It took me a while to track down this obscure action film with Steve Guttenberg. I once saw Overdrive around the time of it’s release on one of Sky’s two Movie Channels in the late 90’s. At the time I remember not thinking too much of it, however, having watched Airborne recently I wanted to see which was the better of The Gutt’s two action outings.
Guttenberg is Matt Stryker, the bestest racing driver… somewhere. Stryker’s backstory is limited at best depicting a disaster that befell his family, a car crash he was the only survivor of and now he has lost his wife and child has something of a death wish whilst also being an unapproachable asshole to anyone by Robert Wagner and hot chicks. He and Wagner race Porsches around a circuit in some dusty, arid state of the US. Wagner is The Gutt’s track-side adviser Freddie, barely a functional character, who gets upset as Stryker’s reckless shenanigans and spends most the his screentime removing his headset in disgust and muttering under his breath.
Meanwhile hot chick Wendy is a sketchy killer under observation by a group of men in a much less arrid end of town. Wendy has something they want and she enlists Stryker and his exceptional car racing skills to help her escape. Despite dashing between the rain and the blistering sun and murdering her pursuers in an underwhelming car chase Styker and Wendy develop a relationship that is painful to watch develop. There is a case full of money, blackmail material and goons needing taken out. Overdrive’s plot is as scant as it is interesting.
Guttenberg can be an excellent actor when required, and he is actually quite good from time to time here. Some of his interactions are quite playful and he is putting in a little effort to make this watchable. He is nowhere as stiff as he was in Airborne and tries to make the dreadful dialogue a little more appealing to the audience. Wagner’s screentime is roughly 5 minutes sprinkled sporadically throughout the 90 minute runtime, there is nothing about the role that is worth seeing and might as well been played by any old bit player in 90’s direct to video movies.
As Wendy, Kaela Dobkin is easily the lead of the film, however, you wouldn’t know that looking at the cover of the video box. Dobkin is another example of an actor with more potential than the material here and whilst she looks the part as a sexy assassin, the dialogue she has to deliver is the real challenge. The story and film revolve around Wendy’s exploits, Guttenberg’s character is along for the ride and other than his driving skills, adds little to the main plot.
The film is cheap! The budget must have been used getting the two named stars involved and arranging a race day for the film depict Stryker’s raceway antics. Even this footage contains little excitement or merit. Director Lev L. Spiro must have been more focused on keeping Guttenberg, Wagner and Dobkin from leaving as he can’t capture any excitement from the race footage… or the drama and action for that matter from the script. Spiro cut his teeth on some late night Emmanuelle TV movies and does manage keep Dobkin front, centre and looking gorgeous, even delivering a love scene that would be the highlight had it not been Guttenberg… he’s too cool for cheap erotica. Aside from one episode of the underappreciated Black Scorpion TV show, this is writer Malcolm Stephens’ only feature film and it’s was very much in need of a rewrite.
For a film focusing on car chases, outside of the race track footage the two they have are poorly filmed and one of the resultant car crash sequences is embarrassingly faked. The climatic crash, where a car is actually destroyed, is poorly put together and lengthened to make the most out of the “stunt.” The common sense of the chases also insults the audience, with a flashy Ford Mustang (that curiously changes to a red corvette for a shot) being unable to outrun an ageing Ford van and a junky Chrysler. There are car to car gun battles featuring baddies who’ manage to miss the’s bullets create sparks on the Mustang’s body but no bullet holes in later scenes.
Overdrive reminds me of Fast Money, a vastly superior action flick that does 10 times more to keep things enjoyable (and stars Guttenberg’s replacement in the Police Academy franchise, Matt McCoy.) Whilst I didn’t hate Overdrive, I found it a paltry collection of badly handled action sequences linked together by a poorly written story and ugly characters. Adding Guttenberg, Wagner and Dobkin gives the audience the drive to stick with it as they have some onscreen personality. However, it’s ultimately a waste of time with nothing redeeming in the long run. The only positive is that Guttenberg is more animated than his character in Airborne, and I hate to say it, Airborne is the better film.
Overdrive seems to have only been released on physical media once, VHS and only in the US. This does feel somewhat understandable, however, I am concerned that it might become lost media one day and urge anyone with a VHS copy to preserve it.
Overdrive was likely shovelled onto cable to fill in listings and the likelihood of a move modern release is non-existent. I’d like to think it still surfaces on obscure Roku action movie channels, but probably not. Concorde/New Horizons have too many of these types of films to keep in circulation.
