Fortress (1992)

The movie has it all blood and gore, romance, and a lot of butt kicking action. I like this movie because it not only has a great story line but also stars one of my favorite actors (Christopher Lambert). Fortress is a must-see movie.

Fmovies: Fortress is a very underrated sic-fi/action movie made in the early nineties by Stuart Gordon (the maker of re-animator/from beyond/dagon). The story is your standard prison movie formula, only it's set in the future.

The best thing about this film is the suspense of the action sequences. There were several scenes in the movie that literally had me talking to the TV. Nice performances by Jeffery Combs(as a very amusing computer geek type)and Christopher Lambert are a big plus. Kurtwood smith is also great as the prison director.

At the time it was released I was impressed with this film and over time my affection for it has grown (it continues to entertain even after seeing it several times). The main flaws would be the predictability of the plot and some cliché characters, but it's all handled so well that it doesn't really hurt the movie.

It's a good popcorn action movie, and one of my favorite Stuart Gordon Films. In my opinion, this is probably Gordons Second best film, after re-animator.

2017, a dystopian future, and US Army officer John Henry Brennick (Christopher Lambert) and his wife Karen S. Brennick (Loryn Locklin) are expecting a second child. Strict one-child policies forbid any couples having a second child, but the Brennick's first child died at birth so they attempt to get away with a second pregnancy. They are caught trying to cross the border and sent to a maximum security prison that is owned and run by the "MenTel Corporation" A place where dreams are not your own and all thoughts of escape are dealt with severely by futuristic methods unheard of in the civilised world.

You got Connor MacLeod, Herbert West, Clarence J. Boddicker and one of the finest female bottoms in cinema, all crammed into one riotous, hokey and immeasurably fun movie. It probably wont come as much of a surprise to anyone to learn that this Christopher Lambert starrer is not going to have you scratching the cranial matter and pondering the future of mankind. But it does have some interesting ideas both in terms of its prison setting and in the technological advancements used. I mean hey, would you try to escape if you had an intestinal bomb set to go off outside the perimeters? {think The Running Man's neck braces but in your belly}. It can also be said of Fortress that it's not over ambitious, where director Stuart Gordon is aware of his restraints and keeps it simple but sparky, of which this is aided by Lambert buffing up and throwing punches left right and off kilter. Tho nothing much as an actor, Lambert none the less gives the likes of Sly and Arnie a run for their money here and looks every inch and sinew an action hero.

Kurtwood Smith, Jeffrey Combs, Lincoln Kilpatrick, Clifton Collins Jr. and of course,Loryn Locklin's bottom, all add varying degrees of fun and frolics to the occasion. While the set design for the interiors is really rather snazzy. It's B movie berserker time folks, a dystopian world where Christopher Lambert can beat the crap out of blokes twice his size, where half humanoids have flame throwers for arms, and Kurtwood Smith is in charge of a prison. Great fun really, truly. 7/10

Fortress fmovies. I'll get this out of the way first: the budget of this film isn't fantastic. Nearly all of the action takes place in the titular Fortress, which consists of a handful of sets used two or three times over. There is also a truly awful make up job - a 'tattoo' that more resembles an enthusiastic black marker.

That aside...

Despite said bad make up, Fortress features some extremely good practical effects. While avoiding spoilers, some very messy deaths are involved with characters being literally blown apart. These look frankly fantastic, especially (as I'm sure you've heard from every other critic ever) compared to CGI deaths in PG-13 films today. There's something visceral and authentic about them...the idea that what you're seeing is really happening.

And despite being restricted to one location, Fortress certainly makes the most of what it has. The Fortress is very well designed, packed with containment systems that the protagonist turns against it. Granted, there is some silliness involved - apparently, there is only one non-lethal way to subdue prisoners, and after that it's straight on to 'blow-to-bits'. But -and this is important- all of it is for a reason. You don't get the sense that something is there just to facilitate someone using it to escape, and indeed the design appears to be based on a real-life idea from Britain - the Panopticon, emphasising prisoners' fear of being watched more than actual effort spent watching them.

Characters, then. Honestly, Christopher Lambert's acting is the worst part of the film. In fact, I get the impression that a certain sequence was made just for him, since all he needs to do is zone out for a few hours. It's as if his batteries ran out one day, but the crew had to keep filming so they quickly wrote in an in-story excuse. His character isn't that interesting either - ex-army, highly decorated, a typical 90s interchangeable backstory with little impact on the plot. However, this is more than made up for by the antagonist, Prison Director Poe.

Unlike normal villains of the genre, Poe isn't a cartoon character given form - indeed, Kurtwood Smith is rather subdued even by normal villain standards, contrasting with his earlier role as Clarence Boddicker. And also unlike Boddicker, Poe's actually a fairly interesting character - though an aloof, even sadistic Warden, we do see what little personal life he has, and are continually reminded in his scenes that he's still a person - he has tastes, even loves, and by the end of the film it's not even clear whether he's the real bad guy. The rest of the supporting cast do an okay job - I can't think of a stand out performance though everyone does their jobs well. Honourable mention goes to the writers and the director for giving a female character many good action scenes and half of a subplot, even when it would have been incredibly easy to neglect her as post-victory booty.

The setting, I should mention, has a very nice atmosphere. Too many films forget that these days, instead going for a more realistic, bland appearance - comparing the first and second of Nolan's Batman trilogy shows it blatantly. Fortress has a dark, smoky look, which helps greatly both to maintain an oppressive, cyberpunk feel, and hide bad FX which is a nice bonus.

This isn't a 'bad but fun film' in my opinion, though some may see it that way. It has that look, sure, and if the creators had cast Arnie in the role th

Well, here we have another brilliant Christopher Lambert movie but once again it's very underrated. Lambert stars as John Brennick he is an innocent prisoner in a futuristic high-tech prison trying to escape with his wife, there's lots of special effects and blood and guts in this fantastic film. The acting is very good, even though I haven't heard of them apart from Lambert. If you've seen "Lock-Up" starring Stallone, you'll love this!

Overall a brilliant and very entertaining movie, with some surprises in it. My advice is to see this movie, it's good!

Jonathan Horner.

Its about a totalitarian society where people only have one chance at having a kid. They have this futuristic super max, with these ingestible detectors, and a computer mainframe warden. This film is great, watch for the scene with the d day computer virus, it is a classic. The character development, and acting is decent. Worth renting, I love this film.