I have a new rule of bad movies. Anything with the word "Troopers" in the title will reek. Ok, so this rule is only based on two or three movies I've seen, but so far it's been 100% accurate.

"Zone Troopers" is a mid-eighties World War II movie starring nobody you've ever heard of. The only word for it is peculiar. It's too boring to be an action movie, it isn't dramatic enough to be a serious movie, and it isn't funny enough to be a comedy. The American and German soldiers and the Italian setting, look more realistic than usual for a straight-to-video war film, but having achieved an accurate look, it's as if the makers didn't know what to do next. And the effects department failed badly when it came to the gorilla-suited aliens.

Yes, this is where it goes beyond peculiar into hallucinogenic. This is what the world has been waiting for: a World War II movie with gorilla-suited aliens. I want to stress that this is exactly what it is. It's not a science fiction movie which happens to be set in World War II. It's a straightforward, shoot-'em-up, troop-lost-in-Italy-behind-enemy-lines, Americans vs. Nazis war movie. With gorilla-suited aliens.

As the movie begins, we are introduced to Joseph, or Joey, who appears to be the main character, although it's hard to tell because he's so boring. He says things like "Golly gee!" and "Gosh!" far too often even for the 1940s. He even says "Gee whiz!" a few times. I believe he's supposed to be perkily endearing. If I were in the troop there'd be a freak grenade accident arranged within mere hours.

Joey likes comic books. One of the other guys asks to borrow a particular one. Joey says sadly that he doesn't have it any more -- he traded it to some guy for a pack of cigarettes. "You don't smoke," his friend points out. Gee whiz! I bet the troop has fun getting this moron ready in the mornings. No, pants go on before boots, Joey. Helmet goes on your head. Just like yesterday, Joey.

Various boring war-type scenes happen, until the Americans get edited down to the main characters during an attack by SS guys. This is actually quite funny. We see all the Germans lined up before the attack, and there are about twenty of them. During the fight we see at least twice that number get killed, and they just keep on turning up.

The heroes escape into the Italian countryside, and there is some more standard war-movie plot. Eventually the Germans catch up with them again. The Germans seem to prefer a challenge, because instead of firing their rocket launcher directly at our heroes (who are right there in front of them), they try to shoot big branches off trees to fall on them and squash them. As the branch falls, a gorilla-suited alien silently appears out of nowhere and makes the branch vanish in mid-air. Then the alien goes away again. Up until this point, there were no aliens in the movie; it had appeared to be a dull but not badly done war story. The overall effect is so far beyond weird there isn't a word for it in the English language.

As anyone would do when faced with a sudden alien-plus-vanishing-tree-branch situation, the guys ignore it completely and get on with the war. Later in the movie the alien turns up again while Joey is guarding their night hideout. I'm not sure that standing spotlit against a white wall in full moonlight is a really terrific way of staying hidden behind enemy lines. I'm almost certain that lighting a nice bright cigarette (he forgot he didn't smoke) doesn't help either. And I'm absolutely 100% sure that you wouldn't pass the time by breaking into song. Oh, Joey.

He sees the alien, which basically just stands there doing nothing, and runs back inside in terror. He tells the others a giant gorilla with huge bug eyes, mandibles, claws, and a silver jumpsuit is hanging around. The others laugh and tell him it must have been a moose.

There is something so badly wrong with this explanation.

Meanwhile, two other guys from the troop get captured by the SS. They really ask for it. They couldn't be more easily captured if they'd walked into SS headquarters with a big sign around their necks saying, "Capture me." There they meet the gorilla-suited alien, which the SS have also captured, and get to punch Hitler in the nose. This is an important plot point, because it means that the guy playing Hitler can walk around with his hands over his face for the rest of the scene, thus disguising the fact that he looks about as much like Hitler as Danny DeVito does.

Another major oddity of this film is the Sarge, who is indestructible. Towards the beginning, he gets shot in the back from about ten feet away and falls over. Joey and the others gasp in horror! But it's ok -- he gets up again, shoots the badguy, and continues with no apparent ill-effects or even a wound. Later in the movie we see him deliberately blow himself up with a grenade and survive. The other soldiers are mystified. When the "alien" part of the plot came along, it seemed obvious to me that Sarge's indestructibility would tie into it somehow. He'd turn out to be an alien, or half alien, or a robot, or a secret biological weapon, or something. ANYTHING. Wrong. They never explain it. He's just this indestructible guy. Gee whiz.

Anyway, while looking for the captured guys, Joey and the Sarge find the crashed alien spaceship. They get trapped in the control room, because the aliens decided to make all the doors slam closed when you turn on the light switch. It doesn't occur to our heroes to try turning *off* the light switch again to see if the doors open, but eventually they escape through some kind of vent. (An air-vent crawling scene is required by law in all spaceship-related movies.) As they leave, they destroy the spaceship by tossing a grenade inside. That was one heck of a grenade. The ship is about the size of a Boeing 747 and tossing one grenade up the tailpipe blows the whole thing to kingdom come.

At this point they get captured by the SS too, and the indestructible Sarge does his stunt with the grenades. There are more war scenes, until our heroes are surrounded by badguys firing down on them. Suddenly the gorilla-suited alien walks casually into the scene and passes around rayguns. "Thanks," the soldiers say and use the rayguns to make the badguys disappear. By now, you're thinking there hasn't been a word in any language EVER to describe how weird this movie is.

There's some more war-movie plot, and then we meet up with the aliens again in a different spaceship. The gorilla-suited alien is there, but now we have some others too, who look completely different. They wear the same silver jumpsuits as the gorilla-bug-mandibled thing but are human, with dyed metallic-gold hair and thick white makeup. The general impression is that they are an experimental New Wave rock band forty years ahead of their time. They are not particularly explainable.

The Germans attack again, and this time Joey gets killed. Ok, he's not much, but he IS the main character, and the gorilla alien had become his -- *sob* -- best friend. So, I bet the aliens can cure him, right? No, they all get back in their spaceship and leave. The other guys shrug, bury Joey, and wander off to continue World War II. End of movie. I have no idea what it was trying to say, if anything.

Rating: two turkeys. It's a lot more boring than it sounds.

Scene to watch for: Joey picks up a bit of the crashed spaceship wreckage. He holds it for about five seconds before he discovers that it's white hot, screams, and drops it.

Best line: That casual "thanks" on being handed rayguns by a suddenly-appearing giant gorilla-bug in a silver jumpsuit.

Things that make you go "Huh?": Sarge's unexplained indestructibility. The guy who doesn't look like Hitler. What the heck the title means. And, uh, the whole movie in general, really.

Response From RinkWorks:

Wow. I find myself wondering what on Earth would ever possess a person to make such a movie. I find myself failing to find an answer.