting up a fight), an unsparingly harsh and savage tone (early in the picture the bikers raid a missionary and murder a bunch of nuns!), and shocking outbursts of raw, brutal violence lift this one well out of the rut. Vincent Cox and Colin Taylor's spare, stripped-down cinematography, shot on gritty film stock, gives the film a convincingly scrappy look. Only the somewhat sluggish pace and Nic Labuschagne's slushy, obtrusively overwrought score detract from this otherwise satisfyingly tense and gripping winner.

And with those words, our ubiquitous couple walk off into the sunset together, having just survived a spade/knife fight and an attempt on their lives with a land rover. Warms the cockles doesn't it? Except in this film it doesn't. You'll have been too busy laughing at one of the most hilarious decapitations ever seen on film and wondering what the hell happened to the little boy who vanished from the cast twenty minutes ago with no explanation. Not to mention the strange case of the American dad who has a South African accented wife and daughter, but a USA sounding son. And then there's the..But I digress, let's get to the plot.. for what it is. Another nuclear bomb, another bunch of mutated survivors on motorbikes, and yep, you guessed it.. plenty of leather and shades to go around. They are led by the typical bearded bloke with a rasping voice and a toy doll's head on his helmet(?) We knows he's in charge because he has the word BIGMAN engraved on the back of his jacket. During the opening, him and his crew of ruffians ransack a nunnery. (Oh the beasts!!) Turns out they're cannibals who roam around munching their way through the survivors of the holocaust. But have they met their match when they try to take over a farm presided over by a resourceful farmer and his feisty family? Let battle commence!! All thumbs and no fingers sums up this little flick. Every single scene seems to be have been handled in the most clumsy way imaginable, so you get random camera angles and abrupt sudden cuts galore. You know from the budget that the acting isn't going to be the best and the dialogue won't win the screenwriter any Oscars, but it would be nice to have a few surprises along the way. Nothing in this film is anything less than predictable, from who will be the first to die (always the old guy) to the fact that the stereotypical young blonde hero who arrives on the scene in the middle will be the one to save the day. From a purely artistic point of view I've seen much worse even in the last month, but why waste time on this when there are so many other superior movies out there calling for your attention? In fact, some of them are probably on television right now. Go and take a look.. 3/10

This like it's going to be a good slasher at the beginning, when in the second scene, Bigman defeats another bikie in a jousting match with chains, then soon after another of his gang punches a nun to death, but it goes very quiet after that and never picks up.

This movie is not too shabby. The scenery is magnificent. Zoli Marki turns in another one of her brilliant, brown-eyed performances (she could have been the South African Lara Flynn Boyle). The rest of the cast is okay, but as things go with these "international" productions you can't pay too close attention to the accents (you might ask why, for instance, is the dad American, the mother English, and the two children South African). The main villain looks like a lost member of the Village People and wears a tight leather outfit with "Big Man" spelled out in studs across his back. As in THE DEMON (another film made by the same director and crew), the blood is orange.