Cyberpunk Review » Nemesis

February 1, 2006

Nemesis

Year: 1993

Directed by: Albert Pyun

Written by: Rebecca Charles

IMDB Reference

Degree of Cyberpunk Visuals: Medium

Correlation to Cyberpunk Themes: Medium

Key Cast Members:

  • Alex: Olivier Gruner
  • Farnsworth: Tim Thomerson
  • Angie-Liv: Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa
Rating: 5 out of 10

 


DVD Cover

~86.5% is still human~

 

Overview: Surprise surprise - another movie with Gruner playing a cyborg - this time by Martial Arts cyborg master, Albert Pyun. Like Gruner’s performance in Automatic (1994), Nemesis is also a decent “B” cyberpunk flick. In Nemesis, Gruner does his Robocop impersonation while trying to fight bad guys in the year 2027. In a well done style over substance movie, we get a nice underground war between cyborgs and humans. Throw in a good bit of Escape from New York and Blade Runner knock-off visuals and you have yourself an evening of trashy fun! Again, nothing new here, but the action is actually done well enough that you might want to give it a watch if you’re hankerin for mindless but fun Robocop knockoffs.

 

This post has been filed under Dystopic Future Movies, Man-machine Interface, 5 Star Rated Movies, B Cyberpunk Cinema, Cyberpunk movies from 1990 - 1999 by SFAM.

Comments

August 3, 2006

Hugo said:

Isn’t there something like four sequels to this? I saw the first back in the days of VHS (back in the day, when men rode pteradactyls to and fro and women wore leopard skin bikinis…:P) but seem to remember there being a handful of sequels…

SFAM said:

Hi Hugo, yeah, there is. I just haven’t gotten around to reviewing them yet. But they do drop off in quality rather dramatically.

August 4, 2006

erc1452 said:

I saw Nemesis 1 back when it first came out. I was blown away, and fell in love with the movie.

A few months ago, I found it on DVD and picked up. After watching it, I was thinking “Wow, movies sure have gotten alot better since the early 90’s”

And yes, all the sequels were horrible!

SFAM said:

Wow! Found it on DVD? Lucky man. No such luck here. erc1452, If you could send me some good screencaps of this movie I’d appreciate it. I’m stuck with just the VHS. :(

August 5, 2006

erc1452 said:

Never done screencaps before - what method works best?

January 7, 2007

Clarkone said:

Why the “correlation to cyberpunk themes” is rated here as LOW?!! That film is reffering to one of the most important problem, like in “I Robot”! I mean feelings of an cyborg! Can someone explain it to my, that ratting? Thx

January 8, 2007

Clarkone said:

a cyborg* to me* sorry for the mistakes i was drunk;p

January 16, 2007

SFAM said:

Hi Clarkone, in retrospect I agree with you. In thinking back, I probably got my quality and relation to themes ratings combined. There is nothing original here, but it does deserve at least a medium on the themes. Changed accordingly!

January 17, 2007

Clarkone said:

Thx for answer, btw great site- incredible database of films, I’ve remembered slightly from my childhood (but the impression remainded:) - and now I found all those awesome movies by titles! Its great to see them again! Thx and good luck!

March 27, 2007

85% Is Still Sheep! | Cyberpunk Review said (pingback):

[…] to the tagline Albert Pyun’s movie, Nemisis (~86.5% is still human~), apparently we’re now saying similar things about sheep. But at […]

June 15, 2007

microchip said:

When I first saw Nemesis back in the days on VHS (I still have it, also in DivX version), I was fully blown away. To me, this movie is one of the best in its CP genre despite the low-budget used and the “not so good” Albert Pyun directory. I was fascinated by the mood it constantly created. A future where information terrorists and cyborg conspiracy is put in front of everything. Nemesis is also one of the most explosive and action-packed movies I’ve ever seen. It begins with action, goes through the whole movie with action and ends with action. The movie just doesn’t let you take a breath so to speak. The first time I saw it, the storyline was a bit confusing, but after watching it for the 2de and 3rd time, it became very clear. To me, Nemesis is one of those movies I could watch over and over again without getting tired - not many of those around anymore. Nemesis is still in my Top 5 list and will always be together with Nirvana, Blade Runner, Hardware and APEX. The sequels of Nemesis where absolutely horrible. They totally drifted away from the original storyline and their acting and story lines were absolutely horrible beyond words. A total waste of time, budget, acting and energy

June 20, 2007

Quaver said:

Its a case of Great Premise, Crappy Budget. I have a huge fondness for Nemesis and would urge anyone with a passing interest in CyPunk / SciFi to give it the time of day. Sure, its not the greatest film ever and the film begins to unravel into shlock towards the end (Max Impact? Come ON!) but I think Nemesis should be given the time of day at least once by everyone. It seemed to have close ties to both Shadowrun and Rifts (Roleplaying games) and even Syndicate (video game released around the same time) and had more than enough drawn from the rich history of cyberpunk to flesh out its weaker points. Its just a shame that the writer and/or directors were unable to develop the film out of its “Futuristic Action” hole.

Farrkin Huumans!

SFAM said:

I absolutely agree that Nemesis deserves a real DVD release. It’s definitely good enough for that. Microchip, I’m afraid I’m not with you in placing it with Blade Runner, Hardware, or even Nirvana (I need to see Apex so I can’t comment on this). This is definitely one of Pyun’s most enjoyable flicks though.

June 21, 2007

microchip said:

SFAM, to be honest with you, I’m not very found of Blade Runner, the movie just bores me at the beginning, if I have to choose between Nemesis and Blade Runner, I choose Nemesis any time, but this is just personal taste so I’m not gonna argue with anyone here which one is better ;). The same goes for Nirvana which I’ll choose over Blade Runner any time. Nemesis is much more packed with action than Blade Runner and to me it has a very interesting story. Sure, it could be better, but this goes for most of the movies out there

SFAM said:

Hi Microchip, Albert Pyun stops by here every now and then. My guess is he’ll be thrilled to see your comments. :)

microchip said:

SFAM, wow, I didn’t knew he comes around here, but if so, I’ll be more than happy to congratulate him about Nemesis, but I’ll be also more than happy to give him a headache about the sequels of Nemesis, hehe

Again, I don’t want you to think that I hate Blade Runner, but years ago when I saw Nemesis it really left a huge impression on me, and I can’t say the same for Blade Runner

October 10, 2007

Jack Swift said:

Found this from a flea market yesterday. (VHS) Ok condition.
Not bad! I’d give it a 7.

October 13, 2007

skylined said:

Any screenshots? Amazon sellers want £17 or more for this!

November 2, 2007

skylined said:

i watched this movie. the ending was hilariously bad.

November 19, 2007

Anonymous said:

awful movie. end of story

March 19, 2008

sysscan said:

One of the coolest movie covers I’ve seen. Pretty good movie if you like cyberpunk cliches. Didn’t the main character shoot a hole in the floor like in Underworld?

April 23, 2008

toxicwaste said:

dudes, where can i find these movies to download. i mean all nemesis movies.

May 12, 2008

9d523970339a said (trackback):

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March 31, 2009

Andresias said:

This movie could have been so much better with a bunch of REAL actors and better enviroment, but if you can forgive those details, it’s definatly worth 5-6 stars!

August 3, 2009

Albert Pyun said:

Thanks for all the comments. I’m keeping them all in mind as I am developing a Nemesis style cyberpunk film to shoot in Jan 2010. I actually tried to update the original Nemesis in 1999 with loads of 3D CGI and added scenes. The gnarly upgrade included expanding every wide shots with a very Blade Runner-ish skyline and added a bunch of different robots, flying air ships and cars plus surviellance eye in the skys that stalked every street and alley. Really enhanced the explosions and bullet impacts to the point where entire buildings were blown apart in that initial gunbattle. We got the first 15 minutes of the film completely done but the company that owned the film went under. Bummer. We did screen this 15 minutes at the MGM GRand for execs from Hollywood Video in 1999.

Enjoyed the review and comments and hopefully I will improve as I am takng it all to heart (if not brain).

Best,
Albert
www.talesofanancientempire.com
www.roadtohellmovie.com

December 10, 2009

f-01 said:

Ah man that sucks that you didnt get to remake this movie in 1999, you’ve gotten alot right with this movie, all it needs is a few tweeks.

If theirs one movie I want to see remade its this one for sure.

I hope this new movie you’re working on can be even better, look forward to it, all the best.

February 1, 2010

CyberGirg said:

Nemesis is exellent movie! I’ve just download full movie . And I really like it ))

February 2, 2010

Dan said:

Albert, thanks for taking the time to post here. I wanted to let you know that I loved Nemesis when it was released and have encouraged many a movie buff to take time to enjoy it. As with any movie its not perfect but I think that is a seminal Cyberpunk movie. It would have been fantastic to see an updated version but alas. All the best!

October 12, 2010

Nemesis 5 said:

I wish you good luck with your movies Mr. Pyun. To be honest i think Nemesis is really worth watching. But how and why did you such a total turn to the franchise afterwards? I consider part 2 as a very strange Red Sonja vs Predator clone wich completely misses the connection to original Nemesis. Part 3 seems to me as a very poor recycling of Set from part 2 without any notable act. But finally watching part four makes me think about what happened to the core of the franchise and who may forced you to do this. It is a (bad) italo-style Softcoreflick wich shares nothing more than the title-emblem with Nemesis. If Nemesis shall ever return, just do it the genuine way. :)

September 20, 2011

JEff said:

Hey what is the difference between the origional 1994 movie and the one being sold on Amazon which looks like it was released in 2008?

November 26, 2011

capnsid said:

You might be referring to the Director’s Cut which, in my opinion, is inferior to the original version. Albert cut lines of dialogue which added motivation to characters (like Jared say ‘I live here too’), which explained why she wanted Alex to succeed. I haven’t seen the other three parts in years; I’m gonna turn my brain off and watch them all in a row. BTW, Albert is putting out Nemesis 2.0, sometime soon.

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