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Thou Shalt Not Kill... Except... (Widescreen, remastered with trailer and extras)
A.k.a: Bloodbath, Stryker's War
Directed by Josh Becker 1985, USA

"What would happen if Rambo met Charles Manson?"

"When violence demands revenge"

Another practically unheard of horror film re-released by Anchor Bay. Many of The Evil Dead pals helped make or starred in this movie including Bruce Campbell, Scott Spiegel, Ted Raimi, director Becker and Sam Raimi. It's a low budget action/revenge flick about a Vietnam vet named Stryker who returns home from combat with an injured leg. At the time of his return a lunatic (Sam Raimi doing Charles Manson) and his cult are scurrying about killing people. When Stryker's girlfriend Sally is kidnapped by the cult and her father murdered Stryker gets together with some old Nam buddies and mops up the whole lot of'em.

The beginning of the movie takes place during the Vietnam war while the movies running time is 84 minutes therefore making it go by at a pretty quick rate. The conclusion is the best part of the movie and where most of the better scenes lie. The acting is simply horrible and it shows, meanwhile Raimi as the hippie cult leader is priceless, he looks like a grade A psychotic. The camera work is quite good and a number of shots are creative enough to have bodies falling on the cameras or blood spraying on the lenses for a cool life like effect. Director Josh Becker said he was influenced by the Manson murders and the time the Vietnam war ended so the movie was set during the right time frame when the actual events took place.

The extras featured at the end of the this version include the alternate title sequence in which the movie was originally titled 'Strykers War' and a cut scene which is simply hilarious and should have been included in the film. this version puts the Prism video copy to shame. Now all we need is an uncut remaster of Scott Spiegel's Intruder.

-Richard Taylor