It’s not quite worth waiting for the appearance of the late great Native American acting icon Graham Greene in “The Protector,” one of the last films he finished before dying last September.

As the reservation leader Brand, Greene is world weary and wise and sardonic, an old safe of the West presiding over the last aquifer in a region the locals have sucked dry. We hear him narrate the story, but he doesn’t show up until 68 minutes of really bad movie have passed before our eyes.

Writer-director Raul Gastreazoro’s debut feature — he made the doc “11-8-16” — is straight-up C-movie sci-fi, built around a grab bag of sci-tropes and cliches. It’s junk centered on a convict freed from prison to break into that reservation for a gangster who wants the water so he can rule what’s left of the ruined American West.

But Greene classes it up.

There’s also this silly sport of this not-that-distant-future, “Dirt Jousting,” featuring lance-armed riders standing on the hoods or roofs of vintage suicide-door Buick Rivieras hurtling at one another, a half-assed novelty worthy of George Lucas at his laziest.

The water’s all but gone. A plague called “The Rot” has spread through the land. The West is cordoned off, with Border Patrol merely shifting its checkpoints. The law is survival of the best-armed. And women are infertile, making this the “last generation” to live the American Dream.

Marguerite Moreau is Key, a veteran “dirt jouster” freed from prison by the finagling of Gael (Aryeh -Or, properly menacing) who wants Key’s knowhow about how to get into Brand’s reservation. The old man put minefields on all the routes in.

Moreau, whose credits go back to “The Mighty Ducks,” is credible as a fighting fury, often shot in silhouette, almost always in shoulder pads, mask or gas mask so we can’t tell if it’s a stunt woman doing the heavy lifting.

April Lee is Sona, the resentful sex worker Gael relies on as a lieutenant. Edgar Feliciano is Nayati, a Native-born hoodlum aiding Gael.

And Mark Keith Lane and Treci Lane play the nomadic (and real life) parents of Mark Lane III, that rarest sight in a barren land, a small boy. There’s a bounty on children who are wanted for scientific “study” to see if the human race can be saved.

Greene narrates this story of a place and time where there “ain’t much life to live.” We get it.

When another character cracks, “Those sci-fi movies, they got it right,” he’s merely pointing out that all the ideas stirred up here are stolen from better movies. Because “The Protector” gets pretty much everything wrong.

Rating: unrated, violence and profanity

Cast: Marguerite Moreau, Aryeh-Or, Edgar Feliciano, April Lee, Mark Lane III, Mark Keith Lane, Treci Lane and Graham Greene.

Credits: Scripted and directed by Raul Gasteazoro. A Vertical release on Amazon Prime.

Running time: 1:43