I see a lot of independent films anymore wether by choice or by chance, and a lot of them manage to beat budget constraints by having a great story, good acting, and a well thought out premise. They rise above their low budgets and deliver stories better than anything Hollywood could hope to accomplish these days. Which brings me to Ed Radmanich's Artie Saves the Hood. This film was shot on (I assume) an extremely low budget, has a lot of sub-par acting, and a paper thin premise. However, despite these shortcomings, this movie still rocked! Thanks to the musical stylings and computer effects wizardry of Phil Mohr, this movie has a look that belies it's meager budget.

Artie Saves the Hood begins on a quiet afternoon, which is when Artie Guy gets up from bed. We get a brief glimpse of his personal life and needless to say... it's pretty boring. No wonder Artie uses all free time to do stupid things, like backyard wrestling. (I'm extremely curious as to what he does to bring in any money. Artie has a pretty nice house and car for someone that seems unemployed.) Next we meet the rest of the film's characters: Mason and Fry, Artie's two best buds and Manny, Artie's mentor. Things are business as usual in Artie's life, that is until he trips while running upstairs in his house and puts a hole in a wall. Within the hole, Artie discovers what appears to be a glowing green bar of soap. He takes it into his bedroom and inspects it closely. Artie soon learns that it's not really a bar of soap after he accidentally spills some water on it and is immediately teleported to his friend Mason's house.

After a few more teleports, Artie finds himself back at home. Unfortunately for him, his interdimensional travel has alerted Clonebots from another dimension that are after the strange green item that Artie has found. Soon the Clonebots begin teleporting into Artie's neighborhood and quietly begin searching for Artie's "bar of soap" (later revealed to be a DCG... whatever that stands for). First the bots kill Artie's Mexican neighbor (no loss there) and then invade Artie's house where they ambush Artie and his friend Mason. The two slackers attempt to fight the bots in hand-to-hand combat, but with lousy results. To even the odds, Artie grabs a hidden handgun and kills both of the Clonebots. (I wonder what else is hidden in this house? So far there's been glowing soap bars/teleportation devices and handguns. Maybe there's a treasure map or a holy relic under a floorboard somewhere?)

Afterwards, Artie and Mason hide the dead Clonebots inside a garbage can and just assume that that attack was just an isolated incident. Later, they try to tell Manny about what happened but he refuses to believe them and tells them to hit the road. Manny later realizes that everything Artie and Mason were saying was true because some Clonebots pay him a visit. Manny tries to fight them off, but is killed during the fight when a mini flashing light-saber keychain is inserted into his mouth. (The only reason I know what that flashing item was, is because I own one myself. Yes I am a nerd!) In another part of the hood, Artie is attacked by Clonebots again, but this time he's ready. Artie shows off his impressive arsenal of guns to the Clonebots and mows through them with his machine gun. (Where the hell did he get all of these guns?!)

Artie escapes from his house and drives down the street where he picks up Mason. Mason has also just had a close encounter with those "interdimensional bastards" and hops into Artie's car. They drive a bit further and end up picking up the "Crazy Lady." This girl is the last of a race that was nearly obliterated by the Clonebots and is out to stop them from continuing their conquest of other worlds. She flags down Artie and hops in the car and hitches a ride with the two trigger-happy locals. They all go to Manny's house where Artie discovers the corpse of his deceased mentor. Rather than sob over the death of a good friend, Artie instead takes Manny's wallet and cleans out all the cash! (HAHAHAHA! Unbelievable!) The crazy gibberish-speaking chick also wanders into the house and uses a device to scan the rooms. She ends up discovering a blue DCG (a.k.a. the blue soap bar of unfathomable power) and leaves the house, with Artie in tow.

Now, I don't even know why they bothered introducing the crazy girl as a character in this film because over the next few minutes, she draws a diagram that explains the entire situation to Artie and Mason. Then she teleports out of the house, leaving the two witless heroes on their own. Artie and Mason saddle up and drive over to Fry's house to make sure he's alright. They rush in through the back door and surprise attack two Clonebots that were sitting on Fry's couch. (Apparently Fry was telling them a story and they were just chilling out and listening to him.) After taking out the bots with extreme prejudice, Artie brings Fry up to speed on the situation and accidentally zaps him with a blast from the blue DCG they now have. (For some reason, the crazy girl took Artie's green bar of soap.) They check on Fry to make sure he's ok and then decide to start portal jumping to other dimensions in order to get back to Manny's house. (Apparently Manny's shed is a major gateway into the neighborhood... I think... and now Artie and Mason must blow it up!)

They begin portal hopping and venture through several different worlds. The background settings in each alternate dimension are impressively rendered, and we get a good feel for all the different worlds beyond ours. (Most of them look like they've been wrecked by wars and/or polluted terribly by industry. Nice touch!) They eventually take a right turn and end up at Manny's shed. They go inside their late friend's house and are ambushed by a large group of Clonebots. Artie and Mason are then questioned about the location of the DCG by a Clonebot leader, and claim that they don't have it anymore. ("Crazy bitch stole my soap!") Just then, the crazy girl teleports into the room and zaps a nearby Clonebot. Following that, she gets into a gibberish argument with the Clonebot leader, and they scrap over a the green DCG. During their scuffle, they both end up teleporting out of the room, creating enough of a diversion for Artie and Mason to grab their guns and go on a rampage.

Both guys blast away at wave after wave of Clonebots in the house and fight their way toward the backyard. (At this point, I began noticing that only two Clonebots were used in each scene. Through the magic of editing, we get the illusion that there's at least a dozen or more.) Once they reach the back door, Artie and Mason are assaulted by Manny! Apparently the Clonebots turned Manny into one of the undead in order to serve their purposes, but he doesn't pose too much of a threat. Rather than have an emotional conflict and think twice about shooting his mentor, Artie just blows his zombified friend away. That's when things start to get a little crazy for our two heroes. Pairs of Clonebots start pouring out of Manny's shed/dimensional gateway and the backyard quickly becomes a shooting gallery. There seems to be no end to the number of Clonebots pouring out of the shed, so Artie sacrifices himself to blow it up. He grabs a gas can and dives into the shed, which explodes seconds later.

The next day, Mason, forlorn over the loss of his best friend, actually decides to not play any video games and calls up Fry to see if he's ok. Fry is indeed alright, even though he was hit with a blue fireball the night before. After Mason gets off the phone with Fry, Artie suddenly bursts out of a closet door. He swiftly explains that he's been over in the Clonebot dimension for a year and has been fighting against the evil cyborgs. Artie hands Mason a gun and and leads him outside where a large group of Clonebots have just warped in. It seems that Artie has killed their leader and is now number one on the Clonebot hit-list. The Clonebots have also managed to obtain the "green soap," but Artie managed to snag the "red soap," which controls time! (Wait, huh?!) As the film ends, Artie and Mason leap into action to kick some Clonebot butt before the end credits roll.

Artie Saves the Hood was definitely a fun little sci-fi romp and has some amazing special effects. Phil Mohr is the master behind the computer generated lasers and alternate dimensions, and he did a top notch job on it all! The music in the film (composed by Phil Mohr) is made up of several cool techno tunes and really livens up the action scenes. The awesome effects and music really help things out because the acting in Artie isn't all that great, and most of the cast seems emotionless. Yeah I know, it's only a thirty-three minute short film, but damn it, everyone in the movie acts like they're a Clonebot in disguise! Even if the character's were fleshed out a bit more, I wouldn't care much because none of them have a shred of personality. (Sad but true.) But I'm being way too picky, because the film's main strength is the impressive special effects.

I still can't get over how great the computer rendered effects look, and I'd really like to see what else these guys can put together in the future. Hopefully their next production will place a sharper focus on the storyline and acting, while still delivering on the above average effects. Currently Artie Saves the Hood is only available through the official Artie Saves the Hood Website. The DVD contains a nice, clean, full-screen transfer of the film (with an equally clear and crisp audio track), a trailer for Artie Saves the Hood, and a handful of short films made by Ed Radmanich III and company. These include two "Artie Guy & Jay" cartoons (my personal favorite is "Flying Box Cards"), a weird animated commercial for "Suckle's Suck Puffs," and a short action film called "A.D.D Bad Night." So if you're easily amused and in the mood for a fast-paced indie sci-fi flick, then check out Artie Saves the Hood.