Jim Brown and Fred Williamson are a pair of cowboys hired by Dana Andrews to transport a bankroll to Mexico. Along the way, they encounter Lee Van Cleef in a familiar role as a bounty hunter determined to steal the cash. Jim Kelly is a kung-fu-fighting half-breed Indian (wow!). There are lots of shootouts and much wise-ass talk to satisfy action fans in this Spaghetti Western-Blaxploitation-Martial Arts mashup. The supporting cast of stalwarts include Barry Sullivan and Harry Carey, Jr.. The prolific director Antonio Margheriti (credited under his American pseudonym Anthony Dawson - (not Prof. Dent)) handles the action in his usual profligate manner. Jerry Goldsmith provides the score which nicely sits aside the gunplay.
A decent example of the genre.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
This movie was directed by David MacKenzie, who also directed "Hell and high water" among other movies and TV shows. The leads are Ewan McGregor who plays a chef at a restaurant and our own Eva Green who plays a sceintist who works with epidemics. The world is hit by an epidemic that takes people's senses away one by one, starting with taste. Obviously the professions of th leads are very relevant to the epidemic. Having experienced the covid-19 pandemic we probably experience Perfect Sense in a differnt ligfht now. Some even lost their sense of taste when they got Covid. i think it's impressive that such big stars as McGregor and Green make movies like this where the budget is low and the chanses of being a box office hit is even smaller, but everyone delvers great and intense acting. Of course Eva is stunningly beautiful and being French she has plenty of nude scenes. in spite of this the movie is pretty dark. I like that the movie doesn't focus on the medical side, but the emotional effects and the effects on society. While this is a very different genere I would very much like MacKenzie to direct a Bond movie.
It didn’t take much persuasion for me to watch this early entry in the Women in Prison genre. Super-sexy Pam Grier and our own Sid Haig star, exploitation legend Jack Hill directs, and it’s filmed in the Philippines - nuff said.
The local women’s prison is run by a sadistic warden and his misogynistic guards. The girls fight amongst themselves, yearn for sex with “real men” and are tortured and forced to work at a huge sugar mill (the eponymous Big Bird Cage). Haig and Grier lead a crew of revolutionaries who plan to release the women from their island hell to fortify the ranks of their army. They infiltrate the camp, she as a prisoner and he as a guard, and all hell breaks loose, the inmates dodge bullets and explosions to escape.
Hill’s compact dialogue and helter-skelter direction keep things moving at a rapid pace throughout. Full of gratuitous titillation and fabulous un-PC thrills, The Big Bird Cage is a masterwork of its genre, and another gem in Hill's formidable CV (which includes Switchblade Sisters, and two Pam Grier classics Coffy and Foxy Brown—all highly recommended).
Just about as close to sleazy exploitation drive-in heaven as you're ever going to get.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
I just watched The Big Bird Cage myself a couple months back
a bit more entertaining than other womens prison films I've seen, because its full of comedy, like the scenes in the revolutionarys camp. also beautiful landscapes. The more typical such films are all within dark confined spaces
Barry Newman headlines the cast but make no mistake about the fact that the star of the show is the yellow Dodge 426 Hemi Challenger. Newman is a Vietnam vet/ex-cop/ex-race car driver who bets that he can deliver the Challenger from Denver to San Francisco in 15 hours. Guzzling handfuls of amphetamines, he gets speed-induced hallucinations, encounters a few weirdos while being chased by cops. Dean Jagger and Cleavon Little are two that he encounters along the way. This became a cult movie back in the day but apart from some spectacular car chases it offers very little.
Newman would next do Fear Is The Key where he has an exciting car chase using a Ford Gran Torino. Lucky feller.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
'Cross of Iron' by Sam Peckinpah and starring James Coburn. It was the full, unedited version which featured the infamous 'biting off of the appendage' scene.
It's a long time since I saw the film (it hasn't been on TV for perhaps thirty plus years) and even then it was heavily sanitised.
I'm glad that JC didn't try to put on a German accent. Given his track record in 'The Great Escape' he'd have probably sounded like a pantomime villain.
It's a brutal and uncompromising anti-war film which is well worth a watch if you haven't seen it before.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
Old professor John Hurt and young student Elijah Wood get involved in and try to solve an apparent series of murders in and around Oxford. Dreary and pretentious with name checks or visual homages to philosophers (Wittgenstein being the most prominent) and film directors (eg Hitchcock), unrealistic actions by characters (the police casually allowing Wood and Hurt in on the investigation), and an unsatisfying conclusion.
Alex Cox stands out in the cast, and there's a nicely imagined Victorian era murder scene.
I’m going to rewatch this soon, it’s a great movie and on my streaming channel, I hope it the full uncut version. Coburn’s accent in Great Escape was awful but his Irish accent in FIstfulOfDynamite was pretty good.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
@CoolHandBond I watched it on the 'Movieland' streaming channel. It's a free app and the films are shown without ad breaks. There's loads of classic movies on there, in fact it's the platform I used to watch 'The First Great Train Robbery' starring SC (again unedited)
I don't think I've seen 'A Fistful of Dynamite' so can't comment on JCs accent!
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
AUSTIN POWERS: INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY (1997)
As a fan of James Bond, particularly the ‘golden decade’ of Sean Connery from 1962 – 1971, I ask myself: am I supposed to enjoy Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery ?
Then I start watching, start laughing and stop asking silly questions.
Mike Myers shamelessly bamboozles us with impersonations of our beloved OO7 and his 1960s rivals, retconning the sets, costumes, plots, characters and the misogynistic atmosphere of all things sixties-spy, bubble wrapped for protection in sugary fun and Carry On innuendo. Now, I really enjoy Bond films, but by 1997 they’d become a little bit frayed at the edges. All the best villains and pretty girls had vanished, the plots had become shrouded in glue, everything was a little messy and rather slow, albeit a fun kind of messy and slow. I could say the same thing about Austin Powers, so terrible a film it is outright hilarious. There is a sophisticated knack to making a project so bad it actually becomes good and Mike Myers achieves it by throwing metaphorical kitchen sinks of the spy-craze at the screen and seeing where they land: fembots, over sexed heroes, delectable heroines, evil geniuses, dastardly plots, stupidity from opening second to closing reel, moments that make you laugh because they are genuinely funny, or chuckle because they are so laughably identifiable, no stone cold classic moment of spy-thrill is left unturned. The bald-faced cheek of the writers is admirable.
This is movie is very funny.
Watching Austin Powers #1 capped a great day catching up with old friends in Pimlico. So, okay, I was trashed from a boozy lunch that turned into a boozy evening. Did I care? The lovely Abigail at the Brass Monkey remembered me from my previous visits, and purloined me with free Guinness; so thank you, Abigail. And thanks, Mike Myers, for a fantastic lesson in how to liberally take the piss out of James Bond and his contemporaries. Sometimes, I wish the most recent incarnation had stopped taking himself so seriously and just got on with the job, thrills, stunts, stupidity, laughter and all.
I know Austin Powers #1 is taking the piss out of my cinematic hero, but I loved it in 1997 and I loved it last night.
The AP soundtrack was a big hit on CD in its day and if you're a vinyl junkie I recommend getting the double album you can find on eBay or Amazon, one disc in red the other in purple; it's a great double bill with John Barry's vinyl LP too, can't remember the name of it but it's a double and has that kind of beat girl Soho coffee shop vibe to it (but not Beat Girl on it sadly).
Likewise, the AP LP has everything except These Boots Are Made For Walking on it, still I've got that as a single.
I watched this last night and put this to the front of a long list of reviews that I haven’t posted yet. To get the accent point out of the way, James Coburn speaks in his natural voice, but then again, every other actor does the same, so a bit unfair to single him out for that. I’ve got no problem with actors not attempting accents, it’s very difficult to keep it going for the entire movie, (Sean Connery in The Untouchables is one example of an actor reverting back to natural accent after a few scenes) and movies are supposed to be entertaining so I’m not looking for exact real-life interpretations.
Sam Peckinpah takes us into the Second World War through the eyes of the German army on the Russian front. Coburn is a maverick corporal who is suddenly landed with a devious, cowardly captain, played by Maximilian Schell. His wants to be awarded the Iron Cross and he is not too picky about the way he gets it and betrays Coburn’s unit to try and achieve his aim. Regimental Colonel James Mason is onto him though, but Coburn refuses to acknowledge Schell’s cowardice in battle, instead he rants about hating all officers. David Warner plays another captain, who actually deserves the medal, and Senta Berger is a nurse who Coburn is attracted to when he recuperates in a nursing home after being injured.
The action is bloodily brutal (this is the full uncensored version) and somewhat confusing at times, but to be fair battles must be like that in reality. The budget apparently ran out before the final scenes of mayhem were due to be filmed and the studio refused to give more funding so we get an odd truncated ending and the supposedly penultimate battle scene becomes the final battle.
The acting is fine all round, Peckinpah directs his slow-motion blood spurts efficiently but this would be the last “real” Peckinpah movie before signing off with two very average movies (Convoy and Osterman Weekend) as the alcohol and drug abuse took toll on his body and mind.
It’s a must-see, flawed, but nonetheless a fine anti-war picture.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
Just to be clear I wasn't singling James Coburn out for criticism, having seen his efforts in the Great Escape, I was simply relieved that he didn't try the accent.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
CITIZEN X (1995) starring Stephen Rea, Donald Sutherland, Joss Ackland, and Max Von Sydow.
The film documents the hunt for Andrei Chikatilo, a serial killer in the Soviet Union who operated throughout the 1980s. Stephen Rea stars as Bukarov, a forensics specialist who gets roped into the leading the investigation once bodies start being discovered. Donald Sutherland is Fetisov, the head of the provincial committee and Bukarov's superior. Together, Rea and Sutherland work to hunt down whoever it is that is killing children.
This is an excellent film with well drawn out characters, all of whom have good arcs. Sutherland is particularly excellent, especially in his scenes where he is 'guiding' Rea's character through the Soviet apparatus and corruption. Watching Sutherland and Rea both work against (and eventually, through) the system is really fascinating. The direction is crisp without being showy, allowing the principal actors to all just WORK. Joss Ackland and Max Von Sydow turn in excellent smaller performances as well.
This was up for numerous Golden Globe and Emmy awards when it came out, and Donald Sutherland rightly won Best Supporting Actor in both ceremonies. Had this been theatrically released (and it really should have been), it would have merited several Academy Awards and I suspect that Sutherland would have also won there.
Really a first rate film. This was a 'made for HBO' film and you can currently see it on Max.
An awkward, anxious, depressive teenager unable to grieve for her father who died four years previously struggles to survive her seventeenth year. Fitfully amusing teen comedy which plays out like Dawson’s Creek for the Tech Savvy Generation. Hailee Steinfeld plays Nadine, the mixed up youngster, and while she’s exceptionally good, you do wonder why she is so unpopular, for Nadine is smart, witty, funky and startlingly pretty. Having a chip on her shoulder over her jock-brother isn’t enough to make her socially inept. No. There should be something deeper. The movie makers don’t go there because it is either too painful or too genuine. So we get the sassy version and the cliches come and go and we admire all the tenderness, all the angst and all the keen playing from a youthful cast. Woody Harrellson steals most of the scenes as a world-weary but sympathetic history teacher. Very good for its niche genre market, but really should have been a television series.
Linda Blair turned to bad-girl roles when big budget offers dried up after her Exorcist exploits. But even with her innocent cherubic looks she makes you think that she can kick ass with the best of them. Blair is the leader of The Satins, a gang of sexy girls who dress like streetwalkers. They’re insulted by a rival gang of guys, so they steal their Chevy convertible and trash it. In a very unpleasant scene, the bad guys brutally rape Blair’s deaf-mute sister (Linnea Quigley) for revenge. After a couple more skirmishes, they grab another of the Satins and toss her off a bridge to her death. Blair takes the only route available in exploitation movies by donning a revealing skintight suit and killing the hoods one by one with a crossbow. We also get the obligatory catfight in the girls’ shower and Linda shows off her ample bosom during a bath tub scene while she contemplates how to slaughter the guys. John Vernon gives a bit of gravitas to the proceedings as the school principal.
Its like a thousand other revenge movies but worth checking out for the slutty costumes and mainly well done deaths.
Yeah, well, sometimes nothin' can be a real cool hand.
An Australian war film set in Vietnam which follows the exploits of a group of SAS soldiers during their tour of duty. It's not you typical war film and much of the focus lays on life in and around a tented forward encampment. Monsoons, poor food, disease, in fact all the mundane things soldiers face interspersed by patrolling and contact with the enemy (the 'odd angry shot'). It's filled with black humour, so typical of the Ozzie films of its day.
It's an interesting watch, but not for those who want any 'Rambo' stuff. It's available on YouTube and is ad free.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
Henry Hathaway doesn’t have to do much to keep us entertained. Point the camera and shoot, basically. That system of operating doesn’t lend itself to very intense pictures and The Sons of Katie Elder is no exception. Part rollicking comedy, part revenge tale, part poverty row western, the film marks one of John Wayne’s least interesting performances, partly I suspect due to his still being in recovery from an operation to remove a cancerous lung. He looks unfit, overweight and far too old to play the lead; he grimaces through almost every scene, standing on that left hip like he does and drawling his lines to interminable length. There’s barely an ounce of enjoyment in his performance. His role really needed someone younger; Charles Bronson would have fitted perfectly and brought a brooding presence to a film that tries to be too sunny for its underlying revenge theme. Unfortunately, not even the usually reliable Dean Martin can raise a smile. The chemistry between Duke and Dino that worked so well in Rio Bravo fails to materialise here. The similar slow burn romance barely flickers. The action, when it comes, is daft in the extreme and the resolution far too simple.
Wayne and his three brothers [Martin, Earl Holliman and Micheal Anderson Jr] reunite at their mother’s funeral and learn that all is not well in the Texas town of Freshwater, where James Gregory’s Morgan Hastings is plotting a big business take over, using the river water on the Elder’s range to bring the railroad and the big money. Cue plenty of old-style wild west tropes ladled with too much good humour. George Kennedy makes an impression as a nasty gunslinger. The film was tremendously popular, but to suggest the film is a classic because it features big stars, big Mexican scenery [well photographed by Lucien Ballard and probably the best thing about the movie], a big booming Elmer Bernstein score [unfortunately much too similar to The Magnificent Seven] and a wonderfully sentimental closing shot of Katie Elder’s rocking chair – well, that just isn’t enough.
I have never seen this film before and, frankly it was a big disappointment.
Sir MilesThe Wrong Side Of The WardrobePosts: 26,923Chief of Staff
This film is my favourite - by far - of any John Wayne film…and is easily in my top 3 Westerns…exactly why you don’t like Wayne’s portrayal is exactly why I do, I think he brings out the ‘tough, grizzled and slightly gone to seed gunslinger’ that John Elder has become - I also disagree with you about the chemistry between Wayne & Martin, but I understand what you mean about it resolving simply, although I don’t think there is anything wrong with that…perhaps I just like simple films 😂
Among the casual absurdities of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Ant-Man must rank as one of the most preposterous. Scott Lang is a loser with a heart of gold and a cute daughter who robs the safe of scientist Dr Hank Pym and steals his secret super-powered suit. Naturally, Pym is a super-genius and he has perfected the ‘Pym Particle’, an atom shrinking serum that reduces the suit-wearer to the size of an ant. Cue lots of tongue firmly in cheek, a good ninety minutes or so of CGI effects – mostly of marauding armies of insects – and a half decent central performance from Paul Rudd. Michael Douglas does his bit for cross generational heroics as Dr Pym. Evangeline Lilly makes an impression as his martial art loving daughter. Bald headed villain Darren Cross, who metamorphosises into the similarly miniaturised Yellowjacket, is impersonated by Corey Stoll. Naturally, Cross is another genius scientist, only he’s got more than one screw loose. Fights and general silliness abounds. The movie was cowritten by Edgar Wright [of Shaun of the Dead etc] and doesn’t take itself too seriously which is a refreshing change from the usual Marvel deadpan antics. Despite the constant wizardry on show, the film doesn’t explain itself very well and the extended climax is as overblown as all the rest of these comic book adaptations. Fun, I suppose, but I won’t be revisiting Ant-Man any time soon.
Comments
35 anniversary today Batman '89
TAKE A HARD RIDE (1975)
Jim Brown and Fred Williamson are a pair of cowboys hired by Dana Andrews to transport a bankroll to Mexico. Along the way, they encounter Lee Van Cleef in a familiar role as a bounty hunter determined to steal the cash. Jim Kelly is a kung-fu-fighting half-breed Indian (wow!). There are lots of shootouts and much wise-ass talk to satisfy action fans in this Spaghetti Western-Blaxploitation-Martial Arts mashup. The supporting cast of stalwarts include Barry Sullivan and Harry Carey, Jr.. The prolific director Antonio Margheriti (credited under his American pseudonym Anthony Dawson - (not Prof. Dent)) handles the action in his usual profligate manner. Jerry Goldsmith provides the score which nicely sits aside the gunplay.
A decent example of the genre.
Perfect Sense (2011)
This movie was directed by David MacKenzie, who also directed "Hell and high water" among other movies and TV shows. The leads are Ewan McGregor who plays a chef at a restaurant and our own Eva Green who plays a sceintist who works with epidemics. The world is hit by an epidemic that takes people's senses away one by one, starting with taste. Obviously the professions of th leads are very relevant to the epidemic. Having experienced the covid-19 pandemic we probably experience Perfect Sense in a differnt ligfht now. Some even lost their sense of taste when they got Covid. i think it's impressive that such big stars as McGregor and Green make movies like this where the budget is low and the chanses of being a box office hit is even smaller, but everyone delvers great and intense acting. Of course Eva is stunningly beautiful and being French she has plenty of nude scenes. in spite of this the movie is pretty dark. I like that the movie doesn't focus on the medical side, but the emotional effects and the effects on society. While this is a very different genere I would very much like MacKenzie to direct a Bond movie.
THE BIG BIRD CAGE (1972)
It didn’t take much persuasion for me to watch this early entry in the Women in Prison genre. Super-sexy Pam Grier and our own Sid Haig star, exploitation legend Jack Hill directs, and it’s filmed in the Philippines - nuff said.
The local women’s prison is run by a sadistic warden and his misogynistic guards. The girls fight amongst themselves, yearn for sex with “real men” and are tortured and forced to work at a huge sugar mill (the eponymous Big Bird Cage). Haig and Grier lead a crew of revolutionaries who plan to release the women from their island hell to fortify the ranks of their army. They infiltrate the camp, she as a prisoner and he as a guard, and all hell breaks loose, the inmates dodge bullets and explosions to escape.
Hill’s compact dialogue and helter-skelter direction keep things moving at a rapid pace throughout. Full of gratuitous titillation and fabulous un-PC thrills, The Big Bird Cage is a masterwork of its genre, and another gem in Hill's formidable CV (which includes Switchblade Sisters, and two Pam Grier classics Coffy and Foxy Brown—all highly recommended).
Just about as close to sleazy exploitation drive-in heaven as you're ever going to get.
KELLY'S HEROES, in honor of Donald Sutherland.
Yep, still good.
I just watched The Big Bird Cage myself a couple months back
a bit more entertaining than other womens prison films I've seen, because its full of comedy, like the scenes in the revolutionarys camp. also beautiful landscapes. The more typical such films are all within dark confined spaces
VANISHING POINT (1971)
Barry Newman headlines the cast but make no mistake about the fact that the star of the show is the yellow Dodge 426 Hemi Challenger. Newman is a Vietnam vet/ex-cop/ex-race car driver who bets that he can deliver the Challenger from Denver to San Francisco in 15 hours. Guzzling handfuls of amphetamines, he gets speed-induced hallucinations, encounters a few weirdos while being chased by cops. Dean Jagger and Cleavon Little are two that he encounters along the way. This became a cult movie back in the day but apart from some spectacular car chases it offers very little.
Newman would next do Fear Is The Key where he has an exciting car chase using a Ford Gran Torino. Lucky feller.
'Cross of Iron' by Sam Peckinpah and starring James Coburn. It was the full, unedited version which featured the infamous 'biting off of the appendage' scene.
It's a long time since I saw the film (it hasn't been on TV for perhaps thirty plus years) and even then it was heavily sanitised.
I'm glad that JC didn't try to put on a German accent. Given his track record in 'The Great Escape' he'd have probably sounded like a pantomime villain.
It's a brutal and uncompromising anti-war film which is well worth a watch if you haven't seen it before.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
The Oxford Murders (2008)
Old professor John Hurt and young student Elijah Wood get involved in and try to solve an apparent series of murders in and around Oxford. Dreary and pretentious with name checks or visual homages to philosophers (Wittgenstein being the most prominent) and film directors (eg Hitchcock), unrealistic actions by characters (the police casually allowing Wood and Hurt in on the investigation), and an unsatisfying conclusion.
Alex Cox stands out in the cast, and there's a nicely imagined Victorian era murder scene.
I’m going to rewatch this soon, it’s a great movie and on my streaming channel, I hope it the full uncut version. Coburn’s accent in Great Escape was awful but his Irish accent in FIstful Of Dynamite was pretty good.
@CoolHandBond I watched it on the 'Movieland' streaming channel. It's a free app and the films are shown without ad breaks. There's loads of classic movies on there, in fact it's the platform I used to watch 'The First Great Train Robbery' starring SC (again unedited)
I don't think I've seen 'A Fistful of Dynamite' so can't comment on JCs accent!
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
AUSTIN POWERS: INTERNATIONAL MAN OF MYSTERY (1997)
As a fan of James Bond, particularly the ‘golden decade’ of Sean Connery from 1962 – 1971, I ask myself: am I supposed to enjoy Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery ?
Then I start watching, start laughing and stop asking silly questions.
Mike Myers shamelessly bamboozles us with impersonations of our beloved OO7 and his 1960s rivals, retconning the sets, costumes, plots, characters and the misogynistic atmosphere of all things sixties-spy, bubble wrapped for protection in sugary fun and Carry On innuendo. Now, I really enjoy Bond films, but by 1997 they’d become a little bit frayed at the edges. All the best villains and pretty girls had vanished, the plots had become shrouded in glue, everything was a little messy and rather slow, albeit a fun kind of messy and slow. I could say the same thing about Austin Powers, so terrible a film it is outright hilarious. There is a sophisticated knack to making a project so bad it actually becomes good and Mike Myers achieves it by throwing metaphorical kitchen sinks of the spy-craze at the screen and seeing where they land: fembots, over sexed heroes, delectable heroines, evil geniuses, dastardly plots, stupidity from opening second to closing reel, moments that make you laugh because they are genuinely funny, or chuckle because they are so laughably identifiable, no stone cold classic moment of spy-thrill is left unturned. The bald-faced cheek of the writers is admirable.
This is movie is very funny.
Watching Austin Powers #1 capped a great day catching up with old friends in Pimlico. So, okay, I was trashed from a boozy lunch that turned into a boozy evening. Did I care? The lovely Abigail at the Brass Monkey remembered me from my previous visits, and purloined me with free Guinness; so thank you, Abigail. And thanks, Mike Myers, for a fantastic lesson in how to liberally take the piss out of James Bond and his contemporaries. Sometimes, I wish the most recent incarnation had stopped taking himself so seriously and just got on with the job, thrills, stunts, stupidity, laughter and all.
I know Austin Powers #1 is taking the piss out of my cinematic hero, but I loved it in 1997 and I loved it last night.
Shagadelic, baby !
The first AUSTIN POWERS is great. The sequels, not so much.
The AP soundtrack was a big hit on CD in its day and if you're a vinyl junkie I recommend getting the double album you can find on eBay or Amazon, one disc in red the other in purple; it's a great double bill with John Barry's vinyl LP too, can't remember the name of it but it's a double and has that kind of beat girl Soho coffee shop vibe to it (but not Beat Girl on it sadly).
Likewise, the AP LP has everything except These Boots Are Made For Walking on it, still I've got that as a single.
Roger Moore 1927-2017
CROSS OF IRON (1977)
I watched this last night and put this to the front of a long list of reviews that I haven’t posted yet. To get the accent point out of the way, James Coburn speaks in his natural voice, but then again, every other actor does the same, so a bit unfair to single him out for that. I’ve got no problem with actors not attempting accents, it’s very difficult to keep it going for the entire movie, (Sean Connery in The Untouchables is one example of an actor reverting back to natural accent after a few scenes) and movies are supposed to be entertaining so I’m not looking for exact real-life interpretations.
Sam Peckinpah takes us into the Second World War through the eyes of the German army on the Russian front. Coburn is a maverick corporal who is suddenly landed with a devious, cowardly captain, played by Maximilian Schell. His wants to be awarded the Iron Cross and he is not too picky about the way he gets it and betrays Coburn’s unit to try and achieve his aim. Regimental Colonel James Mason is onto him though, but Coburn refuses to acknowledge Schell’s cowardice in battle, instead he rants about hating all officers. David Warner plays another captain, who actually deserves the medal, and Senta Berger is a nurse who Coburn is attracted to when he recuperates in a nursing home after being injured.
The action is bloodily brutal (this is the full uncensored version) and somewhat confusing at times, but to be fair battles must be like that in reality. The budget apparently ran out before the final scenes of mayhem were due to be filmed and the studio refused to give more funding so we get an odd truncated ending and the supposedly penultimate battle scene becomes the final battle.
The acting is fine all round, Peckinpah directs his slow-motion blood spurts efficiently but this would be the last “real” Peckinpah movie before signing off with two very average movies (Convoy and Osterman Weekend) as the alcohol and drug abuse took toll on his body and mind.
It’s a must-see, flawed, but nonetheless a fine anti-war picture.
Just to be clear I wasn't singling James Coburn out for criticism, having seen his efforts in the Great Escape, I was simply relieved that he didn't try the accent.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
CITIZEN X (1995) starring Stephen Rea, Donald Sutherland, Joss Ackland, and Max Von Sydow.
The film documents the hunt for Andrei Chikatilo, a serial killer in the Soviet Union who operated throughout the 1980s. Stephen Rea stars as Bukarov, a forensics specialist who gets roped into the leading the investigation once bodies start being discovered. Donald Sutherland is Fetisov, the head of the provincial committee and Bukarov's superior. Together, Rea and Sutherland work to hunt down whoever it is that is killing children.
This is an excellent film with well drawn out characters, all of whom have good arcs. Sutherland is particularly excellent, especially in his scenes where he is 'guiding' Rea's character through the Soviet apparatus and corruption. Watching Sutherland and Rea both work against (and eventually, through) the system is really fascinating. The direction is crisp without being showy, allowing the principal actors to all just WORK. Joss Ackland and Max Von Sydow turn in excellent smaller performances as well.
This was up for numerous Golden Globe and Emmy awards when it came out, and Donald Sutherland rightly won Best Supporting Actor in both ceremonies. Had this been theatrically released (and it really should have been), it would have merited several Academy Awards and I suspect that Sutherland would have also won there.
Really a first rate film. This was a 'made for HBO' film and you can currently see it on Max.
THE EDGE OF SEVENTEEN (2016)
An awkward, anxious, depressive teenager unable to grieve for her father who died four years previously struggles to survive her seventeenth year. Fitfully amusing teen comedy which plays out like Dawson’s Creek for the Tech Savvy Generation. Hailee Steinfeld plays Nadine, the mixed up youngster, and while she’s exceptionally good, you do wonder why she is so unpopular, for Nadine is smart, witty, funky and startlingly pretty. Having a chip on her shoulder over her jock-brother isn’t enough to make her socially inept. No. There should be something deeper. The movie makers don’t go there because it is either too painful or too genuine. So we get the sassy version and the cliches come and go and we admire all the tenderness, all the angst and all the keen playing from a youthful cast. Woody Harrellson steals most of the scenes as a world-weary but sympathetic history teacher. Very good for its niche genre market, but really should have been a television series.
SAVAGE STREETS (1984)
Linda Blair turned to bad-girl roles when big budget offers dried up after her Exorcist exploits. But even with her innocent cherubic looks she makes you think that she can kick ass with the best of them. Blair is the leader of The Satins, a gang of sexy girls who dress like streetwalkers. They’re insulted by a rival gang of guys, so they steal their Chevy convertible and trash it. In a very unpleasant scene, the bad guys brutally rape Blair’s deaf-mute sister (Linnea Quigley) for revenge. After a couple more skirmishes, they grab another of the Satins and toss her off a bridge to her death. Blair takes the only route available in exploitation movies by donning a revealing skintight suit and killing the hoods one by one with a crossbow. We also get the obligatory catfight in the girls’ shower and Linda shows off her ample bosom during a bath tub scene while she contemplates how to slaughter the guys. John Vernon gives a bit of gravitas to the proceedings as the school principal.
Its like a thousand other revenge movies but worth checking out for the slutty costumes and mainly well done deaths.
The Odd Angry Shot.
An Australian war film set in Vietnam which follows the exploits of a group of SAS soldiers during their tour of duty. It's not you typical war film and much of the focus lays on life in and around a tented forward encampment. Monsoons, poor food, disease, in fact all the mundane things soldiers face interspersed by patrolling and contact with the enemy (the 'odd angry shot'). It's filled with black humour, so typical of the Ozzie films of its day.
It's an interesting watch, but not for those who want any 'Rambo' stuff. It's available on YouTube and is ad free.
Author of 'An Ungentlemanly Act' and 'Execution of Duty'. The WW2 espionage series starring Harry Flynn.
THE SONS OF KATIE ELDER (1965)
Henry Hathaway doesn’t have to do much to keep us entertained. Point the camera and shoot, basically. That system of operating doesn’t lend itself to very intense pictures and The Sons of Katie Elder is no exception. Part rollicking comedy, part revenge tale, part poverty row western, the film marks one of John Wayne’s least interesting performances, partly I suspect due to his still being in recovery from an operation to remove a cancerous lung. He looks unfit, overweight and far too old to play the lead; he grimaces through almost every scene, standing on that left hip like he does and drawling his lines to interminable length. There’s barely an ounce of enjoyment in his performance. His role really needed someone younger; Charles Bronson would have fitted perfectly and brought a brooding presence to a film that tries to be too sunny for its underlying revenge theme. Unfortunately, not even the usually reliable Dean Martin can raise a smile. The chemistry between Duke and Dino that worked so well in Rio Bravo fails to materialise here. The similar slow burn romance barely flickers. The action, when it comes, is daft in the extreme and the resolution far too simple.
Wayne and his three brothers [Martin, Earl Holliman and Micheal Anderson Jr] reunite at their mother’s funeral and learn that all is not well in the Texas town of Freshwater, where James Gregory’s Morgan Hastings is plotting a big business take over, using the river water on the Elder’s range to bring the railroad and the big money. Cue plenty of old-style wild west tropes ladled with too much good humour. George Kennedy makes an impression as a nasty gunslinger. The film was tremendously popular, but to suggest the film is a classic because it features big stars, big Mexican scenery [well photographed by Lucien Ballard and probably the best thing about the movie], a big booming Elmer Bernstein score [unfortunately much too similar to The Magnificent Seven] and a wonderfully sentimental closing shot of Katie Elder’s rocking chair – well, that just isn’t enough.
I have never seen this film before and, frankly it was a big disappointment.
This film is my favourite - by far - of any John Wayne film…and is easily in my top 3 Westerns…exactly why you don’t like Wayne’s portrayal is exactly why I do, I think he brings out the ‘tough, grizzled and slightly gone to seed gunslinger’ that John Elder has become - I also disagree with you about the chemistry between Wayne & Martin, but I understand what you mean about it resolving simply, although I don’t think there is anything wrong with that…perhaps I just like simple films 😂
Another thumbs up for Katie Elder. Although I don’t rate it as high as @Sir Miles I still think it’s a terrific western - great entertainment.
GHOSTBUSTERS: FROZEN EMPIRE
ANT-MAN (2015)
Among the casual absurdities of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Ant-Man must rank as one of the most preposterous. Scott Lang is a loser with a heart of gold and a cute daughter who robs the safe of scientist Dr Hank Pym and steals his secret super-powered suit. Naturally, Pym is a super-genius and he has perfected the ‘Pym Particle’, an atom shrinking serum that reduces the suit-wearer to the size of an ant. Cue lots of tongue firmly in cheek, a good ninety minutes or so of CGI effects – mostly of marauding armies of insects – and a half decent central performance from Paul Rudd. Michael Douglas does his bit for cross generational heroics as Dr Pym. Evangeline Lilly makes an impression as his martial art loving daughter. Bald headed villain Darren Cross, who metamorphosises into the similarly miniaturised Yellowjacket, is impersonated by Corey Stoll. Naturally, Cross is another genius scientist, only he’s got more than one screw loose. Fights and general silliness abounds. The movie was cowritten by Edgar Wright [of Shaun of the Dead etc] and doesn’t take itself too seriously which is a refreshing change from the usual Marvel deadpan antics. Despite the constant wizardry on show, the film doesn’t explain itself very well and the extended climax is as overblown as all the rest of these comic book adaptations. Fun, I suppose, but I won’t be revisiting Ant-Man any time soon.