Tag Archives: Gary Busey

#SundayShorts with SURVIVING THE GAME!

Posted on by Bradley Crain

Since Sunday is a day of rest for a lot of people, I present #SundayShorts, a weekly mini review of a movie I’ve recently watched.

Jack Mason (Ice-T) is a homeless man who’s having a very bad day. His dog and best friend both die so he’s ready to give up on life. Just in the nick of time, a kind gentleman named Walter Cole (Charles S. Dutton), who works at the 7th Street mission, shows up, saves his life, and tells him about a potential job opportunity, even giving Jack his partner’s business card. The job would consist of helping out a group of hunters as a survival guide. Soon, Jack is meeting with rich businessman Thomas Burns (Rutger Hauer), who tells him all about the responsibilities of the job and hires him for the position. It looks like things are finally turning Jack’s way as he finds himself on a charter flight out into the mountains, where the hunters are waiting. The night he arrives, they have a huge feast as he gets to know the guys. It’s a strange lot, but hey, he’s got food in his belly and money in his pocket, so he can put up with some odd behavior for a few days. This very short period of happiness turns out to be fool’s gold as Jack is roused from his sleep early the next morning and told to run. They’re going to be playing a game, and the rules are simple… kill or be killed!

SURVIVING THE GAME was released to theaters on April 15th, 1994, when I was 20 years old. As one of Rutger Hauer’s biggest fans, I went to see it in the movie theater of course. As a fan of B-movies filled with action and violence, I had a good time with it. A big part of that fun came from it’s cast of interesting actors. I’d watch Hauer in any role, and I pretty much have. There’s not a lot asked of him in SURVIVING THE GAME in terms of heavy lifting, but I still enjoy watching him on screen. He looks pretty cool riding his motorcycle with his big goatee and ponytail. I just like Ice-T. There’s something I’ve always found appealing about him on screen, and the same can be said here. Charles S. Dutton is so capable of projecting good on screen. The fact that his character is working at a charity mission as a front to set up homeless men to be hunted and killed was a nice bit of casting. And finally, with other actors like Gary Busey, F. Murray Abraham and John C. McGinley playing the hunters, you just know you’re in for an over-the-top, scenery chewing good time. I also want to shout out one particularly disturbing and graphic scene that involves Charles S. Dutton and a blown up 4-wheeler. It’s the one scene from the film that I’ve remembered ever since saw it that first time at the theater.   

Five Fast Facts:

  1. SURVIVING THE GAME was released about eight months after John Woo’s HARD TARGET starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. Both films are re-tellings of THE MOST DANGEROUS GAME. Woo’s higher budgeted film did much better at the box office.
  2. It was Rutger Hauer’s idea that his character rides a motorcycle rather than a 4-wheeler, like the other hunters in the film. He felt the bike looked like an iron horse, giving him the appearance of a warrior knight!
  3. There’s not a single female character in the film.
  4. Near the end of the movie, there’s a shot of a cityscape with a caption on the screen that reads “Three Days Later in Seattle.” The cityscape is actually that of Philadelphia.
  5. Prior to directing his own films, director Ernest R. Dickerson had been the cinematographer for the Spike Lee joints SHE’S GOTTA HAVE IT, SCHOOL DAZE, DO THE RIGHT THING, MO’ BETTER BLUES, JUNGLE FEVER, and MALCOLM X.

Hider In The House (1989, directed by Matthew Patrick)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

After spending years in a mental hospital for murdering his abusive parents, Tom Dreyer (Gary Busey) is released and told to find somewhere else to live.  He ends up secretly living in the crawl space of the new home Julie (Mimi Rogers) and Phil Dreyer (Michael McKean).  Obsessed with Julie, he’ll do anything to be with her, including breaking up her marriage to Phil and killing anyone who comes to close to discovering him in the crawlspace, whether it’s the family dog, an exterminator, or Julie’s best friend.

Due to the distributor having financial issues, Hider In The House never got a theatrical release but it used to show up on HBO frequently in the late 80s and 90s.  I can also remember that our local video store had the film’s poster hanging on the wall near the cash register, creating the impression that Gary Busy was not only staring at Mimi Rogers but also judging whatever you decided to rent for the weekend.  Hider In The House was very popular amongst those of us who had a crush on Mimi Rogers, which was basically every guy on the planet back in the day.

It’s not a bad movie, even if it is predictable.  Both Mimi Rogers and a pre-motorcycle accident Gary Busey give good performance and it’s interesting to see Michael McKean playing a dramatic role for once.  The main problem with the movie is that it’s impossible to believe that big and hulking Busey could possibly live in someone’s attic and move around between the walls without everyone immediately noticing.  A Clydesdale would have more luck going unnoticed than Gary Busey.

Shortly after he completed filming on Hider In The House, Gary Busey was in a motorcycle accident that nearly killed him.  He fractured his skull and suffered permanent brain damage.  It’s always interesting to compare the Gary Busey of the 70s and 80s with the Gary Busey of today.  People are so used to the Busey who yells and speaks in riddles that it’s easy to forget that he was once a very good actor, even when he was appearing in something like Hider In The House.

Retro Television Reviews: Blood Sport (dir by Jerrold Freedman)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay.  Today’s film is 1973’s Blood Sport!  It  can be viewed on YouTube.

David Birdsong (played by Gary Busey, who was 29 at the time) is a high school senior with a potentially bright future ahead of him.  He’s the quarterback of his high school’s football team and it looks like he’s on the verge of leading his team to an undefeated season.  He’s getting recruited by all the big schools.  Scouts are coming to his games to watch him play.  He also has one of the highest GPAs at his school, though it’s suggested that might have more to do with his importance to the football team than his actual study skills.

“Don’t you have anything else you want to do with your life?” his high school principal (David Doyle) asks him and David’s reaction indicates that he’s never really given it much thought.  From the time he was born, David’s father, Dwayne (Ben Johnson), has been shaping his son to become a star athlete.  Dwayne is happiest when he’s watching David play, whether on the field or in the highlight reels that he keeps down in the basement.  When Dwayne sees that his son isn’t on the field, he’s the type of father who will get out of the stands and argue with the coach on the sidelines.  Dwayne continually tells David not to stay out too late.  The one time that David does, Dwayne slaps him hard enough to send his son to the floor.

Coach Marshall (Larry Hagman) is determined to get his undefeated season, no matter how hard he has to push his players.  The coach is the type who is convinced that his players respect him for his stern ways and his long-winded speeches but little does he realize that they all secretly despise him.  When one of his players drop dead of a heart attack during practice, Coach Marshall demands that the player stop being lazy and get up.  When he realizes that the player is never going to get up, Coach Marshall angrily asks, “Why did this have to happen now!?”  Later, at a pep rally, Coach Marshall announces that his team had a private meeting and agreed that they would win the final game in the player’s memory.  The team is disgusted but the rest of the town loves their coach.

David is never happier than when he’s on the field, playing football and being cheered by both the crowd and his team.  But, through it all, he sees reminders that the future in uncertain.  On the sidelines, David spots an injured player, watching the game with the knowledge that his dreams of getting a scholarship have ended.  When David visits a college, he’s reminded that being the best high school player doesn’t mean much in college and when he says that he’s a quarterback, he is told that his coach will ultimately decide who he is and David will accept the coach’s decision because David isn’t being offered a scholarship to think for himself.

When the film originally aired in 1973, it was called Birdsong but the title was changed to Blood Sport for both subsequent showings and for a European theatrical release.  Blood Sport is the more appropriate title because, even though the main character is named David Birdsong, the film is ultimately about all of the athletes who are expected to put their health at risk for the people on the sidelines.  It’s not just football that’s a blood sport, the film suggests.  It’s the entire culture that has sprung up around it, the one that cheers when players are at their best but which also looks away at the times when the players need the most help.

At 29 years of age, Gary Busey is a bit too old to be totally convincing as a high school senior but he still does a good job of capturing David’s gradual realization that he’s never really had any control over his own life.  Ben Johnson and especially Larry Hagman also give good performances as the two men who are living vicariously through David’s accomplishments.  Hagman is so believably obnoxious as the coach that you’ll want to cheer when someone finally finds the guts to stand up to him and tell him to just shut up for a minute.

The film ends on an ambiguous note, leaving many questions open about David’s future.  One hopes that he’s started to find the strength necessary to live his own life but it’s ultimately hard to say.  In the end, nothing is guaranteed, no matter how far you can throw a football.

Live Tweet Alert: Join #FridayNightFlix for Let’s Get Harry!

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

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, I will be hosting #FridayNightFlix!  The movie?  1986’s Let’s Get Harry!

When Mark Harmon is taken hostage, the U.S. Government proves that it was just as worthless in 1986 as it is in 2022!  Fortunately, Harmon’s friends are going to let him be forgotten.  Enter Robert Duvall as a soldier of fortune!  This film also features Glenn Frey, Rick Rossovich, Thomas F. Wilson, Gary Busey, and David Hess!  Director Stuart Rosenberg requested to be credited as Alan Smithee.  That’s always a good sign, right?

If you want to join us this Friday, just hop onto twitter, start the movie at 10 pm et, and use the #FridayNightFlix hashtag!  I’ll be there tweeting 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.

Let’s Get Harry is available on Prime!

See you there!

Film Review: Tribulation (dir by Andre Van Heerden)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The Apocalypse saga continues with 2000’s Tribulation!  This is the film that answers the question: How do you get an outspoken atheist and a prominent Jewish entertainer to star in your evangelical Christian propaganda film?  Apparently, you do it by not revealing what type of film that you’re making.

At least, that’s what Margot Kidder said happened.  In an interview with the AV Club, Kidder said that neither she nor Howie Mandel realized that they were appearing in a Christian film until they got on the set, looked at the complete script, and asked why Kidder’s character mysteriously vanished from the film.  According to Kidder, this was a film that she did because she was broke, she couldn’t get a job because she had a reputation for being difficult, and she was offered a lot of money to go up to Toronto for a week and shoot a few scenes.  And so, Kidder, who was not a fan of religion in general, was cast as Eileen Canboro, the outspoken Christian who tries to teach everyone about the rapture.

To quote Kidder: “And I still get stopped by those freaky fundamentalists going “Oh, I’m so glad you did Tribulation.” And I wanna go, “Don’t count me into your group, honeybuns. I’m not one of you.”

As for the film itself, it stars Gary Busey as Tom Canboro, a police detective who is indifferent to religion.  His brother-in-law is Jason Quincy (Howie Mandel), an occultist who, early on in the film, gets possessed by a bunch of Satanists.  The film never really makes it clear why Jason was possessed, beyond I guess to warn against using Ouija boards or reading New Age literature.  After Jason is briefly possessed, the Satanists decide that they have to kill everyone who saw him possessed so that no one learns of their existence.  (But it seems like it would have just been simpler to not possess anyone in the first place.)  All of this leads to Tom eventually slipping into a coma.  Don’t ask how.  It just does.

While Tom’s out of it, the events of the first two movies happen.  Franco Manculousso (Nick Mancuso) magically rids the world of nuclear missiles and declares himself to be the messiah.  Millions of people — including Margot Kidder — mysteriously vanish.  An underground rebellion — labeled “The Haters” by Manculousso — forms against the one world government.  Everyone in the world is given a VR headset that will allow Manculousso to either kill them or steal their soul by giving them the mark of the beast.

(In this film, getting the mark of the beast means that you literally end up with 666 tattooed on your hand.  One thing I always find interesting about films like this is how they take everything in Biblical prophecy so literally.  For instance, 7 is the number of God so therefore it makes sense that the number of the Beast’s number would be 6 because the Beast will always be powerful but ultimately inferior.  He’ll be “one away” from God.  However, films like this always feature people wandering around with 666 prominently displayed on their body and oddly, no one ever says, “Hey, have you ever seen that Omen movie?”)

Anyway, Tom eventually wakes up and finds himself trapped in this brand new world.  It turns out that his sole remaining brother is now prominent follower of Manculousso’s and Jason is now involved in the Hater underground.  A few characters from the previous films pop up, largely so they can be executed by Manculousso.  You know how it goes.

Anyway, if Apocalypse was basically a found footage film and Revelation was an action film, Tribulation is a horror film, complete with demonic possession, exploding heads, and virtual reality snakes.  It’s also a bit slow — it takes forever for Tom to actually enter that coma — but it has a few effective scenes.  Howie Mandel, for instance, really throws himself into being possessed.  As for Gary Busey, Margot Kidder said in that previously cited interview that he was a “pain in the ass” to work with but he actually gives a …. well, I don’t know if it’s really a good performance but it’s definitely interesting.  He’s credible during the first half of the film and then, during the second half of the film, he seems to be genuinely confused.  There’s a few weird moments where he smiles when he definitely shouldn’t be smiling but otherwise, Busey’s okay in this film.

There would be one more film in the Apocalypse saga, Judgment.  I’ll be posting a review of that film in 15 minutes.  Hope to see you there!

Film Review: Insignificance (dir by Nicolas Roeg)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

The 1985 film, Insignificance, opens in New York City in the 1950s.

On the streets of New York, a crowd has gathered to watch as the Actress (Theresa Russell), a famous sex symbol, is filmed standing on a grate while wearing a white dress.  Beneath the street and the Actress, a fan has been set up and the crowd of onlookers cheers as the Actress’s skirt is blown up around her hips, again and again.  Standing in the crowd, the Actress’s husband, the Ballplayer (Gary Busey), watches and shakes his head in disgust.  After the scene has been shot, the Actress hops in a taxi while the Ballplayer chases after her.  A very famous man is in town and the Actress is on her way to pay him a visit.

In a nearby bar, the Senator (Tony Curtis), drinks and talks and sweats.  Though it may not be obvious from looking at him, the Senator is a very powerful man.  He’s leading an investigations into subversives who may be trying to bring down the United States government.  He may look like a small-time mobster but the Senator can make and destroy people on a whim.  He’s come to New York on a very specific mission.  He and his goons are planning on pressuring another famous man into testifying before the Senator’s committee.

Though they don’t know it, both the Actress and the Senator are planning on dropping in on the same man.  The Professor (Michael Emil) is a world-renowned genius.  When we first see him, he is sitting alone in a hotel room and looking at a watch that has stopped at 8:15.  The public may know the Professor for his eccentricities but, in private, he is a haunted man.  The Professor’s work was instrumental in the creation of the first atomic bomb.  And now, with both the U.S. and Russia stockpiling their atomic arsenals and the world seemingly on the verge of war, the Professor fears that his work will be the end of humanity.

Though none of the characters are actually named over the course of the film, it should be obvious to anyone with even a slight knowledge of American history that the four main characters are meant to be versions of Marilyn Monroe, Joe DiMaggio, Joe McCarthy, and Albert Einstein.  Insignificance imagines a meeting between these four cultural icons and really, it’s not difficult to imagine a scenario in which they all could have met.  Joe DiMaggio actually was present during the filming of the subway grate scene from The Seven Year Itch and most accounts record his reaction as being not that different from what’s portrayed in Insignificance.  Albert Einstein was suspected of having communist sympathies and several scientific figures (including many who worked on the Manhattan Project) were investigated during the McCarthy era.  Finally, Marilyn Monroe was often frustrated by her “dumb blonde” image and said that she found Albert Einstein to be a very attractive man.  When she died, a biography of Einstein was reportedly found on her nightstand.

In the film, the Senator pressures The Professor to appear before his committee.  It’s not long after the Senator leaves that the Actress arrives.  The Actress announces that she’s fascinating by the theory of relativity and, using balloons, toys, and a flashlight, she proceeds to demonstrate the theory for the Professor.  The befuddled Professor is impressed.  The Actress informs the Professor that he’s at the top of her list.  Meanwhile, downstairs in another hotel room, the Senator is met by a prostitute who bears a resemblance to the Actress. The Ballplayer sits in the hotel bar, tearing up a picture of the Actress and wondering why their marriage is failing.

Because this film was directed by Nicolas Roeg, the film is full of seemingly random flashbacks.  We see the Senator as an altar boy, trying to impress a smiling priest.  We see the Ballplayer getting yelled at by his domineering father.  We see the Actress, growing up poor and being ogled, at first by the young boys at an orphanage and later by Hollywood execs.  Meanwhile, The Professor continually sees the destruction of Hiroshima.  His visions are apocalyptic and, towards the end of the film, he even gets a glimpse into a possible future of atomic hellfire.  It’s a film about fame and cultural transition, a film where people look to celebrities for hope while doomsday comes closer and closer.

Or something like that.  To be honest, I wanted to like Insignificance more than I actually did.  As is typical with so many of Nicolas Roeg’s films, Insignificance has an intriguing premise but the execution is a bit uneven.  There are moments of absolute brilliance.  Theresa Russell and Gary Busey both give perfect performances and the film’s final apocalyptic vision will haunt you.  And then there are moments when the film becomes a bit of a slog and the dialogue starts to get a bit too pretentious and on-the-nose.  Michael Emil has some good moments as the Professor but there are other moments when he seems to be lost.  Meanwhile, Tony Curtis gives such a terrible performance as The Senator that he throws the entire film off-balance.  Curtis bulges his eyes like a madman and delivers his lines like a comedian doing a bad 1930s gangster impersonation.

That said, Insignificance is still an interesting film.  It’s uneven but intriguing.  Though the film may take place in the 50s and may deal with a quartet of historical figures, it’s themes are still relevant in 2020.  People still tend to idealize celebrities.  Politicians still hold onto power by exploiting fear.  The possibility that everything could just end one day is still a very real one.  Insignificance is a film worth watching, even if it doesn’t completely work.

The Gumball Rally (1976, directed by Chuck Bail)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

When he gets bored in a business meeting, Michael Bannon (Michael Sarrazin) calls his old friend, Prof. Samuel Graves (Nicholas Pryor) and says only one word: “Gumball.”  Inspired by that one word, dozens of racers assemble in New York, all planning on taking part in the Gumball Rally.

What is the Gumball Rally?  It’s a highly illegal race in which teams of two compete to see which team can drive from New York to the other side of the country in the least amount of time.  Bannon and Graves currently hold the record for completing the Gumball Rally in the quickest amount of time and all of the racers are determined to try to claim that record for their own.  Meanwhile, one cop named Roscoe (Norman Burton) is determined to break this race up.  Has there ever been a good cop named Roscoe?  Rosco P. Coltrane probably had more of a chance of stopping them Duke Boys than Roscoe does stopping the Gumball Rally.

If The Gumball Rally sounds familiar, it’s because it’s basically a less star-filled version of The Cannonball Run.  Instead of Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise, The Gumball Rally has Michael Sarrazin, Nicholas Pryor, Tim McIntire, and Norman Burton.  Instead of Jackie Chan making his American debut, The Gumball Rally has early performances from Raul Julia and Gary Busey.  Instead of Dean Martin and Sammy Davis, Jr., The Gumball Rally has Steven Keats and Wally Taylor.  You get the idea.  However, the lack of big stars in the cast works to The Gumball Rally‘s advantage.  Whereas you watch The Cannonball Run with the knowledge that there’s no way Burt Reynolds isn’t going to at least come in second, it seems like anyone of the eccentric teams in The Gumball Rally could win the race.

Make no mistake about it, The Gumball Rally is a car chase film, one that was released at the height of that underrated genre’s popularity.  The actors are all likable and almost all of the characters get at least one funny, personality-defining moment but the real stars of The Gumball Rally are the cars and the stunts. That’s not surprising as this film was directed by legendary stuntman Chuck Bail.  This film is full of spectacular crashes and near misses.  (The race’s lone motorcyclist is especially accident-prone.)  Again, the lack of stars in the cast (and the fact that the cast reportedly did most of their own driving) bring an added element of suspense to the stunts.  You watch The Cannonball Run and Smoky and the Bandit secure in the knowledge that Burt Reynolds is never going to crash his vehicle because he’s Burt Ryenolds.  You don’t have that same automatic security when the car is being driven by Michael Sarrazine or Tim McIntire.

It may not be as well known as some of the films that it inspired but, if you like a good car chase (or a good car crash) film, The Gumball Rally is for you.

Review: Predator 2 (dir. by Stephen Hopkins)

Posted on by Arleigh

Predator 2

Like any successful genre film, Predator would remain in the consciousness of filmgoers during the late 80’s. The film was that popular and successful. This also meant that the studio who produced and released the film were more than happy to try and replicate what made them a lot of money.  So, a sequel was quickly greenlit within the halls of 20th Century Fox.

Yet, despite the success the first film was able to garner despite some major production problems, this time around luck wasn’t with Predator 2. The follow-up film would have different production issues than the first but they would affect the film in the long run.

First off, John McTiernan wouldn’t be on-board to direct the sequel. His back-to-back successes with Predator and Die Hard has suddenly made him a coveted action director. His schedule would keep him from directing Predator 2 as his slate was already full with The Hunt for Red October being his next film. In comes Stephen Hopkins to helm the sequel.

Yet, the biggest blow to the production would be not being able to get Arnold Schwarzenegger to return in the role of Dutch, the sole survivor of the elite rescue team from the first film. As with most stars and sequels, this time it would be over a salary dispute that would keep Arnold from returning so in comes Danny Glover to take on the sequel’s lead role.

Now, Danny Glover has more than pulled his own action film weight with two Lethal Weapon films already under his belt, but in terms of on-screen charisma he would be a major downgrade from the presence Schwarzenegger provided the first film. But Glover was more than game to take on the role of Lt. Harrigan of the LAPD as the setting for the sequel moves from the steaming jungle canopy of Central America to the blistering asphalt and concrete jungle of gang-ridden Los Angeles.

This change in location made for an interesting take as it helped establish some world building that showed these Predators have visited Earth many times in the past and not just in the faraway jungles but more towards areas and places rife with conflict. We learn that it hunts those who have survived the conflicts of the area they’re in. Only the strongest for these extraplanetary hunters.

Unlike, the original film, Predator 2 fails in not having a cast of characters that the audience could empathize and root for. This follow-up is mostly about action and even more gore than the first. Even the opening sequence tries to one-up the jungle shooting scene from the first film, yet instead of shock and awe the sequence just seems loud and busy,

Predator 2 suffers from a lot of that as the film feels more than just a tad bit bloated. The Thomas brothers (Jim and John) who wrote the original film return for the sequel but were unable to capture lightning in a bottle a second time around. Where the first film was very minimalist in it’s narrative and plot, the sequel goes for the throw everything in but the kitchen sink approach. We have warring drug gangs, inept police leadership, secretive government agencies with their own agendas.

What does work with Predator 2 and has made it into a cult classic as years passed was the very worldbuilding I mentioned earlier. We learn a bit more of this predator-hunter. While some comes as exposition from Gary Busey’s special agent role Peter Keyes, the rest comes from just seeing the new look of this particular Predator courtesy of special effects master Stan Winston.

The biggest joy for fans of the films comes in an all-too-brief scene showcasing the trophy case of the Predator inside it’s spacecraft. Within this trophy case are the skulls of the prey it’s hunted and killed. One skull in particular would ignite the imagination of scifi action fans worldwide. It’s a skull of a xenomorph from the Alien franchise. It made fans wonder if the two films were part of a larger tapestry. Both properties were owned by 20th Century Fox, so there was a chance and hope that the two meanest and baddest alien creatures on film would crossover together.

It would be many, many years before such a team-up would happen. Even when it finally did fans of the franchises would be let down with what they get after waiting for over a decade.

Predator 2 could be seen as trying to make lightning hit the same patch twice or it could be seen as a quick cash grab by a studio seeing a potential franchise. Both are true and without its two biggest stars, Arnold Schwarzenegger and John McTiernan, returning to reprise their roles for the sequel the film was already behind the eight-ball before filming began.

While the follow-up had some interesting new ideas that helped round out the Predator as one of film’s greatest onscreen villains, it also failed to capitalize on those ideas in a creative way. There’s some good in Predator 2, but way too much baggage and too much bad to have it live up to the success and popularity of the original.

A Movie A Day #354: Lolly-Madonna XXX (1973, directed by Richard C. Sarafian)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

In the backwoods of Hicksville, USA, two families are feuding.  Laban Feather (Rod Steiger, bellowing even more than usual) and Pap Gutshall (Robert Ryan) were once friends but now they are committed rivals.  They claim that the fight started when Pap bought land that once belonged to Laban but it actually goes back farther than that.  Laban and Pap both have a handful of children, all of whom have names like Thrush and Zeb and Ludie and who are all as obsessed with the feud as their parents.  When the Gutshall boys decide to pull a prank on the Feather boys, it leads to the Feathers kidnapping the innocent Roonie (Season Hubley) from a bus stop.  They believe that Roonie is Lolly Madonna, the fictional fiancée of Ludie Gutshall (Kiel Martin).  Zack Feather (Jeff Bridges), who comes the closest of any Feather to actually having common sense, is ordered to watch her while the two families prepare for all-out war.  Zack and Roonie fall in love, though they do not know that another Feather brother has also fallen in love with Gutshall daughter.  It all leads to death, destruction, and freeze frames.

Lolly-Madonna XXX is a strange film.  It starts out as a typical hicksploitation flick before briefly becoming a backwoods Romeo and Juliet and finally ending up as a heavy-handed metaphor for both the Vietnam War and the social upheaval at home.  Along with all the backwoods drama, there is a fantasy sequence where Hawk Feather (Ed Lauter) briefly imagines himself as an Elvis-style performer.  (Hawk also dresses up in Roonie’s underwear.)  Probably the most interesting thing about Lolly-Madonna XXX is the collection of actors who show up playing Feathers and Gutshalls.  Along with Steiger, Ryan, Martin, Bridges, and Lauter, everyone from Randy Quaid to Paul Koslo to Scott Wilson to Gary Busey has a role to play in the feud.  Lolly-Madonna XXX is too uneven and disjointed to really be considered a good movie but I can say that I have never seen anything else like it.

One final note: Lolly-Madonna XXX was directed by Richard Sarafian, who is best known for another early 70s cult classic, Vanishing Point.

A Movie A Day #332: Surviving The Game (1994, directed by Ernest R. Dickerson)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Jack Mason (Ice-T) has been living on the streets of Seattle ever since the death of his wife and daughter.  When Cole (Charles S. Dutton), the friendly man at the soup kitchen, tells Mason that he can get him a job, the suicidal Mason accepts.  It turns out that a group of wealthy men are going on a hunting trip and they need a guide to lead them through the wilderness.  Mason accepts but, upon arriving, he discovers that the men (who are played by Rutger Hauer, F. Murray Abraham, William McNamara, John C. McGinley, and, of course, Gary Busey) are actually planning on playing the most dangerous game and hunting him for the weekend.

There are definitely better versions out there of Richard Connell’s famous short story.  One of the best, John Woo’s Hard Target, was released a year before Surviving the Game.  Both films share the idea of rich men hunting down the homeless for fun.  Surprisingly, it is Woo’s film that seems to take the idea, with all of its societal implications, more seriously.  Surviving the Game may present Jack Mason as being a suicidal homeless man but there is never any doubt that he is actually Ice-T, everyone’s favorite rapper and all-around badass.  But it’s precisely because Ice-T has such a recognizable persona that Surviving the Game is a guilty pleasure.  There is never any doubt that Ice-T can survive the game because Ice-T is the fucking game.  Matching Ice-T every step of the way is a rogue’s gallery of recognizable character actors, all of whom bring a different type of crazy to the proceedings.  When a movie delivers the spectacle of Ice-T being hunted by and then hunting Gary Busey and Rutger Hauer, it is easy to forgive whatever plot holes might be present in the script.

One final note: Surviving the Game was directed by Ernest R. Dickerson.  Dickerson got his start of Spike Lee’s cinematographer so it’s not surprising that Surviving the Game looks great.