
In the early 21st century, the USA is in the wake of the Second Civil War. The whole country is in a constant state of emergency. What was formerly called the American Congress now rules the country with fascistic methods. There is only one free city left, Steel Harbor, a coastal California industrial town which is headquarters for the resistance. This is the home town of Barb Wire, owner of the Hammerhead nightclub. As times aren't good, Barb has a second job. She's a bounty... (Full plot summary below)
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In the early 21st century, the USA is in the wake of the Second Civil War. The whole country is in a constant state of emergency. What was formerly called the American Congress now rules the country with fascistic methods. There is only one free city left, Steel Harbor, a coastal California industrial town which is headquarters for the resistance. This is the home town of Barb Wire, owner of the Hammerhead nightclub. As times aren't good, Barb has a second job. She's a bounty hunter and you probably wouldn't want her after you. Barb's credo is to never take sides for anybody and that's the only way to survive these days in the crime-ridden streets of Steel Harbor. One evening, her former lover Axel Hood appears at the club asking for a favor to help him and his lover Cora D flee the country to Canada, Barb suddenly finds herself to be key player on high political stage. Now she has to take sides.
Leave your thoughts about Barb Wire.
| Time OutDerek AdamsThe film's haphazardly edited, lacks narrative clout, and rambles on to a ludicrously extended conclusion. |
| Laramie Movie ScopeRobert RotenOne of those outrageous, over-the-top comic book style movies, and as such, it's kinda fun. |
| Washington PostDesson ThomsonDavid Hogan keeps the action moving and loaded with fights, gun battles and other action-trashy thrills. Lee is terrific. |
| Washington PostHal HinsonLee elevates herself from the lower echelon of mere international super-babedom to the loftier realm of pulp myth. She is "It" with an exclamation mark. |
| VarietyAndrew HindesDespite its obvious flaws, Barb Wire does what it sets out to do and does it well. |
| Sci-Fi Movie PageJames O'EhleyIt is, after all, a comic book come to life (it's based on the Dark Horse comic series) and doesn't pretend to be about anything more than that. |
| Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertThe filmmakers must have known they were not making a good movie, but they didn't use that as an excuse to be boring and lazy. Barb Wire has a high energy level, and a sense of deranged fun. |
| Entertainment WeeklyOwen GleibermanThis rusted-future comic strip comes at you in shards -- exhaustingly derivative images of mayhem and titillation, with Lee, in her bad-girl bondage gear, as its blank vixen. If you didn't call her babe, she wouldn't exist. |
| Boxoffice MagazineKim WilliamsonThe focus remains on Lee throughout, and (except for one flashback scene, in which we see the young, compassionate woman she once was) she pretty much delivers. |
| Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovIt's a comic book movie in the broadest sense of the term, and although it's neither as emotionally resonant as "The Crow" nor as surreally goofy as "Tank Girl," Barb Wire still manages to get you going, Anderson Lee fan or not. |