Cyborg (1989)
Cyborg is a 1989 American martial-arts cyberpunk film directed by Albert Pyun. Jean-Claude van Damme stars as Gibson Rickenbacker, a mercenary who battles a group of murderous marauders led by Fender Tremolo (Vincent Klyn) along the East coast of the United States in a post-apocalyptic future. The film is the first in Pyun’s Cyborg Trilogy. It was followed by 1993’s Knights (originally entitled The Kingdom of Metal: Cyborg Killer) and Omega Doom in 1997. Cyborg was followed by the sequels Cyborg 2 (1993) an d Cyborg 3: The Recycler (1994). After the success of Bloodsport, Cannon films offered Jean-Claude van Damme the lead in Delta Force 2, American Ninja 3 or Cyborg. He chose the latter although he later admitted “I didn’t like [the film] so much.”
Plot:
A plague known as the living death cripples civilization. A small group of surviving scientists and doctors — located in Atlanta, home of the CDC — work on a cure to save what remains of humanity. To complete their work they need information stored on a computer system in New York City. Pearl Prophet volunteers for the dangerous courier mission and is made into a cyborg through surgical augmentation. Pearl, accompanied by bodyguard Marshall Strat, retrieves the data in New York but is pursued by the vicious Fender Tremolo and his gang of pirates. Fender wants the cure so he can have a monopoly on its production. Strat, badly injured while fighting the pirates, tells Pearl to leave him and find a mercenary, known as a “slinger”, who can escort her to safety.
She gets cornered but is saved by a slinger named Gibson Rickenbacker. After she explains her situation, they are overrun by Fender’s gang, and Gibson is knocked out by falling debris. Fender demands that she accompany him to Atlanta or die. Fender’s gang slaughters a family and steals their boat. They head south for Atlanta via the Intracoastal Waterway with the captive Pearl. Gibson, who had been tracking the pirates, arrives at the scene of slaughter later that night. A shadowy figure attacks him, but he disables her. She turns out to be Nady Simmons, a young woman who mistook him as a pirate. Nady, whose family was wiped out by the plague, joins Gibson. Gibson is less concerned with a cure for the plague than with killing Fender.
Cast:
Jean-Claude van Damme as Gibson
Deborah Richter as Nady Simmons
Vincent Klyn as Fender Tremolo
Dayle Haddon as Pearl Prophet
Alex Daniels as Marshall Strat
Blaise Loong as Furman Vux
Ralf Möller as Brick Bardo
Haley Peterson as Haley
Terrie Batson as Mary
Jackson ‘Rock’ Pinckney as Tytus