Trancers (1984/1985)
B-movie maestro Charles Band directs this low-budget sci-fi blending of Blade Runner, The Terminator, James Bond flicks, the John D. MacDonald novel “The Girl, the Gold Watch, and Everything” (which had been adapted into a couple of TV movies in the early 1980s), and hardboiled film noir classics with its own campy flair. We start the film off in the neon-tinged year of 2247, where we find much of old Los Angeles (the remnants called “Angel City” in the future) submerged by the ocean after the “Great Quake”. In what’s left, law enforcement officers called “Troopers”, like Jack Deth (Tim Thomerson), are taking down (referred to as “singeing”)”trancers”, which are weak-minded people (dubbed “squids”) who can easily come under the hypnotic, homicidal zombie-like spell (“not quite alive, not dead enough”) of nefarious Charles Manson-esque cult leader Martin Whistler, who Deth sees as responsible for the murder of his wife. Deth thinks he has taken down Whistler once and for all, only to learn that the telepathic supervillain is still alive, but has avoided Deth (and death) by traveling back in time to Los Angeles in late 1985 with something called “time serum”, where one can go back through time by their conscience into the body of another person (a la “Quantum Leap”, which this predates) in their direct family lineage of the past.
There and then, Whistler hopes to terminate the ancestors of the three-person “High Council of the Western Territories” members who took him down in 2247. Jack Deth always gets his man, so he too goes back in time to stop Whistler once and for all, inhabiting his consciousness into one of his own ancestors, a sleazeball journalist named Philip Dethton, who happens to be a dead ringer. Along with Phil’s young girlfriend Leena (Helen Hunt), Deth is going to be crafty to take down his target, as Whistler is inhabiting the body of his own ancestor, who happens to be an LAPD detective, and has already channeled a number of “trancers” to his cause to protect him as he tries to take down the last Council member’s ancestor, a down-and-out, alcoholic ex-pro baseball pitcher currently living on Skid Row (Biff Manard).
The makers of Trancers (which is known in some parts of the world more generically as Future Cop) proceeded to film with a budget of about $400,000 and made the best of it, with modest but effective retro-futuristic visual effects, and a solid collection of character actors to bring personality. A former stand-up comedian who studied acting, Tim Thomerson makes for a charismatic tough-guy lead, offering up that quirky mix of pulp-detective self-seriousness amid the absurd and eerie surroundings that are the makings of campy fun. Fish-out-of-water gags are kept to a minimum (he doesn’t know how to pronounce Cahuenga Boulevard, for instance, but very few non-Los Angelinos would in the modern day), offering up just what the story needs to progress forward without needless gags, with the entire story clocking it at a very economical 76 minutes. Helen Hunt makes for a spirited sidekick, energetic and enthusiastic, in the requisite vapid Southern California way, in good contrast to the more taciturn and gruff Jack Deth. Reportedly, Bette Davis was sought after to play one of the members of the High Council, Chairman Ashe, but the role would eventually go to Anne Seymour. Seymour, whose own part was pared down considerably during the shoot because her memory was so spotty that she had trouble remembering what she was supposed to say for very long.
Trancers does a pretty good job of encapsulating the stereotypes we might associate with the mid-1980s we might envision today, though in real time. Punk rock, tanning salons, the fitness craze, wild fashion, big hair, and all the rest are put into the mix, making it a movie experience that helps it stand up remarkably well today, especially with the added flavor of nostalgia to draw in those who enjoy the era. The only headaches you might get is if you try taking any of what you’re seeing either seriously or logically. Time travel flocks are almost always headache-inducing if you try to piece the timelines and events together, and Trancers is not a film that’s made by people who care to hash out their reasoning, preferring to keep the story moving to the fun part without the interest in ensuring it makes sense. Even the time-slowing watch that turns one second into ten for the wearer (essentially, allowing the possessor of the watch to move normally while the world around them goes very slowly) last not ten seconds but sometimes half a minute to nearly two minutes, as if it knows how long the task will take and adjusts accordingly.
Despite its budget, Trancers did not have success at the box office, reportedly due to a bad distribution deal that made it difficult to find screenings outside of the Los Angeles area. It fared much better on home video, where it quickly found an audience among genre aficionados, and its rentals and sales would eventually propel interest in creating a 24-minute short film called, Trancers: City of Lost Angels in 1988, which was intended as one of a three-part film anthology from Full Moon Pictures called Pulse Pounders, but Empire International Pictures would go bankrupt shortly after it was produced. Long thought lost, a workprint of the film was found in 2011 and remastered. It was not officially available until 2013, where it was available on Full Moon’s streaming channel, and also appears as an extra feature on a DVD re-release of Trancers.
Nevertheless, the relative popularity of the first film resulted in the release of Trancers II in 1991, followed by three additional straight-to-video sequels featuring Thomerson in the early-to-mid 1990s, with a Thomerson-less follow-up (a Jack Deth body double was used behind some archival footage of the actual Thomerson) in 2002 called Trancers 6 that was not nearly as well-received.
Many consider Trancers to be the best film that Charles Band would ever direct, and it has a relatively small but loyal following that finds it infinitely rewatchable for a short but very entertaining goofy b-movie fix. Here’s another reason to go back to 1985 yourself.
Qwipster’s rating: B+
MPAA Rated: PG-13 for violence, disturbing images, and language
Running Time: 76 min.
Cast: Tim Thomerson, Helen Hunt, Michael Stefani, Art LaFleur, Telma Hopkins, Richard Herd, Anne Seymour, Biff Manard
Director: Charles Band
Screenplay: Danny Bilson, Paul De Meo