The bad of the bad: GYMKATA!

I want you to imagine something.

It is the year 1985. Mullets, cocaine, synth-rock and parachute pants are in full swing. A pasty gymnast, sporting a $5 haircut and a severe unibrow, is commissioned by the United States government to infiltrate an annual life-or-death tournament in the nation of Parmistan (yes, Parmistan). He trains under a random assortment of sweat-panted lumpy guys, who instruct him on how to fuse the “skill of gymnastics with the kill of karate.” After spending an afternoon being kicked in the nuts and walking on his hands up a flight of stairs while wearing the tiniest pair of red shorts I have ever seen, the government sends him to Parmistan to take part in the tournament.

Sounds awesome, doesn’t it? Well, I have a good news for you. This isn’t a crazy, far-fetched dream. This is a reality. The absurdly kickass reality of …

GYMKATA.

Yes, “Gymkata,” a film so ridiculously laughable it nearly beats itself up for bus fair. Through the course of the movie, our hopeless hero finds himself in hair-raising situations involving gangsters, ninjas and even zombies. Luckily for him, the small villages of Parmistan are positively teeming with old gymnastic equipment!

As he scampers away from machine-toting thugs, he stumbles upon an opportune set of uneven bars, and promptly proceeds to dish out the awesome might of GYMKATA! When he finds himself surrounded by the zombie-like villagers of a fortified town, what should be conveniently placed in the village square? Why, it’s a pommel horse! He mounts the medieval gym equipment and provides the violent mob with a hefty taste of GYMKATA! And what better way to kill his arch-nemesis than by thrusting the man’s head into his crotch and crushing it between his powerful thighs, using the skill of – what else? – GYMKATA!

The entire film is chock full of priceless moments like these. It’s crap camp at its very finest. With a lead who has little-to-no acting talent whatsoever, a love interest who doesn’t speak a single word of English, a completely made-up country to take place in and a not-so-subtly homosexual villain, “Gymkata” is simply amazing.

I would, without a shadow of a doubt, rank it among the likes of “Plan 9,” “Manos” and “Battlefield Earth,” bestowing upon it the coveted title of “Bad of the Bad.”

GYMKATA!