AllMovie

An utterly unique homemade sci-fi-action-sexploitation buddy picture, Runaway Nightmare is a sublimely amateurish mess that must be endured to be believed. Two pals running a worm ranch in Death Valley long for some excitement to cut the boredom of their lives. Their wishes are fulfilled when they witness mobsters burying a beautiful blonde woman alive in the desert, rescue her, and are taken captive by a ruthless squadron of female revolutionaries for their trouble. Our heroes are first tortured and then used as sex slaves, but eventually the girl gang invites them to join their cause, and they fight the syndicate to recover a briefcase full of stolen platinum. Runaway Nightmare initially follows a standard male fantasy template (kidnapped by dominant females for stud service), but it isn't pornographic. The male leads crack jokes like adolescent versions of Bob Hope and Bing Crosby, but none of it is funny. The plot includes radioactive accidents, exploding warehouses, and bar fights, but there is no action. First-and-only-time director Michael Cartel is fond of long, airless scenes in which nothing happens, giving Runaway Nightmare the bizarre waking dream sensation that badly constructed films sometimes achieve accidentally. The dialogue is ridiculous, the situations are ludicrous, and there isn't an actor in sight. Brief, clumsily-inserted nude scenes are meant to double for characters in the narrative, but the women's bodies are different, their faces are obscured, and they're shot on videotape rather than the film stock used for the rest of the picture. In spite of (and because of) these dubious virtues, Runaway Nightmare is a one-of-a-kind cinematic experience, a fascinating failure that reaches new heights of weirdness, and its obscure home video release is worth seeking out for the jaded and the curious.