Run Her Over With A Tank It’s Dressed Up As A Creative Movie, But ‘Tank Girl’ Is Just Same Old Boring Stuff

“Tank Girl” has a great title. The bare roots of the plot have potential, too: A young woman rides around the desert in a souped-up tank in the year 2033, when water is scarce.

But this story, taken from a British comic book, suffers from a lack of talent and creativity in nearly all departments.

That’s right, “Tank Girl” is not a very creative or inventive film. Sure, it looked like one (mutant kangaroos, robot arms, holographic heads, futuristic brothels, sets packed with odd trinkets), but deep down, the film doesn’t offer anything new or particularly offbeat.

This is because “Tank Girl” is all surface; there’s nothing going on underneath. The cheesy sets look like rooms randomly decorated with toys and other novelties. They could have been assembled by anyone with a garage full of junk and lots of glue.

The script is the same kind of monotonous garbage the many action films Hollywood pumps out subscribe to. The hero has a loved one killed by a ruthless band of goons led by an evil mastermind. The hero kills countless bad guys. There are too many bad guys, so the hero joins a resistance group and soon becomes the leader.

In the end, after killing still more bad guys, there’s a climatic fight between the evil leader and the hero, and the hero wins.

In addition to the stale storyline, the acting is dismal. Most annoying is the star of the film, Lori Petty, as the title character. She has stood out as a talented actress in her previous films, but here her exaggerated way of speaking and dramatic disposition are distracting. Multiplying the effect is the script, which is littered with booger and penis jokes.

As the head villain, Malcolm McDowell plays exactly the same character he did in the last “Star Trek” movie. Supporting actress Naomi Watts does absolutely nothing as Tank Girl’s partner, Jet Girl. And although he is listed as one of the stars, Ice-T has only a minor role in which he scowls and disagrees with almost everything anyone says.

“Tank Girl” is a kind of cross between “The Road Warrior” and last year’s “Super Mario Brothers.” It’s got the “Road Warrior” vision of the future with that “Mario Brothers” logic.

By the end of the film, everything has been worn out: the repetitiously crazy editing, dull action scenes, cheesy dialogue and dumb jokes.

Grade: D