The Black 6 (1973)

AKA: The Black Six

Director: Matt Cimber

Writers: Matt Cimber, Mikel Angel

Composer: David Moscoe

Starring: Robert Howard, Cindy Daly, Mikel Angel, John Isenbarger, Gene Washington, Carl Eller, Lem Barney, Mercury Morris, Willie Lanier, Joe Greene, Garnett Higgens, Bill King, Marilyn McArthurs

More info: IMDb

Tagline: See the 6 biggest, baddest and best waste 150 motorcycle dudes!

Plot:  A gang of six black Vietnam veterans fight white racists in a Southern town to avenge their dead friend.

My rating: 6.5/10

Will I watch it again?  Maybe.

On paper, this sounds like a great revenge, action-filled, Blaxploitation picture that would be awesome to see as a drive-in double feature.  While it does have those elements, there's a lot more attention paid to the social race aspect than anything else.  It's half exploitation and half social issues and, to a large degree, it works.  The Black 6 are made up of real life NFL players, many of whom made their acting debut here.  I like them and I dig that they're not seasoned actors because they bring something authentic to the role that you wouldn't get otherwise.  That also means it gets a little amateurish but it's in a good way.  If I had to single out my favorite performance it would be Hannah Dean who plays the lead's mother.  She's about as genuine as it gets and this is only her first of four films she made.  The low budget nature suits this film just fine.  I wasn't once bored, even if there's very little action (which most of it was saved for the big fight at the end).  The plot moves nicely even if it doesn't fit a conventional mold.  For instance, we're a long ways into the picture when Bubba (Washington) investigates his brother's unsolved murder which doesn't take as long as you'd think before the big fight at the end.  There's not much time spent with the bad guys.  But then we don't have to hang with them long.  We know from the opening of the picture that these guys are bad and they need to be dealt with.  This isn't Shakespeare.  I've seen this twice now and it's one of the better low budget Blaxploitation pictures to come out of the 70s.  It's a fun ride that has be benefit of inexperience from different aspects to the cast and crew.

Gone in 60 Seconds 2 (1989)

Director: H.B. Halicki

Writer: H.B. Halicki

Starring: H.B. Halicki

More info: H.B. Halicki Wiki

Plot:  A man hijacks a semi and leads hundreds of cops on a destructive chase.

My rating: 7/10

Will I watch it again?  Maybe (I've already seen it twice).


Since this is footage put together from a movie that was never finished, you just have to watch this as one long 30-minute car chase.  It's a good one.  There are times when you have to kick in your suspension of disbelief (like when the semi plows into 20 or more parked cars and doesn't slow down one bit) but that's not too much to ask I guess.  Halicki was a stunt master like no other when it came to cars.  His GONE IN 60 SECONDS (1974) is a masterpiece in car chases (don't watch the widescreen version where his widow replaced the songs and score with crap and also changed the original car sounds - you're better off with the original fullscreen VHS version).  He was in the middle of shooting this film when an unexpected accident took his life.  The chase is fun and Halecki and pals crash a shitload of cars and motorcycles.  That goes on for about twenty minutes when he switches vehicles and takes The Slicer out for a spin.  At first it's ridiculous and goofy looking but that only lasts a few seconds until you get to see what it's capable of.  Then it's pure badass.  Fans of car stunts shouldn't pass this one up.  It's not polished but don't let the low budget get you down.  Halecki tears some shit up and there are lots of get stunts that shouldn't go un-noticed.

Highwaymen (2004)

Director: Robert Harmon

Writers: Craig Mitchell, Hans Bauer

Composer: Mark Isham

Starring: Jim Caviezel, Rhona Mitra, Frankie Faison, Colm Feore, Gordon Currie, Andrea Roth, Noam Jenkins

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Terror hits the road

Plot: Rennie Cray (Caviezel) embarks on a bloodthirsty rampage to avenge the death of his wife who was struck down by a serial killer - a man who hunts and kills women using his '72 El Dorado.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again? No.

Gee whiz.  What a letdown.  There's a good movie to be made from this really neat and simple premise but the one I just watched is rather dull.  A lot of the car stunts are really great.  That's the best part.  Caviezel is bland and a tad too dramatic.  Mitra is fine I suppose.  It's always great to see Frankie (Barney from the Hannibal Lector films) Faison in anything.  It's been ages since he showed up in anything I've watched.  The story has a great idea of having a serial killer using his car as his weapon but some of the wind gets knocked out of it when you see that the killer is all cyborg'd out like he's still in the hospital.

What's worse is that he's in a wheelchair.  Rennie (Caviezel) gives us all of the details, by way of telling Molly (Mitra), halfway into the picture.  When he starts talking of how he put Fargo (Feore) in the hospital and Fargo is released months later but covered in metal traction shit and gets back on the road to kill, I was laughing.  But you're not supposed to be laughing and his description wasn't enough to prepare me for when I saw Fargo all done up for the first time minutes before the movie ends.  This could have been and should have been so much better.  Chalk it up to another missed opportunity.  This came three years before Tarantino's much better DEATH PROOF (2007).  The New Line DVD has a nice anamorphic widescreen print with the only extras being the trailer for this film (also anamorphic widescreen) and anamorphic widescreen trailers for THE BUTTERFLY EFFECT, THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE (remake) and FREQUENCY.

True Lies (1994)

Director: James Cameron

Writers: Claude Zidi, Simon Michael, Didier Kaminka, James Cameron

Composer: Brad Fiedel

Starring: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jamie Lee Curtis, Tom Arnold, Bill Paxton, Tia Carrere, Art Malik, Eliza Dushku, Grant Heslov, Charton Heston, Marshall Manesh

More info: IMDb

Tagline: When he said I do, he never said what he did.

Plot: A fearless, globe-trotting, terrorist-battling secret agent has his life turned upside down when he discovers his wife might be having an affair with a used car salesman.

My rating: 8.5/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

It's been ages since I last saw this and I'd forgotten how brilliantly awesome and fun this picture is.  I think you'll find in Writing a Screenplay 101 that you only include scenes that further the story.  If it doesn't move the plot then it needs to go.  The first half hour has our heroes going after the bad guys.  Suddenly all of that takes a backseat to focusing on Harry's (Schwarzenegger) suspicion that his wife, Helen (Curtis), is cheating on him and that's where we spend the next third of the movie without hardly a word spoken about the big terrorist threat.  Then it's back to the business at hand as we finish the picture.  Technically it sounds all wrong but Cameron & Co. make it one hell of a fun ride which makes that diversion insignificant.  The action is fantastic (blowing up the bridge was amazing), the humor is hilarious (Tom Arnold deserves a lot of credit for what he brought to the film) and the actors are having a blast.  Curtis is as sexy as she is funny and everybody wins.  One thing I noticed this time was how nice it was not to get the usual Schwarzenegger quips after he offs somebody.  The silence was sweet.  This really is a super fun ride.  Unfortunately there's no friggin' Blu-ray.  The 20th Century Fox DVD has the film in non-anamorphic widescreen which is unacceptable.  Oh, and the only extra is the trailer.  Very weak considering how good and popular this movie is.

Siren of Bagdad (1953)

Director: Richard Quine

Writer: Robert E. Kent

Composer: John Leipold

Starring: Paul Henreid, Patricia Medina, Hans Conried, Charles Lung, Laurette Luez, Anne Dore, George Keymas, Michael Fox, Karl 'Killer' Davis, Carl Milletaire

More info: IMDb

Tagline:  Very, Very Gay! When the Sultan's Away, and the Royal Magician Starts to Play...in the Harem!

Plot:  Kazah the Great (Henreid), a magician heads a troupe of girls and acrobats traveling in Arabia. The girls are stolen by Sultan El Malid (Lung), and Kazak joins forces with Zendi (Medina), the daughter of the rightful sultan that was deposed by Malidi to get the girls back and rid Bagdad of the evil Malid.

See an authentic harem dance!!!

My rating: 6.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Well this was a lot more fun that I expected.  I've never seen Paul Henreid in a comedy and boy is he having fun in this one!  The film works partly because the actors are having a blast.  What's more is you've got a lot of jokes that land.  I laughed more than I thought I would, as in laughed out loud.  As is standard for even a big studio B picture, the costumes and set design are colorful and fun.  After seeing this flick I can see why there has been civil unrest in the Middle East for thousands of years...the chicks are smokin'!!!

The gal in the red in the last picture isn't even credited.  Kazah (Henreid) puts Ben Ali (Conried) into the magic box and transforms him into this hottie but she still has Ben Ali's voice.  The IMDb trivia says her name is Vivian Mason.  She's fucking hilarious.  She jumps into the middle of the dancers and tries her best to fit in but she's as clumsy as Ben Ali would be if he were still in male form.  She's brilliant in the few minutes she's on screen.  A short 73 minutes is all you get with this one and that's all you need.  I wish more movies knew when to quit when they should.  I recorded this off of TCM many years ago and finally got around to it.  This is one of those pictures that would be great on a rainy, quiet afternoon or back in '53 with a double feature, Warner Bros. cartoon, a Three Stooges short and a chapter from the latest serial (even though serials were a dying breed at this point).

Batman: The Killing Joke (2016)

Director: Sam Liu

Writers: Alan Moore, Brian Bolland, Brian Azzarello

Composers: Kristopher Carter, Michael McCuistion, Lolita Ritmanis

Starring: Kevin Conroy, Mark Hamill, Tara Strong, Ray Wise, John DiMaggio, Robin Atkin Downes, Brian George, JP Karliak

More info: IMDb

Tagline:  The madness begins.

Plot:  As Batman hunts for the escaped Joker, the Clown Prince of Crime attacks the Gordon family to prove a diabolical point mirroring his own fall into madness.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  Probably not.

Talk about a disappointment.  While I never read the graphic novel from (I think) the 80s, I'd heard a lot about it.  It sounded like a really dark and gritty tale.  So when I heard months ago that this was being brought to the screen with Conroy and Hamill back in their iconic roles AND that it was going to be rated R, I was properly excited.  Then I saw it.  It's OK.  When it came to delivering the grisly goods they only kind of went there.  For an R-rated picture there's no bad language, the violence is minimal and there's no nudity.  I guess it's only R for the adult themes...and to boost sales by slyly implying that it's going to earn it's adult rating.  Bullshit, I says.  I'd have to read the graphic novel to know where the film makers departed and expanded but the film they made feels like an extended episode for a late-night Batman animated series.  As it is, Batgirl has sex with Batman for the first, and presumably, the only time (which is fine but I'm not savvy on their history leading up to this point so I just have to assume that she's been hot for him for a long time and that he's totally OK nailin' a child or a very, very young woman) and then she spends the rest of the picture (until she's taken out of it) going through teen romance issues.  The Joker is the best part.  Hamill is outstanding in the role (as if he wouldn't be, right?) and he's the best part.  There was some great imagery but the overall film animation isn't nearly as smooth as you would expect for a movie, even though it was a direct-to-DVD film.  It looked like a rushed job you'd get from a TV series.  Maybe that's what they were going for.  I would have like more time spent on this project before making it this far and that's how the film felt, unfinished and needing more time and care to make into something ballsy, worthwhile and iconic.  The ONLY extra on the Warner Bros. DVD is a sneak preview of a new Batman video game!  Really, that's it.

The Big Country (1958)

Director: William Wyler

Writers: James R. Webb, Sy Bartlett, Robert Wilder, Jessamyn West, Donald Hamilton

Composer: Jerome Moross

Starring: Gregory Peck, Jean Simmons, Carroll Baker, Charlton Heston, Burl Ives, Charles Bickford, Alfonso Bedoya, Chuck Connors, Chuck Hayward, Buff Brady

More info: IMDb

Tagline:  Big they fought! Big they loved! Big their story!

Plot: A New Englander arrives in the Old West, where he becomes embroiled in a feud between two families over a valuable patch of land.

My rating: 8.5/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

I just watched this for the very first time.  I didn't know anything about it.  It looked like it might have a sugary love story mixed in with some pretty scenery.  The gorgeous location shooting is abundant but the lovey stuff is very minimal, VERY minimal.  It's like the genre grew up a little and took the male/female relationship (within a Western) to the next level.  So often a romance in a film hurts it or at least too much of one can bring a film down.  Not this picture.  The performances are very good (Burl Ives OWNS it in every scene he's in.  His entrance at the big party is top drawer stuff.  In every scene he tells more about himself that reveals a multi-layered character and not some pissed off rancher who wants revenge.  He's fantastic.  Jerome Moross's score is big, lush and a perfect compliment to the great outdoors on display.  Jim (Peck) does some unexpected things that got me to giving up what I think he's going to do next and just roll with it.  Early on you might have a good idea how the rest of the near-3-hour picture is going to play out but you'd only be partially correct.  The ending is outstanding and the absence of dialogue adds to its effectiveness.  Speaking of absence, the fist fight between Jim and Steve (Heston) goes on for a couple of minutes with no music and when the music does come in, it's just a quiet instrument or two.  It was very effective and I was impressed the film makers played it out like that.  Usually you'd get a busy, violent music cue.  As for being two hours and forty-five minutes long, it doesn't feel like it.  Looking back, there isn't a wasted scene in the film.  Everything that's there needs to be there.  Great flick.  The MGM DVD features the film in anamorphic widescreen with only the theatrical trailer (non-anamorphic widescreen) for an extra.