Just perfect...

it is finally so absorbing because it plays like a lyrical road odyssey that’s also a detective story.

To all those who have watched it: I hope you enjoyed it as much as I do.

True to its essence, the characters remain on the same line and manage to entertain the viewer, each highlighting their own distinctive qualities or touches.

Teri Marshall (Heather Thomas) finds herself in a world of nefarious Government and bad guy types after her inventor boyfriend Rick Davenport (Jeffrey Combs) is murdered. Seems everyone is after his invention Cyclone, a $5 million dollar motorbike with stealth technology. Of course, Rick expected this and delivers a post-death message to Teri to get the motorbike to the only G-man (Troy Donahue) he can trust. The big chase is on with CIA agents Waters (Martine Beswick) and Knowles (Robert Quarry) and baddies Rolf (Dar Robinson) and Hanna (Dawn Wildsmith) in pursuit. And Martin Landau figures in here somewhere as the main bad guy. More Fred Olen Ray madness here and this film is a marked improvement over his earlier stuff. By that I mean it looks like an actual film with decent cinematography. It is still pretty low budget though with cheap sets and a almost-but-not-quite futuristic bike design. The leads are decent and I noticed Combs - like Peter Cushing before him - has an insane talent for making techno-babble sound 100% believable. You also get a gaggle of ex-stars who mostly likely were around for a few days in supporting roles. Donahue has one scene while Landau gets three. All of the big action is saved for the finale and there are two really cool car stunts there. Of course, the film's biggest leap of faith isn't the stealth bike. My friend Marty summed it up best when he said: "As implausible as this thriller is, the biggest stretch is that sexy blonde Thomas, first seen hitting the Nautilus machine in a bust-bursting Spandex outfit, would be dating dorky scientist Combs."

Cyclone is full of laughs and enjoyment. Bare in mind that none of this is intentional on the filmmaker's part. Because that filmmaker is Fred Olen Ray. Fred's name in the credits is nature's way of warning you that there is some plentiful bad movie coming and that you should take proper precautions. Get a lot of friends that appreciate bad movies together, and probably some alcohol too. Otherwise, you might suffer irreparable mental trauma from viewing the film sober and alone.Cyclone stars Heather Thomas,(most famous to me for her role in the Fall Guy series), as Teri Marshall action bimbo. She lives with the Re-Animator (Jeffrey Combs) who tinkers on motorcycles for some undisclosed government agency. OR maybe it's the private sector, this point is never really made clear, and the script writer probably didn't think that much about it himself. After we see Teri pumping iron with her blonde PT and beating on some yokels we quickly realize that she is the masculine partner in the relationship. She wants to take her egghead boyfriend out dancing at a club that we quickly realize is his laboratory with some slightly different set dressing. We will see this scenery again.However while the horrible horrible band Haunted Garage plays (I thought the song was Double Meadow, but the credits reveal it was actually Devil Metal, my bad) her boyfriend gets an icepick to the back of the head, and she'd be dead too if it weren't for some extra who gets his face slashed by the hit-man's incompetent girlfriend. Gasp! Could this be related to the top secret project he was working on in his lab? Of course. Teri goes home and via a prerecorded message, the Re-Animator tells her about his armor plated, laser flinging, perpetual clean energy super scooter. Now, why armor plating a motorcycle would be a big deal doesn't make much sense to me, sure the bike is fine but the driver is swiss cheese. Also, the energy source is a MUCH MUCH better invention than the title bike. PERPETUAL CLEAN ENERGY. To hell with the bike! Sigh! With such valuable technology on the line, you'd think the bad guys would have their best men on the job. But it's just the bozo from the nightclub and his girlfriend, a more low rent pair you couldn't find. Their vehicle of choice, a faux wood paneled station wagon. They work for Martin Landau, who will appear in ANYTHING apparently. He has promised the Cyclone to shady Asian businessmen, though it does seem that they are more interested in the power source. Teri gets visited by some government types who apparently work for the same agency as her ex-living boyfriend. They want the bike, but Re-Animator has already told her the only person she can deliver it too is the aptly named Bob Jenkins. After a crash course in super motorcycle safety, she proceeds to do so, to the tune of a song called "Edge of the Night" which I only mention because if Phil Collins wanted to, he would have a pretty good lawsuit against whoever wrote it. It sounds a LOT like In the Air Tonight. However, before Bob Jenkins can get it to safety, he gets shot by Inept Hit-man #1 and crossbow-ed by Inept Hit-man #2. Neither deciding that Teri is important enough to kill I guess. Instead of blasting them with the supercycle, we have a brief station wagon chase-Cyclone chase which ends with Teri escaping.She hides out with her PT but...SPOILERS...she works for the bad guys! And so does...SPOILERS...one of the feds that spoke to Teri earlier! And they all know the inept Hit men! They take Teri to their secret arms dealer HQ which is...her boyfriend's lab/dance club with some boxes piled up in it, and in a vain excuse to show Heather arch her back and scream, they give her the old car battery electric torture. I was kind of surprised at this, until I remember that Teri is just a masculine character played by an actress. She's tough enough to take it until she is saved by the other female agent who shoots the bad agent as they make their getaway. (THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT LATER) Finally after what seems like several hours of movie, we see Cyclone zap something with cartoon lightning bolts. Then there's a really big asplosion and some decent car stuntwork. Teri wins, yay. The agent makes a call to her boss that they have the superbike. Her boss is...SPOILERS...Martin Landau? The hell? If he'd just waited he would have gotten the bike anyway. The "twist" makes absolutely no sense. Hell, if Bob Jenkins worked for the agency, he would have just taken the bike to Landau anyway. Maybe they needed to downsize. I dunno.So, Cyclone. Bad movie. Good to watch with people who like bad movies.

I was expecting to view a more exploitation style of film but unfortunately this turned out to be just a badly made low budget action flick that just doesn't have the talent for that. Story is about a very beautiful woman named Teri Marshall (Heather Thomas) who's boyfriend Rick (Jeffrey Combs) works for a secret agency and he has invented a motorcycle that is bullet proof and can shoot lasers and rockets and has a helmet that can shoot lasers as well. The head of the agency Bosarian (Martin Landau) has made a 5 million dollar deal to sell it and sends two hired thugs to kill Rick and Teri and collect the bike. A tall blond thug named Rolf (Dar Robinson) and his partner Hanna (Dawn Wildsmith) manage to kill Rick but Teri survives. While at home she discovers a video tape that Rick left describing his invention that helps Teri on what to do next.*****SPOILER ALERT*****Teri is being chased by several agents and she gets caught and tortured but doesn't talk about where a piece of the motorcycle that is needed but she gets help from a federal agent named Waters (Martine Beswick) where they end up using the motorcycle for a bloody shoot-out.This film is directed by Fred Olen Ray who has made his career out of making ultra-low budget exploitation films but he made a dire mistake here by leaving out the exploitation aspect and trying to make an action film. Aside from a quick shower scene at the beginning there is no nudity and the usual titillation that viewers are accustomed to seeing in a Ray film is no where to be found. I don't think anyone was expecting Thomas to get naked but she doesn't wear one sexy outfit. Not that it stopped me from ogling her in those tight jeans and admiring her near perfect form but Ray really blew it in this case. Like all of his films the cast is fun to watch and many familiar faces have roles like Robert Quarry, Huntz Hall, Troy Donahue, Tim Conway Jr., Michael Reagan, and Russ Tamblyn. Stuntman Dar Robinson died shortly after this was made and it's his last acting effort and the film is dedicated to him. You have to wonder why Landau would waste him time with such junk like this but I was interested in the casting of Combs in a very rare romantic role. Is Thomas any good in this film? Who cares! I think she showed that she could have become a popular "B" movie starlet if she wanted but it never did happen. Ray wastes everyone's time with this effort although the cast is fun to watch but he left out the elements that make him an enjoyable filmmaker.

The best thing about this move was Ms. Thomas's assets. She seemed to have reprised her role fromtheold 'Fall Guys' Tv series, in that her wardrobe consisted of, in order of their appearance, leotards, skin tight jeans and spandex mini skirts. The plot was comical, while the fight scenes were pretty good. I kept getting the impression the other actors wished they were some place else.One particularly silly scene had Teri (Ms.Thomas) tied to a chair, being tortured by the villians to reveal the location of the Cyclone. The dialog is silly, and villians seem more interested in sneering and threatening than getting the information.For a laugh it worth seeing, but for serious action fans, skip it.