Category Archives: 70’s Movies

The Sunshine Boys (1975)

Posted on January 2, 2026 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: Comedians try to reunite.

Wily Clark (Walter Matthau) is an aging comedian from the vaudeville era who’s now in his 80’s and finding it hard to find work. His nephew Ben (Richard Benjamin) acts as his agent but signing Wily to acting gigs proves challenging due to Wily’s disagreeable manner. Al Lewis (George Burns) worked with Wily when the two where in their prime and known as The Sunshine Boys. ABC wants to reunite the two for a TV special, but Wily resists insisting that he can’t work with Al again due to petty grievances. Ben though gets the two together in Wily’s apartment for a rehearsal of their old skits, but fighting immediately breaks out. They then pair up again for the TV special under the condition that neither has to talk to the other outside of the skit, but when Wily falls over with a heart attack things take a serious turn. Will Al be able to reconcile with Wily before it’s too late?

This is another hit Neil Simon play that hasn’t aged well. At the time it was best known for having George Burns, who hadn’t been in a movie in 36 years, and his subsequent Academy Award win for Best Supporting Actor, which he received at age 80 that was a record for oldest recipient until broken 14 years later by Jessica Tandy. My main gripe though is more with characters. Matthau is alright, though he was only 55 when he did the part, but still looked adequately old, but the person he plays is unlikable. Supposedly he wants acting gigs but makes little effort to get to the auditions on time, or memorize his lines while expecting his stressed-out nephew, whom he belittles and berates constantly, to do all the legwork. It’s really hard to feel sorry for someone who doesn’t put in the effort and he’s rude and boorish at every turn. The movie tries to play this off as just being a part of old age, but it really isn’t. The guy has a huge attitude problem for any stage in life, and it becomes a big turn off. The viewer could’ve sided with him more, or at least little, had he been trying his best and just coming up short and would’ve created a far more interesting dramatic arc had his only option back into the business would be pairing with Al and the internal efforts he’d have to go through to get along with him to make it work versus having his nephew desperately do all the attempted repairing, which isn’t as interesting.

The reasons for their feud are inane and hinges on minor issues like Al apparently ‘spitting on’ Wily whenever he says a word that starts with ‘T’ or poking him in the chest during a moment in their skit, but you’d think if they had been doing this routine for 43 years that Wily would’ve brought up these grievances already. Al seemed quite reasonable, so why does Wily feel the need to stew about it and not just call it to his attention? The story would’ve been stronger had there been a true gripe to get mad at, like Al stealing away Wily’s wife or girlfriend, or signing some big movie deal without Wily’s knowledge that made Al a star while Wily got left behind. All of these things would make anyone upset and create a better dramedy on how the two would be able to reconcile, but these other ‘issues’ that Wily has are just too insipid even for a silly comedy.

Spoiler Alert!

The film also lacks an adequate payoff. There’s this big build up for this TV special, but then it never gets past the rehearsal phase. It climaxes with Wily lying in bed in his cluttered apartment treating his nurse, played by Rosetta LeNoire, just as shabbily as he does everyone else and having learned nothing. I was surprised to by all of these get-well cards and telegrams supposedly by his fans and other celebrities. Would’ve been more profound if Wily received no well wishes and thus gotten him to realize that he was truly forgotten and this would then force him to reassess his selfish nature and commit to treating people better, which unfortunately doesn’t occur, and the character learns nothing.

Since it’s revealed that Wily and Al will be spending the rest of their lives in the same actor’s retirement community it would’ve been nice to show them doing their skits in front of an audience of other seniors, but the film misses the mark here to. There’s no real finality or journey, just constant rhetorical bickering and a running joke dealing with Wily unable to unlock his apartment door from the inside “don’t push it, slide it”, which gets old fast.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: November 6, 1975

Runtime: 1 Hour 51 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Herbert Ross

Studio: MGM

Available: DVD-R (Warner Archive), Blu-ray, Amazon Video, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, Buddy Movies, Comedy, Movies Based on Stageplays, Movies that take place in the Big Apple

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Plaza Suite (1971)

Posted on December 26, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: One room, different characters.

The entire movie takes place in one setting, New York’s historic Plaza Hotel, where three different couples rent out the same room at different times and the story examines what happens while they’re in it. The first segment involves Sam and Karen (Walter Matthau, Maureen Stapleton). Karen has checked into the room because that was where they spent their honeymoon 23 years earlier, but since then their marriage has soured and she hopes to rekindle the old flame but finds her husband’s resistance to it to be both challenging and troubling. The second story involves a famous Hollywood producer (also played by Matthau) checking into the room so he can have a quick fling with Muriel (Barbara Harris) a girl he dated before he was famous and who is now married with kids. The third and final act revolves around Roy and Norma (Walter Matthau, Lee Grant) and their efforts to get their daughter Mimsy (Jenny Sullivan) to come out of the bathroom, of which she has locked herself inside, and attend her wedding.

The film is based on the play of the same name that was written by Neil Simon who also wrote the screenplay. The play, which opened in 1968 at the Schubert theater before moving onto Broadway, had the same storylines, but was cast differently. In that one George C. Scott and Maureen Stapleton played the characters in all three segments, but director Arthur Hiller didn’t like that approach. Initially he wanted different actors for each story including having Peter Sellers and Barbra Streisand cast in the second, which would’ve been terrific, but when that fell through, he decided to have Matthau play in all three and then simply change around the female leads, but this approach doesn’t work as well. The film suffers badly from having everything done in the same room, which quickly becomes visually static, and the talky script is only occasionally amusing.

The first story features a strong performance by Stapleton, but having the husband eventually admit to having an affair with his secretary, has been done hundreds of times before. The segment lacks anything fresh and the viewer can almost immediately guess where it’s going right from the start making it both predictable and boring. Had it unfolded differently where the husband at least pretended there was a spark left in their marriage and only revealed his true nature through subtle layers then it might’ve had potential but having him be aloof and cranky at the start offers no surprises and makes things much too obvious.

The second segment shows its cards too soon as well. It’s clear that the producer will come onto any attractive woman he sees, so watching him attempt to exploit an old girlfriend and then become shocked when he finds her more intrigued with the celebrities that he knows instead of himself doesn’t offer much of a payoff. Instead, he should’ve been portrayed as being burnt out with Tinsel Town and all of the plastic people he’s bedded and genuinely wanting to rekindle things with his past love whom he remembered as being down-to-earth and then having him shocked to learn that she had become just as superficial as the rest would’ve been funny.

The third act is by far the funniest particularly Matthau hamming up over his frustration at how much the wedding, and subsequent reception, is costing him. This is also the only segment to have some of the action take place outside of the room when in an attempt to get into the locked bathroom he goes out on the 7th story ledge, which is a bit nerve-wracking. However, there’s still some issues including the fact that Mimsy, the daughter, never says anything while locked inside the bathroom, which is unrealistic and off-putting. I didn’t like the point-of-view shots showing her sitting on the toilet through the door’s keyhole as this was unintentionally creepy as it insinuates that anybody could secretly peep at anyone else going to the bathroom and therefore putting a keyhole on a bathroom door would’ve been patently absurd. The parents are also not very likable, or caring as they seem to feel that their daughter is somehow ‘obligated’ to get married and it’s ‘too late to backout’ when it really isn’t. Forcing someone to get hitched and acting like it’s some sort of ‘life duty’ is very old fashioned making the segment quite dated even for its time period.

Some of the exterior shots were cool including the opening bit where Stapleton is shown walking down a busy New York street towards the hotel where the pedestrians are not extras, but instead regular people unaware that they were a part of a movie. The bird’s eye shot showing cars going along the Brooklyn Bridge and its ability to focus in on the one being driven by Harris is impressive and quite possibly, at least on a visual scale, one of the best moments in the film. Even these segments though have some logic loopholes as it shows the character from the segment that has just ended walking outside the hotel while the new character walks in making it seem like the new guest goes into the room the second the former one leaves it, which wouldn’t make sense as a maid would’ve had to go in there in-between to clean it.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: May 12, 1971

Runtime: 1 Hour 54 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Arthur Hiller

Studio: Paramount Pictures

Available: DVD, Amazon Video, PlutoTV, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, Comedy/Drama, Movies Based on Stageplays, Movies that take place in the Big Apple, Movies with a Hotel setting

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Whiffs (1975)

Posted on December 20, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Robbing with laughing gas.

Dudley (Elliot Gould) sacrifices his body to be a guinea pig for the army’s tests. All their latest warfare weapons get used on him first to see how effective they are. He feels he’s doing it to help his country and therefore doesn’t mind the toll that it takes, but as his health declines his superior officer Col. Lockyer (Eddie Albert) realizes that they’re going to have to find someone else to replace him. Dudley is offered a small monthly disability payment, which he feels won’t be enough to survive on. He tries to get other jobs to supplement his measly income but is unable to hold any of them down. He then meets a former fellow test subject Chops (Harry Guardino) at a bar and the two concoct a plan to rob banks using the nerve gas that Dudley has snuck out of the military facility. The scheme is, with the help of a crop-duster named Dusty (Godfrey Cambridge), to spray the gas onto the town’s population, which will disable the folks for certain amount of time and give the two a chance to take the money without any impediment. Trouble ensues when Lockyer catches on to what they’re doing and becomes determined to stop them by bringing in the military.

Screenwriter Malcolm Marmorstein, who wrote also wrote the script for S*P*Y*S, which came out a year before, learned from his mistakes from that one making this a slight improvement. The protagonist has a better arc and the plot is more concretely structured. The humor’s focus is improved as it takes some major potshots at the armed forces and it also manages to have a normal character, as in Dudley’s nurse girlfriend Scottie (Jennifer O’Neill) who is sensible and relatable to the viewer. It features a great performance by Guardino, who’s effective particularly as he riles in pain during one of the tests, but still manages somehow to continue his conversation with Gould. This is also not quite as silly as the other one as it ventures into some dark areas though at times it gets a bit difficult to keep laughing when you witness what terrible, painful things the army gets the two test subjects to agree to.

The main weakness comes in the form of the main character who’s likable enough, but not particularly relatable. I’ll give Gould credit for going against type and taking on a role that was way different from any of the ones he did before. Usually, he played caustic intellectuals who would routinely question and challenge authority, but here he’s a passive simp that does whatever he’s asked without argument, but this then becomes part of the problem. No sane person would agree to allow their bodies to go through such a battering even if it was for the ‘good of the country’ and thus it becomes confusing why Gould would put up with it for so long and the viewer is unable to connect emotionally with his quandary as much as they should.

Spoiler Alert!

The ending doesn’t pack much of a punch and becomes boring just as the tension should’ve been heightening. The idea that Gould decides to drug the whole town just to rob a bank didn’t make much sense as they could’ve easily just used it on the bank employees, which would’ve taken up much less time and effort and not attracted all the needless attention. It also comes off as disingenuous that Gould, who spends the majority of the film being a dope who can’t seem to think for himself, would then suddenly become so cunning as he quickly, on the spur of the moment, comes up with crafty ways to outfox those that are chasing them, but if he was so smart then why did he stupidly subject himself to being the army’s guinea pig for so long? He wasn’t even the one who came up with using the gas to rob the banks in the first place as that idea came from Guardino, so if the story were going to be consistent then Guardino should’ve been the one who continues to do the thinking while Gould would simply take the orders like he had through the first two acts.

Having Gould then jump off Dusty’s crop duster plane just as it’s taking the three men to the safety of Mexico, so he can instead have sex with O’Neil, as his impotency miraculously gets cured, isn’t a satisfying payoff. During the early part of the decade watching two people copulate onscreen in unusual places might’ve been deemed edgy and irreverent, but by this point it had been done too many times, making the moment here, no pun intended, anti-climactic. It would’ve worked better had the sex stuff been written out and O’Neill just been a part of the robbery versus having her disappear for long periods as she does here.

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: October 15, 1975

Runtime: 1 Hour 32 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Ted Post

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: DVD-R

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Posted in 70's Movies, Black Comedy, Buddy Movies, Robbing Banks

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S*P*Y*S (1974)

Posted on December 18, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: Targeted to be killed.

Bruland (Donald Sutherland) and Griff (Elliot Gould) are two CIA agents stationed in France who prove to be inept at every turn. When they accidentally kill a Russian gymnast defector (Michael Petrovitch) the head of the CIA Paris unit, Martinson (Joss Ackland), makes a deal with the soviets to have the two killed. This would then avoid a dangerous retaliation that could lead to a nuclear war. However, neither Bruland or Griff are made aware of this until they start getting attacked by people from all ends including the KGB, the CIA, the Chinese communists, and even a French terrorist group. In their pursuit to survive the two, who initially disliked the other, form an uneasy alliance.

The film’s original title was ‘Wet Stuff’, but the producers wanted a tie-in with M*A*S*H that had been hugely successful and also starred Gould and Sutherland, so they changed it to make it seem similar to that one, but the attempt failed and the movie became a huge bomb with the both audiences and critics alike. Viewers came in expecting the same irreverent humor, which this doesn’t have, so audiences left disappointed and the word of mouth quickly spread causing it to play in the theaters for only a short while. The irony though is that in countries that hadn’t seen M*A*S*H, like the Netherlands and Germany, it fared better because the expectations going in weren’t as high.

On a comic level it’s not bad and even has its share of amusing bits. The way the defector gets killed, shot by a gun disguised as a camera, was clever and there’s also a unique car chase in which Gould takes over the steering wheel from the backseat while someone else puts their foot to the pedal. The initial rendezvous between Sutherland and his on-and-off girlfriend (Zouzou) has its moments too as he finds her in bed with another guy while a second one is in the bathroom forcing him to have to pee in the kitchen sink. Gould then, who thought she was ‘raping him with her eyes’ when they first met, takes over and gets into a threesome while the dejected Sutherland has to sleep on the couch.

On the negative end the characterizations are poor to the point of being nonexistent. Initially it comes-off like Gould and Sutherland are rivals, which could’ve been an interesting dynamic, but this gets smoothed over too quickly. Having the two bicker and compete would’ve been far more fun. There’s also no sense of urgency. While Sutherland does lose his spy job and forced to pretend to feign illness to get out of paying a restaurant bill it’s then later revealed that he did have the money, but this then ruins any possible tension. Had they been in a true desperate situation the viewer might’ve gotten more caught up in their dilemma, but as it is it’s just too playful. The villains are equally clownish and in fact become the center of the comedy by the final act, which takes place at a wedding, while the two leads sit back and watch making them benign observers in their own vehicle.

The film needed somebody that was normal and the viewer could identify with. Buffoons can be entertaining, but ultimately someone needs to anchor it and this movie has no one. I thought for a while that Zouzou would be that person, and she could’ve been good, but she and her terrorist pals end up trying to assassinate the two like everybody else, which adds too much to the already cluttered chaos. The satire also needed to be centered on something. For instance, with Airplane the humor was structured around famous disaster flicks from the 70’s and all the jokes had a knowing tie-in. Here though it’s all over the place. Yes, it pokes fun of spies, but that’s too easy, and having it connected to let’s say James Bond movies would’ve given it a clearer angle and slicker storyline.

Since it did have a modicum of success in certain countries it convinced screenwriter Malcolm Marmorstein to continue to pursue the formula as he was sure it was simply the botched marketing that had ruined this one, so he wrote another parody script, this time poking fun at the army, just a year later, which also starred Gould, and was called Whiffs, which will be reviewed next.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: June 28, 1974

Runtime: 1 Hour 40 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Irvin Kershner

Studio: 20th Century Fox

Available: DVD-R

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Posted in 70's Movies, Buddy Movies, Obscure Movies, Parody, Spy/Espionage

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The Kentucky Fried Movie (1977)

Posted on December 13, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 6 out of 10

4-Word Review: Zucker brother’s first movie.

In 1974 there was the release of The Groove Tube which had a format of comical skits, much like a variety show, that managed to be a big hit and thus ushered in several imitators causing a whole new genre to surface. Unfortunately, those copycats didn’t fare as well and many of them were downright lame. By 1977 the trend had died off and yet brothers David and Jerry Zucker along with their friend Jim Abrahams were motivated to make another one revolving around funny sketches that had gotten a good response from audiences during their improvisational shows done on stage. The studios though weren’t impressed citing the decline in box office receipts towards sketch movies and thus refused their request for financing. They were then able to get a verbal deal from a wealthy real estate developer who agreed to fund the project as long as they made a 10-minute short that he could use to shop around to attract other investors, but when he found out how much it would cost just to produce the short he pulled out forcing the Zuckers to put up their own money, which amounted to $35,000, to get the short made.

This though proved to be beneficial as it attracted the attention of a young up-and-coming filmmaker John Landis, who had just gotten done directing Schlock on a minuscule budget and felt he could do the same here. It also got shown to Kim Jorgenson a theater owner who found it so funny he got other owners to play it before the main feature, and this was enough to get them to pool their money into a $650,000 budget that when completed made a whopping $7.1 million at the box office. This then directly lead to them getting studio backing for their most well-known hit Airplane which was a script that they had written before doing this one but had been previously unable to get any backing for.

Like with most films made during the brief period when this genre was ‘hot’ the jokes and skits are hit-or-miss. The opening sequences dealing with a TV news show are the weakest. Watching a reporter pick his nose because he doesn’t realize that he’s on the air isn’t really all that outrageous when today YouTube has actual news bloopers showing essentially the same thing. Having an ape go berserk in the studio during a live broadcast was too obvious and telegraphs the punchline to the viewer right from the beginning and thus making the outcome quite predictable.

The parody of Bruce Lee movies entitled ‘A Fistful of Yen’ definitely has its share of amusing moments though it goes on a bit too long and the special effects look cheap. My favorite segments came after this one and take up most of the final 20-minutes. These include Hare Krishna monks going to the bar after a ‘hard day of work’ harassing people on the street. There’s also ‘The Courtroom’ skit that’s a parody of Perry Mason-style TV-shows from the 50’s. The Zinc Oxide bit involving a housewife, played by Nancy Steen, who’s forced to face the reality of what life would be like if all the items in her house that was made from Zinc Oxide suddenly disappeared.

The film also features well-known actors who volunteered their time with little pay and appear in brief cameos. These include Bill Bixby as a spokesperson for a send-up of aspirin commercials. There’s also Donald Sutherland who plays a klutzy waiter during a parody of disaster flicks, Tony Dow playing his most famous role of Wally from ‘Leave it to Beaver’ as a jury in the Courtroom and Henry Gibson, in what I found to be both the funniest and darkest skit, where he essentially plays himself in a mock add showing how parents (Reberta Kent, Christopher Hanks) can still keep their deceased son as a ‘a part of their family’ by bringing along his increasingly decomposed corpse with them wherever they go.

My Rating: 6 out of 10

Released: August 10, 1977

Runtime: 1 Hour 23 Minutes

Rated R

Director: John Landis

Studio: United Film Distribution Company

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, Plex, Pluto TV, Roku, Tubi, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, Black Comedy, Crude Comedy, Low Budget, Martial Arts, Movies with Nudity, Parody

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The Sailor Who Fell from Grace with the Sea (1976)

Posted on December 1, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 4 out of 10

4-Word Review: They dissect a cat.

Jonathan (Jonathan Kahn) is a 14-year-old who lives with his mother (Sarah Miles) and nanny Mrs. Palmer (Margo Cunningham) in a beachfront house along the sea after the death of his father three years earlier. Jonathan enjoys his friendship with a group of boys lead by Chief (Earl Rhodes), but his mother does not approve due to Chief’s anti-social sentiment forcing Jonathan to have to sneak out on the sly to see them. One day Jonathan finds a peep hole in his bedroom wall that allows him to see inside his mother’s bedroom, and he begins to peer in on her when she’s undressed, and this creates an unhealthy arousal. When his mother begins a relationship with a sailor named Jim (Kris Kristofferson) he becomes jealous and conveys as much to Chief who devises a sinister plan to ‘solve the problem’.

Lewis John Carlino had a highly respected career as a screenwriter garnering 4 Academy Award nominations for best screenplay, but his three forays as director weren’t as successful and all started out well but ended up just missing the mark. This one was no exception as many critics at the time felt the problem lay in adapting a novel, that was written by Yukio Mishima, which was set in Japan, and trying to convert it to English society. The cultures differences that make up the complex Japanese society that were so integral to the characters in the book gets completely lost in the translation leaving the viewer feeling cold, detached, and genuinely confused when it’s over.

The on-location shooting filmed in Dartmouth, Devon, England, is excellent and the one thing that helps the movie stand-out particularly the isolated hillside house that gives the atmosphere an almost surreal-like feel. There’s also a really creepy performance by Rhodes who nails it as a highly intellectualized kid who displays no moral compass and effectively comes-off as a very believable young sociopath. However, these moments gets coupled with some very disturbing ones dealing with animal cruelty which includes a very drawn-out scene involving the killing and dissecting of a cat as well as putting a firecracker in a seagull’s mouth and while no animal was actually harmed during the production it still left many audiences at the time upset and will very likely do the same with viewers today.

The film’s biggest flaw though is that it doesn’t interpret the character’s actions in any way that helps makes sense of their motivations and for the most part they’re all quite two-dimensional. Jonathan’s arousal at seeing his naked mother needs much better explaining. Most kids aren’t this way, so what is it about his psyche that causes him to enjoy it without any guilt or shame? The movie gives us no clue, nor does it explain how his father died and when you add in the boy’s weird behavior and you start to wonder if the Jonathan maybe had something to do with it, which would’ve opened an interesting subtext if even brought up subtlety, but the script fails to touch on it.

The book makes the reasons for the son’s actions clearer. For instance in the novel the boy losses respect for the sailor when he sees him jump into a water fountain, which he considers to be undignified and the movie really needed to have some similar moment as the kid, like in the book, is initially in awe of the man, but it’s never totally clear what creates the deadly shift. Also, when the son is caught peeping in at his mom the response by his mother in the book is different as she feels the boy should receive a severe punishment, but the sailor, in hopes of becoming ‘friends’ with the kid whom he’s now helping to raise, resists, but the film flubs this scene too by treating it almost like a forgettable throwaway moment that has no impact versus one that would’ve helped reveal the sailor in a more in depth way.

Spoiler Alert!

The ending, which should’ve been a shocker, falls flat as well. In the novel it’s made clear that the boys plan to drug and dissect the sailor just like they did with the cat and they even bring along the tools to do it, in the movie we only witness him drinking the spiked tea. The camera then zooms way out showing the boys at an extreme distance where it’s not obvious what they’re doing. To really make a memorable impression we should’ve seen the boys stab the sailor several times with their knives, which would’ve been far more startling. I felt too there needed to be a reaction from the mother. Does she find out what they did, or does his violent demise remain a mystery? How does her relationship with her son evolve, or devolve afterwards? These questions remain unanswered making the movie seem less like a story and more as a concept that’s never adequately fleshed out.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: April 5, 1976

Runtime: 1 Hour 45 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Lewis John Carlino

Studio: AVCO Embassy Pictures

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, Plex, Roku Channel, Tubi, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, British Movies, Drama, Foreign Films, Moody/Stylish, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with Nudity

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Hitch-Hike (1977)

Posted on November 24, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Couple picks up killer.

Walter (Franco Nero) and his wife Eve (Corinne Clery) are constantly bickering about Walter’s alcoholism. They go on a trip to Los Angeles and on the way pick-up Adam (David Hess) whose car is stranded on the road. Unbeknownst to them he’s a robber who has doubled-crossed his partners and absconded with a suitcase full of $2 million dollars. It doesn’t take long before Adam has a gun to both of their heads demanding they take him to Mexican border where he plans to escape while also killing them in the process. As the two try desperately to figure a way out they are also being secretly followed by the two young men whom Adam betrayed and who are now intent on extracting a revenge.

One of the biggest problems I had with the movie is that it’s supposed to take place in California but was actually shot in the mountains of Gran Sasso in Italy, which looks nothing like the state. I realize that California has a varied topography but the locales here are screaming southern Europe and the highway signs are done in blue, which anyone living in the U.S. would know is fake as here they’re green, which only accentuates the off-kilter look of the production. Since where they’re driving to makes no real difference to the plot I would’ve just had it be some city in Italy like Rome, which would’ve helped the authenticity.

The other problem I had is that, at least the version I watched, it’s spoken in Italian. Normally I prefer movies that are subtitled versus dubbed, but I could’ve sworn years ago I saw it in English, but what’s available on YouTube, which is the only service currently streaming it, doesn’t offer that, which is a big shame. Not so much because of Nero or Clery, but more Hess as his own voice is not used, which then defeats the whole reason for having him. He’s best known for playing the sadistic killer in The Last House on the Left, and he has an excellent way of being menacing, but because we don’t hear him actually speak in his native tongue all of that gets lost and the creepy energy that was supposed to be there by casting him gets completely wasted.

Spoiler Alert!

The story, which is based on the unpublished novel ‘The Violence and the Fury’ by Peter Kane, doesn’t get off to a good start as it features two people, particularly Nero, who are not likable, and thus the viewer really doesn’t care about their predicament making the tension mediocre at best. There are also elements that are stolen from better known movies like the mysterious truck that keeps chasing them during their drive, with the identity of the driver hidden, that’s taken straight from Duel. Loopholes abound as well as we later learn that Hess is the driver of the truck, but how was he able to avoid being shot by his cohorts earlier with a gun aimed right at him and how was he able to hijack the truck as he had been without any vehicle? Maybe he was able to hitch a ride with a truck driver, just like he did with the couple, and then do away with the driver once inside, but this is stuff that needs to be shown as otherwise it comes-off like the filmmakers are just making up the rules as they go with no concern whether it’s logical.

The twist ending is limp as it features Nero setting the car on fire with his injured wife inside and putting Hess’s dead body next to hers in an attempt to make it look like both he (Nero) and she died in the blaze, but there were such things as dental records back then, so after the coroner examined the charred bodies he/she would determine that it wasn’t really Nero who died and thus the authorities would continue to search for him. Seeing him then become a hitchhiker himself leaves open too many questions and comes off like a cop-out where the filmmakers ran out of ideas and thus decided to just end it there.

End of Spoiler Alert!

The moment where Nero is forced to watch Hess make love to his wife, and witnessing the humiliation and anger in his eyes, is the film’s best moment. Watching Clery, the only person you sympathize with, is entertaining both with her clothes on and off. However, the film lacks any character development, and the plot is quite strained with a lot of moments where the story, much like with the car ride, doesn’t seem to be going anywhere and if anything, just driving itself around in circles.

My Rating: 4 out of 10

Released: March 4, 1977

Runtime: 1 Hour 44 Minutes

Rated R

Director: Pasquale Festa Campanile

Studio: Explorer Film ’58

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, YouTube

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Posted in 70's Movies, Foreign Films, Italian Films, Movies Based on Novels, Movies with Nudity, Road Movies, Thrillers/Suspense

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Mother, Jugs & Speed (1976)

Posted on November 19, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 8 out of 10

4-Word Review: A corrupt ambulance company.

Mother (Bill Cosby) is a part of a team of ambulance drivers working for Harry Fishbine (Allen Garfield) who runs the F & B Ambulance company that is competing with Unity ambulance to get a contract with the city of Los Angeles. Harry is willing to do any underhanded deal that he needs to in order to keep the company competitive, which many times is at the patient’s expense. Tony (Harvey Keitel) is a former cop whose been suspended due to allegations of him dealing cocaine and thus gets hired to partner with Murdoch (Larry Hagman), a man whose compulsion for sex seems to know no bounds. Jennifer (Raquel Welch), nicknamed ‘Jugs’ due to her ample breast size, mans the switchboard, but longs to be a driver and is excited to finally get her certification, only for Harry to refuse to hire her due to sexist reasons.

The disco song ‘Dance’ by Paul Jabara, which gets played over the opening credits, may get some viewers to think it’s a silly 70’s flick, which it definitely isn’t. The concept was inspired by cartoonist Joseph Barbera, who after taking an ambulance ride, became intrigued with the idea of doing a movie about an ambulance company and hired noted screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz to write the first draft. Mankiewicz had plenty of success writing James Bond movies but was at a loss at how to approach this one and only after tagging along on some ambulance rides over a span of three nights was able to come up with the plot. He then bumped into Peter Yates at a party. Yates, best known for having directed Bullit, was interested in a change of pace by doing a comedy, but one that he hoped had ‘some bite’. Mankiewicz then immediately ran out to his car and dug the script out of his trunk and handed it to him and by the next day, after having read it during his flight back, Yates was solidly onboard.

As dark comedies go this one has to be one of the darkest and is compelled to look at every grim aspect of the human experience from drug addiction to poverty and the basic apathy people feel about their jobs and the little things they have to do and tell themselves in order to get through it. What surprised me though was that it was only given a PG-rating. Granted they never say the word ‘fuck’, nor is there any nudity, but it’s still very adult, nonetheless. Because it stars Cosby, who at the time was known for his family-oriented comedy it could’ve given parents the mistaken impression that this would be safe for kids, but it’s definitely not. There’s a lot of caustic humor including Hagman making jokes about having sex with 13-year-old twins and one moment where he attempts to get-it-on with a comatose patient. There’s even a shocking scene where somebody gets shot and killed, so what Jack Valenti and his MPAA board where thinking when they viewed it, I don’t know, but this is certainly not material for young eyes.

Mankiewicz’s acerbic script hits all the right targets, but the acting scores as well. Cosby is terrific as a sort of anti-hero who drinks while he’s driving and harasses nuns but also shows the required proportionate jaded sensibilities to handle the grim challenges. Hagman is outrageously crass but countered nicely by Bruce Davidson and Keitel, who manage to bring some likable qualities into the cast. The funniest person though, despite everything, is Garfield, who’s the perfect caricature of a shyster owner more than willing to do whatever it takes to stay afloat and his motivational rants, particularly the one that starts things out, are hilarious.

The only one that seems miscast is Welch, who despite being easy on the eyes, has never really shown to have much of an acting range. I did like her character’s arch where she’s finally given the chance to go on an ambulance run and learns the hard way that not every life can be saved, as well as a scene where she takes an ambulance on a joyride and gets pulled over by the cops, but sympathetic wise she’s kind of cold. She just doesn’t seem to have the ability to show vulnerability, which is what her character required it’s just a shame the part wasn’t played by Valerie Perrie, who would’ve been perfect, but she declined due to her unwillingness to accept a deferred payment.

Spoiler Alert!

My one caveat is the ending, which has Hagman taking some narcotics that causes him to have a psychotic reaction where he holds the owner’s wife Peaches, played by Valerie Curtin, hostage at the station, but this came off as too jarring. While Hagman’s character certainly had a creepy factor it was still done in a humorous way making him benign and just ‘one of the gang’, so having him go nutso without any type of forewarning didn’t make a lot of sense. Would’ve been better had some addicts looking for drugs robbed the station and held Hagman and Peaches at gunpoint and thus requiring the rest of the employees to work together to find a way to save them.

My Rating: 8 out of 10

Released: May 26, 1976

Runtime: 1 Hour 38 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Peter Yates

Studio: Twentieth Century Fox

Available: DVD

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Posted in 70's Movies, Black Comedy

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The Premonition (1976)

Posted on November 14, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 3 out of 10

4-Word Review: Wanting her child back.

Andrea (Ellen Barber) is a woman who was institutionalized and lost custody of her child Janie (Danielle Brisbois). Janie was then adopted by Sheri (Sharon Farrell) and Miles (Edward Bell) who became her foster parents. Andrea though gets released from the hospital and manages, along on with her boyfriend Jude (Richard Lynch), who works as a circus clown, to track down where Janie is currently living. Andrea wants Janie back and the two conspire to kidnap her, but their initial attempt backfires. Jude becomes irritated at Andrea’s inept abilities to retrieve the child, along with her obsession over a doll that she treats as being a real baby, which sends him into a rage that ultimately kills her. Now, Sheri begins having weird visions of Andrea tormenting her from beyond the grave, but when she complains to her husband about it he refuses to believe her insisting that it’s simply hallucinations from all the stress.

Odd film that seems to be a hybrid between sci-fi and thriller, with just a drop of dramatic character study, that doesn’t fully work despite some moments of potential. The on-location shooting, done in Jackson, Mississippi, allows for some visual flavor, but the story isn’t fleshed out enough to be impactful. There are some shades of an early version of Nightmare on Elm Street, but the film doesn’t go far enough with it. In fact, on a creepy level, it’s very low. The one and only slightly scary moment comes when an eviscerated, ghostly Andrea appears in Janie’s bedroom and tries to scare Sheri, but the scene is too brief and doesn’t go anywhere. The only other ‘spooky’ parts entails when Sheri watches her bathroom mirror fog up as well as the windshield of her car, but that’s literally it. No other scares or shocks to speak of making it confusing trying to figure out what type of audience the producers were going for.

Story-wise it’s muddled. No explanation given for how Andrea and Jude where able to track down where the kid was currently living and Andrea’s ability to get inside the house, where she simply turns the knob of the front door and is able to sneak right in, was too easy. Most people lock their doors at night, and this couple especially should’ve since Andrea had already been spotted by Sheri harassing Janie earlier at the school playground, so having them forget to do this makes them seem dumber than dumb it also hurts the tension. Forcing Andrea to come up with creative ways to get in the home, like maybe trying to slide through the basement, or attic window, would’ve given this segment more intrigue.

There’s also no suitable reason for how Sheri is able to receive the premonitions that she does, or how Andrea is able to give them off. Did Andrea at some point dabble in the occult? Or has Sheri always showed signs of ESP all her life and therefore making her susceptible to Andrea’s ‘messages’? None of this gets even remotely addressed, which ultimately makes the movie poorly thought out. 

Spoiler Alert!

The ending is particularly goofy as it features Sheri performing a musical piece written by Andrea in an attempt to appease Andrea’s angry spirit and get Janie back. However, this all gets done late at night while on the steps of the Mississippi state capitol where a small piano has been placed that Sheri plays while in front of a crowd of curious onlookers. The police then stand-by waiting for any ‘suspicious’ people to arrive, so they can be arrested, but the chances that the authorities would allow such an insane ‘show’ to take place on government property, or believe in evil spirits and visions to begin, with is highly unlikely.

End of Spoiler Alert!

I did though enjoy the acting. Farrell is quite good as the distraught mother and Brisebois, who’s probably best known for playing Stephanie on the ‘Archie Bunker’s Place’ TV-show, is cute and looks to be no more than 3 or 4. Lynch is fantastic playing against type as his character has moments where he seems genuinely concerned and I loved the scene where he dresses in mime make-up and does a silent routine while taking someone’s picture. The best though is Barber who’s unnerving as the unhinged woman, and I wished her role had been bigger.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a payoff. Too many questions get left open and the story doesn’t explore enough angles to make anything that occurs here either memorable or riveting. Some may say this was a precursor of better, more well-known thrillers/horror/sci-fi films to come, and they may have a loose point, but it doesn’t do enough with the material to deserve any recognition. 

My Rating: 3 out of 10

Released: May 5, 1976

Runtime: 1 Hour 34 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Robert Schnitzer

Studio: AVCO Embassy Pictures

Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, Tubi

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Posted in 70's Movies, Kidnapping Movies, Movies that take place in the South, Thrillers/Suspense

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Inside Out (1975)

Posted on November 10, 2025 | Leave a comment

By Richard Winters

My Rating: 5 out of 10

4-Word Review: Tracking down nazi gold.

Harry (Telly Savalas) is head deep in bills when he comes across a letter from Ernst (James Mason) an old friend inviting him to meet him the next day at a hotel. Since Harry has nothing to lose he shows up at the agree upon location and learns that Ernst has plans to retrieve some gold that had been misplaced during the war. The problem is that the only one that knows the exact location of where it’s hidden is Holtz (Wolfgang Lukschy) who is locked up in a high security prison. Harry must then hire a team of men that can not only find a way to infiltrate the prison, but also trick Holtz into giving away the secret and then dig up the loot despite it being behind enemy lines.

The film, which was surprisingly written directly for the screen and not based on any book even though I think it would’ve made a great novel that could’ve been actually better than the movie, approaches the material in all the wrong ways. I’ll admit it’s a great concept, but director Peter Duffell unwisely decided to enter comedy into the proceedings, which wasn’t necessary. He also implements a goofy sounding music track that would’ve been better suited for a TV-sitcom. The facility that houses Holtz was shot at Plotzensee Prison in Berlin, which looks like an old rundown building that is barely able to stand on its own and like it’s ready to crumble at any minute. To really make it exciting and daring the place should’ve been modern and state-of-the-art and thus making it more of a challenge to break into.

Spoiler Alert!

Everything comes off too easily and thus hurts any potential tension. The kidnapping of Holtz is especially problematic. The group is able to infiltrate the prison by dressing up in guard costumes, but those costumes wouldn’t be an exact replica of the real guard’s uniform and thus should be easily spotted by a prison employee, and yet that doesn’t happen.

They blackmail Holtz’s doctor Maar (Adrian Hoven) to agree to take Hotlz’s place in the prison cell and pretend to be him while disguising Holtz as the doctor in order to sneak him out, but it’s unlikely anyone would agree to stay in a prison for even a day and trust that this group, whom he really didn’t know, would come back and get him out and not just leave him there. Maar, is also much shorter than Holtz, so the real guards would notice the difference in height and realize he was an imposter, but for whatever reason they don’t.

The drug that they inject Holtz with, which is never named, is unusual in that it puts him to sleep, but still allows him to walk. Most of the time drugs that could knock a person out would make their limbs go limp and force the group to have to drag him away as he slept versus here where they are somehow able to get him to sleepwalk.

The sequence where one of them disguises themselves as Hitler, played by Gunter Meisner, in an effort to trick Holtz to divulge the location of the gold since he had sworn only to give it out to the Fuhrer himself is highly improbable as well since the man really doesn’t look all that much like Hitler and you’d think Holtz, even in the drugged state that he is in, would notice the difference and not share the secret, or give out incorrect information.

I’ll give the script some credit as it does come up with a few unexpected wrinkles, but all these do is stymie the group’s efforts slightly and don’t really put a monkey wrench into the whole thing. For instance, they learn that an apartment building has been constructed on the site where the gold is buried, which most likely would’ve ruined their chances of getting at it, but here they’re able to sneak into the building’s basement via an unlocked door (don’t facilities lock their doors in East Germany?) and then create a ruse to get the tenants out of the building so they can plant a bomb that will cause an explosion to crack the cement floor. There’s even a little boy who sneaks in to witness their efforts and risks getting injured but like with everything else it gets quickly resolved when Telly spots him at the last second and whisks him away to safety and then eventually back to his mother’s arms. However, what’s to say he won’t tell his mommy what he saw? Apparently here he doesn’t, but in reality, he probably would’ve and thus another potential loophole that the film glosses over.

I enjoy Telly more when he’s playing bad guys, but he’s still fun as the protagonist and something that helps keep the movie watchable. Overall though the direction should’ve been tighter and the complex mission gets pulled off too seamlessly and thus seeing them walk away with the fortune isn’t all that satisfying as the complication would’ve been too immense for it to have ever succeeded in real life.

My Rating: 5 out of 10

Released: November 27, 1975

Runtime: 1 Hour 37 Minutes

Rated PG

Director: Peter Duffell

Studio: Warner Brothers

Available: DVD-R (Warner Archive)

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Posted in 70's Movies, British Movies, Foreign Films, Heist Movies

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