The great British director David Lean was born 115 years ago today.
In honor of his films and his legacy, here is a scene that I love from Lawrence of Arabia. In this scene, Peter O’Toole blowing out a flame transports us straight to a sunrise in the desert. Though Lean started out his career directing small-scale but emotionally rich films like Brief Encounter and Great Expectations, he ultimately became best-known for directing historical epics and cinematic spectacles. This scene shows us why. Even to this day, it seems as if any epic film is destined to be compared to the work of David Lean.
As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in a few weekly live tweets on twitter. I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday, I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday, and I am one of the five hosts of #MondayActionMovie! Every week, we get together. We watch a movie. We tweet our way through it.
Tonight, for #ScarySocial, Tim Buntley will be hosting 2013’s 13 Eerie!
If you want to join us on Saturday night, just hop onto twitter, start the film at 9 pm et, and use the #ScarySocial hashtag! The film is available on Prime. I’ll probably be there and I imagine some other members of the TSL Crew will be there as well. It’s a friendly group and welcoming of newcomers so don’t be shy.
A mysterious outlaw known as the Shadow is terrorizing turn-of-the-century Arkansas. He and his gang have killed the last few sheriffs of Little Rock. No one is sure who the Shadow is or how he communicates with his gang but somehow, he is always one step ahead of the law. However, the Shadow didn’t count on federal agent John Travers (John Wayne) riding into town and declaring himself to be the new sheriff. Working with his Native sidekick, Yak (Yakima Canutt), Travers sets out to expose the Shadow and take him down. Along the way, he falls for Anita (Verna Hillie), the niece of rancher Matt Matlock (Gabby Hayes). Luckily, Anita knows her way around a gun too.
This is one of the 50 B-westerns that John Wayne made before Stagecoach made him a star. The Star Packer is more interesting than some of Wayne’s other poverty row productions because The Shadow is a more interesting and much more clever villain than the usual greedy but dumb outlaws that Wayne went up against in these movies. The Shadow actually has a clearly thought-out plan and, for once, Wayne can’t defeat the bad guys on his own. In The Star Packer, it takes a community to stand up to evil. As always with Robert Bradbury’s westerns, the fights and the stunts are impressive. Fans of Wayne’s B-period will probably especially be interested to see the legendary stuntman, Yakima Canutt, play a good guy for once. He and Wayne both do a good job in this 52 minute programmer.
As some of our regular readers undoubtedly know, I am involved in a few weekly live tweets on twitter. I host #FridayNightFlix every Friday, I co-host #ScarySocial on Saturday, and I am one of the five hosts of #MondayActionMovie! Every week, we get together. We watch a movie. We tweet our way through it.
Tonight, at 10 pm et, #FridayNightFlix has got 1981’s Super Snooper!
Directed by Sergio Corbucci and starring Terence Hill and Ernest Borgnine, Super Snooper is the story of an amiable Florida cop who can do just about anything. The film is better known as Super Fuzz but, for some reason, Prime is going with Super Snooper. Whatever. We’re going to live tweet the Heck out of it, regardless of which title it’s under.
If you want to join us this Friday, just hop onto twitter, start the movie at 10 pm et, and use the #FridayNightFlix hashtag! It’s a friendly group and welcoming of newcomers so don’t be shy.
Super Snooper is available on Prime and YouTube! See you there!
4 Or More Shots From 4 Or More Films is just what it says it is, 4 shots from 4 of our favorite films. As opposed to the reviews and recaps that we usually post, 4 Shots From 4 Films lets the visuals do the talking!
Today, the Shattered Lens honors both the birth and the legacy of the great filmmaker, Akira Kurosawa! It’s time for….
4 Shots From 4 Akira Kurosawa Films
Seven Samurai (1954, dir by Akira Kurosawa, DP: Asakazu Nakai)
The Hidden Fortress (1958, dir. by Akira Kurosawa, DP: Kazuo Yamasaki)
Dersu Uzala (1975, dir. by Akira Kurosawa, DP: Asakazu Nakai)
Dreams (1990, dir by Akira Kurosawa, DP: Takao Saito)
Chris Morrell (John Wayne) is an honest cowboy who keeps an eye on Nina (Shirley Jean Rickert), a little girl whose Indian mother died when Nina was just a baby. When oil is discovered on land that belonged to Nina’s mother, Nina is offered $50,000 for the land. Because Nina is only eight years old, her legal guardian will be responsible for taking care of the money. Chris and Nina set out to find Nina’s father so that he can sign the guardianship papers and make Chris into Nina’s legal guardian.
When outlaw Sam Black (Yakima Canutt) decides that he would rather be Nina’s legal guardian, Chris sends Nina to a ranch owned by his old friend, Bud Moore, while he defeats Sam and his men. At the ranch, it turns out that Bud Moore has died and the new ranch owner is another outlaw named Vic (Jack Rockwell) and Vic wants Nina’s oil claim for himself. What Vic doesn’t know is that Nina’s father is one of his ranch hands.
For a 52 minute programmer, there’s a lot going on in ‘Neath The Arizona Skies. There’s actually too much going on and, with that short of a run time, it feels as if more than a few important plot points were glossed over, like how Chris came to look after Nina in the first place. John Wayne is stiff but likable as Chris while Yakima Canutt does his usual double duty as both an outlaw and a stuntman. There are a few good action scenes, especially when Chris runs off Sam’s gang for the first time. Sheila Terry plays Wayne’s love interest, who has to be first convinced that Chris isn’t actually an outlaw. As Nina, Shirley Jean Rickert is energetic but you’ll quickly get tired of her yelling, “Daddy Chris!” whenever anything happens. This isn’t one of the best of the 50 poverty row films that Wayne appeared in before Stagecoachmade him a star but, even in this film, there are still hints of the screen presence that would later become Wayne’s trademark.
Someone is passing counterfeit bills on the Mexican border and the government thinks that it might be Doc Carter (Earle Hodgins), the manger of a traveling medicine show. Working undercover, Treasury agent John Wyatt (John Wayne) joins Doc Carter’s medicine show as a trick shooter. John discovers that Doc Carter is a quack and the miracle cure that he sells is 90% alcohol but that Doc Carter isn’t a counterfeiter. Instead, Doc Carter is being framed by his former partner, Curly Joe (Yakima Canutt). When John tries to tell the Mexican authorities about Curly Joe is doing, he discovers that Curly Joe has framed him as well!
This was the last of the B-programmers that John Wayne made for Monogram Pictures and it was the only one of Wayne’s films to be directed by Carl Pierson. As he did in almost all of his early B-pictures, John Wayne gives a tough but likable performance. He’s the most cheerful undercover agent that I’ve ever seen. The action scenes are rudimentary and Pierson was obviously not as creative a director as some of the other filmmakers that Wayne worked with early in his career. Carl Pierson was no Robert Bradbury. But the medicine show angle does bring a different angle to the story, with Wayne getting to show off his trick shooting skills and Earle Hodgins providing comedic relief with his miracle cure. Of course, John has a romance with pretty Linda (Marion Burns), who is Doc Carter’s daughter and who is also known as Princess Natasha.
Though it may not be one of the best of the 50 movies that John Wayne made before getting his star-making role in Stagecoach, Paradise Canyon will still be appreciated by fans of both the Duke and the simple but entertaining B-westerns of the past.
The 1983 film, 10 to Midnight, opens with LAPD detective Leo Kessler (played by legendary tough guy Charles Bronson) sitting at his desk in a police station. He’s typing up a report and taking his time about it. A reporter who is in search of a story starts to bother Leo.
“Jerry,” Leo tells him, “I’m not a nice person. I’m a mean, selfish son-of-a-bitch. I know you want a story but I want a killer and what I want comes first.”
It’s a classic opening, even if Leo isn’t being totally honest. Yes, he can be a little bit selfish but he’s really not as mean as he pretends to be. He may not know how to talk to his daughter Laurie (Lisa Eilbacher) but he is also very protective of her and he wants to be a better father than he’s been in the past. He may roll his eyes when he discovers that Detective Paul McAnn (Andrew Stevens) is the son of a sociology professor but he still tries to act as a mentor to his younger partner. Leo may complain that the criminal justice system “protects those maggots like they’re an endangered species” but that’s just because he’s seen some truly disturbing things during his time on the force and, let’s face it, Leo has a point. When one of Laurie’s friends is murdered, Leo is convinced that Warren Stacy (Gene Davis) is the murderer and he’s determined to do whatever he has to do to get Warren off the streets. “All those girls,” Leo snarls when he sees Warren, his tone letting us know that his mission to stop Warren is about more than just doing his job.
Warren Stacy is handsome, athletic, and he has good taste in movies. (He’s especially a fan of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Just don’t try to trick him by saying Steve McQueen played the Sundance Kid.) Warren is also a total creep, the type of guy who complains that a murder victim “wasn’t a good person,” because she trashed him in her diary. When Leo takes a look around Warren’s apartment, he finds not only porn but also a penis pump. (“It’s for jacking off!” Leo yells at Warren, enunciating the line as only Charles Bronson could.) Warren is also a murderer but he’s a clever murderer, the type who sets himself up with an alibi by acting obnoxiously in a movie theater. Warren strips nude before killing his victims, in order to make sure that he doesn’t leave behind any evidence. (This film was made in the days before DNA testing.)
Leo knows that Warren is guilty but, as both his gruff-but-fair captain (Wilford Brimley, naturally) and the D.A. (Robert F. Lyons) point out, he has no way to prove it. When Warren starts to stalk Laurie and her friends (including Kelly Preston), Leo decides that he has no choice but to frame Warren. But when Warren’s amoral attorney, Dave Dante (Geoffrey Lewis, giving a wonderfully sleazy performance), threatens to call McAnn to the stand, McAnn has to decide whether to tell the truth or to join Leo in framing a guilty man.
10 to Midnight is a violent, vulgar, and undoubtedly exploitive film, one that features a ham-fisted message about how the justice system is more concerned with protecting the rights of the accused as opposed to lives of the innocent. And yet, in its gloriously pulpy way, this is also one of Bronson’s best films. It’s certainly my personal favorite of the films that he made for Cannon.
Director J. Lee Thompson and Charles Bronson were frequent collaborators and Thompson obviously knew how to get the best out of the notoriously reserved actor. Bronson was not known for his tremendous range but he still gives one of his strongest performances in 10 to Midnight, playing Leo as being not just a determined cop but also as an aging man who is confused by the way the world is changing around him. Stopping Warren isn’t just about justice. It’s also about fighting back against the the type of world that would create a Warren Stacy and then allow him to remain on the streets in the first place. Interestingly, though Leo doesn’t hesitate when it comes to framing Warren, he is also sympathetic to McAnn’s objections. Unlike other Bronson characters, Leo doesn’t hold a grudge when his partner questions his methods. Instead, he simply know that McAnn hasn’t spent enough time in the real world to understand what’s at stake. McAnn hasn’t given into cynicism. He hasn’t decided that the best way to deal with his job is to be a “mean son of a bitch.” Bronson and Andrew Stevens, who had worked together in the past, have a believable dynamic. McAnn looks up to Leo but is also conflicted by his actions. Leo may be annoyed by McAnn’s reluctance but he also respects him for trying to be an honest cop. Their partnership feels real in a way that sets 10 to Midnight apart from so many other films about an older cop having to deal with an idealistic partner.
One of the most interesting things about the film is Leo’s relationship with his daughter, Laurie. Over the course of the film, Leo and Laurie go from barely speaking to bonding over liquor and their shared regrets about the state of the justice system. When McAnn first meets Laurie, she’s offended when McAnn suggests that she takes after her father. But, as the film progresses, she comes to realize that she and Leo have much in common. (To be honest, I related quite a bit to Laurie, especially as I’ve recently come to better appreciate how much of my own independent nature was inherited from my father.) Lisa Eilbacher and Charles Bronson are believable as father-and-daughter and they play off of each other well. The scenes between Laurie and Leo give 10 to Midnight a bit more depth than one might otherwise expect from a Bronson Cannon film. Leo isn’t just trying to protect his daughter and her roommates from a serial killer. He’s also trying to be the father who he wishes he had been when she was younger. He’s trying to make up for lost time, even as he also tries to keep Warren Stacy away from his family.
As played by Gene Davis, Warren Stacy is one of the most loathsome cinematic villains of all time. Warren’s crimes are disturbing enough. (Indeed, the surreal sight of a naked and blood-covered Warren Stacy stalking through a dark apartment is pure nightmare fuel.) What makes Warren particularly frightening is that we’ve all had to deal with a Warren Stacy at some point in our life. He’s the sarcastic and easily offended incel who thought he was entitled to a phone number or a date or perhaps even more. As I rewatched this movie last night, I wondered how many Warrens I had met in my life. How many potential serial killers have any of us unknowingly had to deal with? Warren tries to strut through life, smirking and going out of his way to let everyone know that he knows more than they do but the minute that Leo turns the table on him, Warren starts whining about he’s being treated unfairly. During his final, disturbing rampage, Warren yells that his victims aren’t being honest with him, blaming them for his actions. The film deserves a lot of credit for not turning Warren into some sort of diabolical and erudite supervillain. He’s not Hannibal Lecter. Instead, like all real-life serial killers, he’s a loser who is looking for power over those to whom he feels inferior and for revenge on a world that he feels owes him something. He’s a realistic monster and that makes him all the more frightening and the film all the more powerful. Warren is the type of killer who, even as I sit here typing this, could be walking down anyone’s street. He’s such a complete monster that it’s undeniably cathartic whenever Leo goes after him.
How delusional is Warren Stacy? He’s delusional enough to actually taunt Charles Bronson! At one point, Warren informs Leo that he can’t be punished for being sick. Warren announces that, when he’s arrested, he might go away for a while but he’ll be back and there’s nothing Leo can do about it. (The suggestion, of course, is that Warren will be back because he committed his crimes in California and all the judges were appointed by a bunch of bleeding heart governors. Warren may not say that out loud but we all know that is the film’s subtext. Some people may agree with the film, some people may disagree. Myself, I’m against the death penalty because I think it’s a prime example of government overreach but I still cheered the first time that I heard Clint Eastwood say, “Well, I’m all torn up about his rights,” in Dirty Harry.) How does Leo react to Warren’s taunts? I can’t spoil the film’s best moment but I can tell you that 10 to Midnight features one of Bronson’s greatest (and, after what we’ve just seen Warren do, most emotionally satisfying) one-lines.
The title has nothing to do with anything that happens in the film. In typical Cannon fashion, the film’s producers came up with a snappy title (and 10 to Midnight is a good one) and then slapped it onto a script that was previously called Bloody Sunday. Fortunately, as long as Bronson is doing what he does best, it doesn’t matter if the title makes sense. And make no mistake. 10 to Midnight is Bronson at his best.
Accused and convicted of a murder that he didn’t commit, John Brant (John Wayne) breaks out of prison in Maryland and, following the advice of Horace Greeley, he goes west. After making a narrow escape from the authorities, he meets and befriends Joseph Conlan (Lane Chandler). Conlan brings Brant into his gang, where Brant starts out as a cook but is soon being assigned to help rob stores and stagecoaches. Despite his time in prison, Brant is no criminal and he secretly thwarts every robbery that the gang tries to pull off. When the gang starts to suspect that Brant might be an undercover cop, Conlan is the only one willing to stand up for him and help him. Conlan is also responsible for the murder that Brant was accused of committing.
John Wayne as a hardened escaped convict? Maybe the older John Wayne could have pulled that off but, in 1933, Wayne was still too cheerful and easy going to be believable as someone who had spent the last few months doing hard time. Fortunately, even early in his career, Wayne was convincing when riding a horse or shooting a gun and that’s probably all that the audience for these short programmers demanded. There’s also an exciting scene where Wayne is forced to swim across a pond while his pursuers shoot at him. As the criminal with a conscience, Lane Chandler steals the film.
Fans of westerns will want to keep an eye out for legendary stuntman Yakima Canutt, playing yet another outlaw gang leader. Yakima Canutt started out his career risking his life as a rodeo rider and then went on to risk his life ever more as Hollywood’s most daring stunt performer. When he got too old to continue doing stunt work, he became a second unit director, for John Ford and others. He staged Ben-Hur‘s famous chariot race and was credited with making sure that not a single horse was hurt and not a single human was seriously injured during filming. Yakima Canutt lived to be 90 years old, outliving most of the actors from whom he doubled as a stuntman.
The 1983 Italian film, Warrior of the Lost World, opens with a long title card that explains that society has collapsed, due to radiation, disease, wars, and multiple bank bail-outs. The world of the future is a dangerous place, where the roads are ruled by dangerous scavengers. It’s a world where survival is not guaranteed and only those who are willing to fight will live to see another day and….
Well, look, I’ll be honest. It was a really long title card and, as anyone who knows me can tell you, I don’t have a particularly long attention span. I read about the radiation and the diseases and then I kind of zoned out. The important thing to know is that the film takes place in the future and that the film was made in the wake of the international success of The Road Warrior. In the early 80s, the Italian film industry briefly abandoned zombies to make movies about people driving cars through a post-apocalyptic landscape. In fact, I initially assumed that David Worth was a pseudonym for someone like Enzo Castelleri or even Umberto Lenzi. David Worth is actually a cinematographer who worked on a few Clint Eastwood films and who went to Italy to make his directorial debut with Warrior of the Lost World. After this film, Worth went on to direct Kickboxer and handful of others.
(One thing that’s always interesting about watching these films is discovering that people were speculating about the collapse of society long before 2023. It’s kind of nice to be reminded that people have always been panicking about something, even while society itself continued to survive and grow.)
Robert Ginty stars as The Rider, a man so tough that he doesn’t even need a name. The Rider and his motorcycle travel across the country. The Motorcycle can talk, though it’s screechy voice might make you wish that it couldn’t. It warns The Rider whenever there’s danger nearby. When a bunch of punk rock rejects attempt to attack the Rider, his motorcycle identifies them as being “dorks.” Later, when the Rider is looking at a woman who he has just saved from death, the Motorcycle orders, “Kiss the girl!” The Motorcycle has a weird quirk where it says everything three times. The Rider talks back to the Motorcycle but he always mumbles all of his lines, to the extent that it’s often difficult to really understand what he’s saying. It’s hard not to get the feeling that Robert Ginty couldn’t believe that he was actually having to pretend as if he was a heart-to-heart with a motorcycle.
(The Rider’s bike is actually named Einstein but, to me, it will always by The Motorcycle.)
After the Rider crashes into a wall, he’s nursed back to health by a bunch of old people who are trying to organize a rebellion against the evil Prossor (Donald Pleasence), who rules the State of Omega. Prossor has kidnapped the rebellion’s leader, Prof. McWayne (Harrison Muller, Jr). The old people want The Rider to accompany McWayne’s daughter, Natasia (Persis Khambatta), to Prossor’s city. The Rider whines about being asked but eventually agrees to do so. I’m not sure why The Rider agrees to help because The Rider seriously never stops complaining about how inconvenient the whole journey is. While The Rider does manage to rescue McWayne, Natasia gets left behind so, of course, the Rider has to do it all over again. Fortunately, it turns out that the Omega army isn’t quite as competent as everyone claims that they are. In fact, outsmarting Prosser is so easy that you can’t help but wonder why no one bothered to it before.
Warrior of the Lost World is not necessarily a good movie but, when watched with a group of friends and with the right snarky attitude, it is a fun movie. The action and the plotting is just so over-the-top and ridiculous that it’s hard to look away from the screen and Robert Ginty seems so genuinely annoyed by every little thing that happens that it’s hard not to wonder if maybe The Rider read the script before heading off to confront Prossor. An extended sequence is devoted to everyone singing the Rebellion’s national anthem, the great Donald Pleasence rants like a pro, Fred Williamson has a largely pointless cameo, and the film features what appears to be a 20-minute kiss between The Rider and Natasia. (The Motorcycle watches.) If you can’t have fun while watching Warrior of the Lost World, I just don’t know what to tell you.
Through the Shattered Lens