Turkey Shoot (1982) Reviews

• Hunting is the national sport...and people are the prey!

  Tortoisemogwai2009-08-12

  Ozploitation. Exploitations colloquial cousin. During a period Ozploitation films where popular and Turkey Shoot is a notable success amongst some of the trash of the Australians attempts at exploitation films. It's fairly controversial 'The Most Dangerous Game' approach has helped it gain a fair amount of cult following over the years and all though it doesn't hold up in the slightest to later films with the same honourable human hunting intentions such as Battle Royale and more recently Exam it still holds up nicely as the definitive Australian approach to the subject matter. Turkey Shoot takes place in a dystopian future, now past, where 'social deviants' can be re-educated and returned to society through concentration style camps. The films narrative starts by following the lives of three newly arrived inmates and their view upon the extreme violence and toil prisoners suffer throughout their stay, mostly beatings and depravity by a hugely entertaining large bold Australian with a handlebar moustache. In the second half of the film the camps owners, safari British style hunters, round up five one-dimensional, to the extreme, characters (we have whore, rebel, rebel mark 2, bad guy and vulnerable) and force them to participate for their possible freedom in a human hunt, staring themselves, called Turkey Shoot. When faced with the dilemma of what to do when hunted each character uses their own personality to forge different ways of dealing with the situation and in true exploitation style extreme violence bordering on hilarity ensues. Brain Trenchard-Smiths direction is riddled with plot holes but the right ingredients are there; i.e. gore, nudity and some kind of circus freak werewolf guy. What makes the film and its direction good is that it doesn't treat itself seriously, there is no character development or even some kind of message or lesson learnt by the end of the film. It just wants to exist to entertain its audience and being a film exploiting violence make money. All the factors that would bother audiences in drama films don't matter in Turkey Shoot and can be disregarded as its honesty in being a technically bad film tells the audience that it wasn't made to win awards or be visually or musically stunning. Naturally the acting is bad. But as all the characters only have one characteristic for the actors to act in the characters are appealing as comical relief from the films serious, even if not shown in the film, underlying story. The English actors are great in playing their roles as the bad guys in typical posh ascents to stress that they are 'better people' than the Ausies. The person that stands out most however is Roger Ward as Chief Guard Ritter, his enthusiastic approach to the violent sadistic character fits perfectly creating a highly memorable giant Australian with a handlebar moustache. This along with the werewolf placed in the film just to chew peoples toes and such are probably the most imaginative parts of the film and make it memorable over many other films in its genre. Visually and musically there is little going on. The film is shot and edited nicely enough but sometimes its conventional style makes you think that the director could have done so much more. The aspect that saves its dull camera work comes from the variety of lush Australian landscapes ranging from the sandy concentration camp style centre to woods, fields of long dry grass and beaches. This helps the film as a whole always capture your interest and I'm in no doubt that without this kind of variety in the sets landscapes the film might seem very boring indeed. Overall Turkey Shoot holds up as an entertaining popcorn flick and with its blend of extreme violence and lovable characters (for the most part, villain-wise anyway) makes a entirely watchable exploitation movie. If you are a fan of the The Most Dangerous Game style situations it might boost itself to a must watch.

• Gobbler

  Spuzzlightyear2012-03-22

  This was so mindlessly entertaining, you forget about the constant weird inconsistencies in the script. Primarily people show up out of nowhere, even though, well, it SEEMS to be a big compound, wherever they are. Anyways, it's 1981 or so, and the people are so out of control they hold people in camps. One of the camps have decided to control it's prisoner population by holding hunts, featuring prisoners as game. It attracts a lot of big game hunters looking for the kill! Steve Railsback (!!) and Olivia Hussey (?!?!) are two of the prisoners in the game, and they and 3 others (we can pretty much assume their fate) run run run away from the hunters. The hunters seemingly have no problems finding them apparently (which is slightly strange... how did they do that?) and so they must fight to stay alive! Exploding arrows, deadly all terrain vehicles and, yes, mutant werewolf men are used! It's all pretty strange and goes along in a pretty wild pace. I'd highly recommend anyone who likes their movies bloody, fun, and cheesy.

• Entertaining trash.

  gridoon2002-03-17

  Set in a totalitarian future society, this film has a bleak but quite vividly drawn vision of the world...for its first 20 minutes or so; then it turns into a straight action-chase adventure. The uncut 90-minute version is extremely gory, but some of the effects are rather lame. Nevertheless, it's a fast-paced, trashily entertaining film, and the actors are adequate for the little they're asked to do. (**)

• Turkey or THE great lost Aussie dystopic b-grade classic?

  Infofreak2001-11-10

  'Turkey Shoot' makes me proud to be an Aussie! There is something so gloriously stupid and cheesy about this movie that it utterly fascinates me! Set in a future police state, the movie begins with three new prisoners being taken to a "rehabilitation" centre. They are Steve Railsback ('Helter Skelter', 'The Stunt Man'), Olivia Hussey (Zeffirelli's 'Romeo and Juliet'), and Lynda Stoner (err, 'Cop Shop'). The place, of course, is a seething hot bed of brutality, sexual frustration and yellow jump-suits. Pretty quickly we find out that our three newcomers are going to be hunted for sport by the Camp's leader, the enigmatic Thatcher, his sadistic colleagues, and a werewolf in a dune buggy. I won't say any more as to not spoil your enjoyment of this long forgotten sci fi thriller. Australians will get more out of it than other viewers, as they will fully appreciate the supporting cast of soap stars, 70s TV personalities, and at least two 'Mad Max' actors. In fact, I cannot go without singling out the unknown, unsung hero of Australian cinema, Bill Young, who plays Griff here, and was also in another underrated Aussie trash classic 'Body Melt', AND 'The Matrix' AND 'Chopper'! If this guy has a fan club, sign me up! 'Turkey Shoot' - If you haven't seen this one you just don't know what you're missing!

• Fun, Goofy, Weird "Survival" Film From Australia...

  EVOL6662006-08-15

  I gotta say that I got a kick out of TURKEY SHOOT. Just the sort of strange hybrid type film that I liked to see come out of the 1980s. Part sci-fi, part horror, part exploit film - TURKEY SHOOT pretty much has it all, and somehow blends it all together well, without becoming too "heavy-handed" with any specific elements. A bit disjointed and silly at times for as "serious" as the film seems to take itself - but definitely enjoyable... The film takes place in the future (which at this point looks pretty outdated, and probably didn't look all that "futuristic" for 1982 either...) where a totalitarian government is in control and obedience to the State is all that is accepted. Anyone who dissents or disobeys is sent to a camp for "deviants" for reprogramming. Camp Thatcher (named after the Head of the camp) is supposed to be the worst-of-the-worst as far as the camps go, and a new group of deviants, including a timid (but smokin') female, another girl who's a little tougher, and a guy who is all about anti-establishment and has escaped other camps before, are subjected to the hardships and torture that Camp Thatcher has to offer. To keep things interesting, Thatcher comes up with a MOST DANGEROUS GAME-style amusement - hunting prisoners. The new recruits along with two others are chosen, and are freed as game - under the agreement that if they can avoid death til sundown - they're free to leave the camp as rehabilitated citizens...but of course it's not quite that simple... TURKEY SHOOT is action-packed, violent, and a bit gorier than I would have expected - all good things. The whole rehabilitation and behavior modification camp was actually unnecessary to the storyline for the most part, but it worked in the context of the film. There are some silly things that I have no idea why they were thrown in (the "werewolf" circus creature, anyone???) - but what the hell - there's not a whole lot of rhyme-or-reason to this film, it's just a good time with an excuse to show a bunch of gratuitous violence and a titty or two. Recommended for early-80s Roger Corman-style exploit/action fans - others will probably find it cheezy...8/10