Zone Troopers
Danny Bilson and Paul De Meo are best-known for creating the 1990 television series “The Flash” and for writing the script for the 1991 movie “The Rocketeer.” During the eighties they teamed up with producer/director Charles Band and scripted his 1984 film “Trancers.” The following year Band purchased an existing Italian movie studio to produce low-budget films. He reassembled most of the cast and crew from “Trancers” to make his first production in Italy. This week’s movie was “Zone Troopers” from Empire Pictures in 1985, directed by Danny Bilson from a script by Bilson and Paul De Meo. The film is set in 1944 Italy, and involves four Americans trapped behind enemy lines. Tim Thomerson plays “Sergeant Patrick Stone,”
known to his men as “The Sarge.” He is accompanied by rookie “Private Joey Verona,” (Timothy Van Patten), veteran “Corporal George ‘Mittens’ Minnensky,” (Art LaFleur), and war correspondent “Charlie Dolan,” (Biff Manard), all perfectly cast in their roles. The soldiers discover that a Nazi SS team has arrived in the area to investigate the crash of an alien spaceship! The Germans capture the one survivor of the crash, a hairy, bug-eyed, female “Thrakian Soldier,” (William Paulson). The Sarge and his buddies free the alien and help her to reach a rescue ship manned by blue-skinned humanoid “Zone Troopers,” who use ray guns to defeat the Nazis!
This movie is a joyous and charming adventure from beginning to end. Bilson and De Meo make excellent use of forties slang and culture, from feeding “Lucky Strike” cigarettes to the alien to writing “Kilroy was here” on the spaceship. Richard Band, (brother of Charles), composed the excellent swing music soundtrack making extensive use of the song “In the Mood,” (popularized in the forties by “Glenn Miller and his Orchestra”). This is a wonderful piece of period entertainment that deserves to be better known, and I am pleased to offer my recommendation of this picture.
After the closing credits the audience is encouraged to buy War Bonds, available in the lobby.