Every Monday night at 9:00 Central Time, my wife Sierra and I host a “Live Movie Tweet” event on X using the hashtag #MondayMuggers. We rotate movie picks each week, and our tastes are quite different. Tonight, Monday, August 11th, we’ll be watching RUNNING SCARED (1986), starring Gregory Hines, Billy Crystal, Steven Bauer, Darlanne Fluegel, Joe Pantoliano, Dan Hedaya, Jon Gries, Tracy Reed, and Jimmy Smits.
The plot:Two street-wise Chicago cops have to shake off some rust after returning from a Key West vacation to pursue a drug dealer who nearly killed them in the past.
Peter Hyams directed RUNNING SCARED, and it’s one of the very best “Buddy Cop” films out there. So, if a night full of action and laughs sounds good to you, join us on #MondayMuggers and watch RUNNING SCARED. It’s on Amazon Prime, Tubi, and PlutoTV! I’ve included the trailer below:
After eight years of serving as Governor of California, Arnold Schwarzenegger made his big comeback as an action movie star in director Kim Jee-woon’s THE LAST STAND (2013). Sure, he put in a little work on the first two EXPENDABLES movies, but those were really just glorified cameos. Here, Arnold was front and center for the film’s 107 minute running time. This was an exciting time for me, because like most action movie fans, I loved him and had truly missed seeing him consistently kicking butt and taking names on the big screen. I gladly made my way to the movie theater in January of 2013 for a large tub of ‘corn, a big Mr. Pibb, and the true return of an action megastar!!
In THE LAST STAND, Schwarzenegger plays Ray Owens, a former LAPD narcotics officer who chose to leave the big city and take a job as the sheriff of the quiet, southern border town of Sommerton, Arizona. It won’t be quiet for long after notorious drug kingpin Gabriel Cortez (Eduardo Noriega) makes a daring escape from FBI custody. Cortez immediately heads towards the border in a souped up Corvette where an advanced group of highly trained gunmen, led by Burrell (Peter Stormare), are waiting to help him cross. Cortez and his small army of mercenaries appear to be on a collision course with Sheriff Owens and his ragtag group of deputies, including Mike (Luis Guzman), Jerry (Zach Gilford), and Sarah (Jaimie Alexander). Knowing they’re outgunned and outmanned, Sheriff Owens asks for additional help from ex-military man and current drunk Frank Martinez (Rodrigo Santoro), as well as the crazy local gun nut Lewis Dinkum (Johnny Knoxville). Add to this mixture, FBI agent John Bannister (Forest Whitaker) and his team’s attempts to try to stop Cortez before he gets to Sommerton, and the stage is set for lots of action!
I really liked THE LAST STAND when I saw it at the movie theater in 2013, and I really liked it again when I revisited the film this week. I made it a habit many years ago to not read reviews of a film before I go see it at the theater. I had found that reading potential negative comments could affect my viewing of a film, so I cut that out. As such, after totally enjoying myself with THE LAST STAND, I was surprised that the film wasn’t received very strongly by the audience or critical community, and I was even more surprised that it completely flopped at the box office, only bringing in a total of $12 million in the United States during its run. For me, the film delivered what I was looking for… Arnold Schwarzenegger kicking ass, spouting off some good one-liners, and outsmarting and outmuscling his much younger adversaries! No critic or keyboard warrior can take that away from me, as THE LAST STAND is an entertaining movie with a good cast. Heck, even the great Harry Dean Stanton pops in for a surprise cameo at the beginning of the action.
I also appreciate the fact that THE LAST STAND is the American directorial debut of the great South Korean director Kim Jee-woon, who has directed some of my favorite South Korean films, including A BITTERSWEET LIFE (2005) and I SAW THE DEVIL (2010). His direction brings some Asian flair that results in stronger, more graphic violence, as well a penchant for jarring changes in tone between humorous character interplay and sometimes violent tragedy. In a movie designed primarily as a piece of entertainment, I appreciate those more over-the-top touches that lift it above the norm.
Overall, I easily recommend THE LAST STAND to fans of Arnold Schwarzenegger and old-school action movies. It’s not a Schwarzenegger classic in the same way as movies like PREDATOR (1987), TERMINATOR 2 (1991), and TRUE LIES (1994), but it’s still a fun ride!
Robert Aldrich is a very important director in the career of my favorite actor, Charles Bronson. Bronson appeared in 4 films directed by Aldrich, including APACHE (1954), VERA CRUZ (1954) and 4 FOR TEXAS (1963). In 1967, just before Bronson would become the biggest star in the world, Aldrich would give him a significant role in the box office smash THE DIRTY DOZEN. In celebration of Aldrich’s 107th birthday in cinema heaven, I thought I’d share this fun scene from the World War II classic!
Rory Calhoun was a star of movies and TV going all the way back to the 40’s, but as a kid of the 80’s, the movies I most remember him for are not classics like HOW TO MARRY A MILLIONAIRE (1953) with Marilyn Monroe, or RIVER OF NO RETURN (1954) with Robert Mitchum. Rather, the movies I grew up watching Calhoun in have titles like ANGEL (1984), a B-movie crime thriller about a teenage hooker, and PURE COUNTRY (1992), the acting debut of country music superstar George Strait! One movie that I’ve always enjoyed, and even introduced my son to a decade or so ago, is the horror comedy MOTEL HELL (1980). My son loved it, and even though he’s married with children, whenever we’re together for the holidays he wants to know if I brought my blu ray of the film for us to watch. The amazing thing… I always have it!
In celebration of Rory Calhoun’s 103rd birthday in cinema heaven, I present this scene of Calhoun tending to his human garden in MOTEL HELL! Enjoy, my friends.
Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Thursdays, we will be reviewing Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989. The entire show is currently streaming on Amazon Prime, Tubi and other services!
Episode 4.8 “All the Colors of the Heart”
(Dir by Michael Landon, originally aired on November 18th, 1987)
This episode brings Jonathan (Michael Landon) and Mark (Victor French) to a summer camp for the blind, where they come into contact with two men. There is Frank Riley (Tom Sullivan), an athletic blind man with a great attitude who has high hopes of gaining his sight and being able to see for the first time in his life. In contrast, there is Scott (Peter Kowanko), a young man who is in the process of rapidly losing his sight and is in complete denial of his new reality. Jonathan and Frank, who also happens to be the man who started the camp, work with Scott in hopes of helping him to face both the physical and the emotional challenges of going blind. Will Frank actually be able to regain his sight? Will Scott be able to accept his condition and find a reason to embrace life again?
Our family watched HIGHWAY TO HEAVEN often during its run in the 80’s. My mom loved the series, and I remember its episodes going straight for the heart. I haven’t revisited it as an adult, and I must admit that I had an enjoyably nostalgic time when I watched this episode today.
While I personally had warm and fuzzy feelings based on the show’s connection to my youth, the content of the episode itself was quite serious. Scott, the young man who is going blind, is basically giving up on life, so much so that he contemplates killing himself. Peter Kowanko, who plays Scott and bears a striking resemblance to actor James Van Der Beek, is pretty good in the part. He spends most of his time screaming at people that they don’t understand what he’s going through. It’s not the most endearing performance, but I can’t help but wonder how I would react in the same position. Heck, I’ve had some of my own health issues recently, and the anxiety that has come along with that has definitely hampered my ability to put others first. I think Tom Sullivan is a little more successful in the role of Frank Riley, the man who has been blind since birth. Sullivan, who is blind in real life, receives a “Story By” credit for this episode, and is reportedly much like the man he portrays here. While some of his scenes do lean heavily into melodrama at the end, his inspiring sense of humor and overall outlook on life gives us glimmers of hope throughout the episode. I did want to point out that Kowanko and Sullivan do almost all of the heavy lifting in the acting department in this episode. While they had some fun interplay at the beginning, I was surprised by how little the characters played by Landon and French factored into the main storyline. I’m going to assume this is the exception and not the norm for the show.
Overall, I enjoyed revisiting this TV series from my youth. This specific episode contains a strong message about the importance of finding the joys in life under the most difficult of circumstances. I think we all need to be reminded of that from time to time, even when we’re not facing the types of challenges that these characters are being forced to deal with. Michael Landon, who directed this episode, got me at the end as I felt some moisture welling up in my own eyes. I’m definitely looking forward to taking a little deeper dive into the series in the near future.
Well, I finally did it. I finally made it all the way through a movie starring Robert Bronzi, the Hungarian Charles Bronson lookalike who started making movies a few years ago with titles like DEATH KISS (2018), ONCE UPON A TIME IN DEADWOOD (2019) and 12 TO MIDNIGHT (2024). Any person who’s read any of my work on here knows that Charles Bronson is my all-time favorite actor, and that I’ve been obsessed with him for over 40 years. I’ve known about Bronzi since he first popped up in 2017, but I haven’t had much interest in him because his only similarity to Bronson is his very basic look. I watched enough of DEATH KISS back in the day to know that he doesn’t have any of Bronson’s charisma, grace or acting ability. I turned it off or fell asleep and never finished it. Well, this past week, I was on the set of a movie that’s being filmed here in Central Arkansas that’s using my brother’s convenience store as one of its filming locations. I was talking to a producer of the film (David Wade), and of course, as the conversation went on I eventually told him that I’m obsessed with Charles Bronson. If you hang around me long enough, that information is sure to be shared at some point! Once David knew this, he told me that he acted in a film with Robert Bronzi in 2021 called ESCAPE FROM DEATH BLOCK 13 that was filmed at the Mansfield Reformatory in Ohio, the location made famous as the prison used in the classic THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION (1994). He was impressed that I was fully aware of Bronzi and his resemblance to Bronson. I promised him that I’d watch the film since he’s in it, so here we are!
The plot of ESCAPE FROM DEATH BLOCK 13 is simple. After his brother’s death, Hungarian construction worker Mick Kovacs (Robert Bronzi) travels to America seeking justice. Visiting a recycling factory owned by the shady Renda (Nicholas Turturro), Mick demands compensation owed to his brother’s family. When Renda’s goons attack him, Mick is framed for extortion and attempted murder, and finds himself in the Pleasant Hill Penitentiary, where he faces sadistic guards, violent inmates, and the corrupt Warden Jack (Debbie Scaletta). Before going to prison, Kovacs is offered a deal by Detective Borelli (Lyindaa Russell) and FBI Agent Langley (Lawrence Hilton-Jacobs) to uncover a drug ring. Once inside, he discovers that Renda and the Warden are responsible for his brother’s death. Driven by a desire for vengeance, Mick sparks a violent riot in hopes of bringing justice to all those who have done his family wrong!
I’m not going to spend much time reviewing ESCAPE FROM DEATH BLOCK 13. If you’re a movie viewer who thinks the idea of watching an ultra low budget prison movie, filmed at Shawshank prison, with terrible acting, terrible special effects, and a lead actor who looks kind of like Charles Bronson sounds fun, then this could be the movie for you. This movie is not even close to the quality of Bronson’s 80’s Cannon films. Those films had good directors who delivered entertaining low budget action films, and Bronson was always worth the price of admission. Bronson’s Cannon movies were extremely profitable, especially in the golden age of VHS rentals. In the case of ESCAPE FROM DEATH BLOCK 13, director Gary Jones has delivered a terrible movie that is fun if you like bad movies. This movie knows it’s a bad movie, leans into its turkeydom, and hopes you will like it because Bronzi looks like Bronson, and there is action. In other words, it’s complete schlock that’s looking for an audience that digs the cheesiest of cheese. There’s not a thing wrong with liking cheesefests. I just want to make sure you know that’s what you’re getting into!
I did find it interesting that ESCAPE FROM DEATH BLOCK 13 is full of references to Charles Bronson’s TV and movie filmography. In this film, Robert Bronzi plays a character named Mick Kovacs. From 1958-1960, Bronson starred in the TV series MAN WITH A CAMERA playing a character named Mike Kovac. Nicolas Turturro plays a bad guy named Renda in this film. Al Lettieri played a bad guy named Frank Renda in Bronson’s excellent 1974 action film MR. MAJESTYK. And finally, in this film, Kenny Hendrix plays a bare knuckle prison boxer named Chaney. In my personal favorite Charles Bronson film, HARD TIMES (1975), Bronson plays a bare knuckle boxer named Chaney. I will admit these references were fun to spot as they came up throughout the film’s 105 minute runtime, which is probably a good 30 minutes longer than it needs to be.
As I mentioned earlier, I watched ESCAPE FROM CELL BLOCK 13 because David Wade, who plays a prison guard in the film, asked me to. David does a fine job as guard Schaffner, with his performance fitting in perfectly with the vibe of the film. His friendly manner on the movie set at my brother’s store gave me a rooting interest in the film, and from that standpoint, I thoroughly enjoyed it!
In celebration of the August 6th birthday of the beautiful and talented Michelle Yeoh, I thought I would share this specific fight scene between Yeoh and Zhang Ziyi in CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON (2000). It’s incredible, featuring a variety of swords and other assorted weapons. It’s one of the true highlights of the film, and I’m always glad to have any excuse to watch it! The arrival of my favorite living actor (Chow Yun-Fat) at the end of the scene is just the icing on a delicious cake of action! Enjoy, my friends!
Who thinks that a remake of Akira Kurosawa’s HIGH AND LOW, directed by Spike Lee, and starring Denzel Washington, sounds intriguing? I do! The duo’s fifth film will be released on August 15th, 2025.
Happy 70th birthday to the incredible “hillbilly Olivier,” also known as Billy Bob Thornton. I’ve always been partial to this incredible scene where Thornton and Robert Duvall create a truly powerful moment in Duvall’s film, THE APOSTLE. Enjoy two great actors doing what they do the best!
Through the Shattered Lens 