Don’t you love it when films set in the “future” are actually in our past because time has moved on? According to Star Trek we should have had the Eugenics Wars by now…. mind you with current political events going on I’m not going to say what that became as we might be closer to that… But anyway, now we go to a film that, will have about 7 years to happen.

Demolition Man is an action movie from 1993 starting in 1996 and then jumping to 2032. I think this is the first time I’ve reviewed a Stallone movie, I would do the Rocky films, but not sci-fi, despite the robot in the 4th film, he doesn’t push it into sci-fi people, unless he was boxing the robot. Here he plays Sergeant John Spartan who some call the “Demolition Man” because there is often a lot of damage done when he does things. He is chasing down psychopath Simon Phoenix played by Wesley Snipes (who is clearly having a lot of fun in the role) and when he captures him, Phoenix claims Spartan killed the hostages resulting in him being placed in Cryo Prison alongside Phoenix. Probably one of the only issues I have with the film, is Phoenix is given a lighter sentence than Spartan… which makes no sense. Now a common complaint any properly thinking person would have about the notion of Cryo Prisons is, that it’s dumb. The person is frozen for their sentence but when the sentence is done, surely no time lasts for them. Fortunately this film addresses that in multiple ways and to this point is the only work of fiction I’ve seen handle that.

Anyway at a parole hearing for Phoenix (that once again, happened BEFORE the police officer who would have had manslaughter charges rather than the murder and kidnapping charges of Phoenix) he is somehow able to escape to the point even Phoenix doesn’t know how. And is released into the hellscape of 2032, a world so sanitized that it’s frankly comical.

Yes, part of the fun of this film is seeing things like police seeing a dangerous criminal, and consulting a computer that tells them to be polite and ask the person to just lay down, expecting that to be what happens. It’s a fun different take on a dystopia. Bright and colourful but oh so dumb.

Well as you can guess the police are unable to stop the crazed Psychopath who is somehow even more skilled than he was before, so they unfreeze the Demolition Man. And so the rematch is on between the two as Stallone butts heads with the new head of police, encounters the man who runs this new hellscape as well as encountering the people below who don’t want to follow the sanitized rules. Conspiracies revealed and the humanity of Stallone’s character is shown, all the while Wesley Snipes gets to have a lot of fun as an over the top criminal. Yeah there’s a lot to enjoy in this one.

While you expect the comedy of the sanitized world and the action of the stars, those moments of humanity from Stallone give it a surprising edge. Also Nigel Hawthorne plays the ruler of the city, so I can’t help but imagine this as a world lead by Sir Humphrey Appleby, which just brings a big smile to my face. I really like Yes Minister.

Rating: 🎞️🎞️🎞️🎞️