26 Films: Roadracers

A throw back to 50s JD pictures should open with a car chase intercut with a rockabilly band. Robert Rodriguez knows this and that exactly how he opens his entry in the Rebel Highway series, Roadracers.  The series, a revival of the American International Pictures of the 50s and 60s, ran for ten-feature length made for Cable TV films. Roadracers is about Dude Delany, a small town outsider who dreams of leaving to become a rockabilly star. He’s on the outs with the town sheriff.

     The film includes an early performance by John Hawkes from Winters Bone and Deadwood, along with a solid turn with by William Saddler.  The perfect music selection included Link Wray and Hasil Adkins, and Gene Vincent. It’s not some long lost treasure, it’s simply a solid entertaining film that catches a young cast and crew making a B film and having some fun.

     Re-watching it has gotten me geeked to revisit the rest of the series. and thanks to the magic of the Internet I have 5 of them on the way on DVD. I do have to wonder why we don’t have a box set of these from the Shout Factory or someone like that.

The complete series includes:

▪        Girls in Prison - Directed by John McNaughton and starring Anne Heche and Ione Skye.

▪        Dragstrip Girl - Directed by Mary Lambert and starring Mark Dacascos and Natasha Gregson Wagner.

▪        Shake, Rattle and Rock! - Directed by Allan Arkush and starring Renée Zellweger and Howie Mandel.

▪        Runaway Daughters - Directed by Joe Dante and starring Julie Bowen and Paul Rudd.

▪        Roadracers - Directed by Robert Rodriguez and starring David Arquette and Salma Hayek.

▪        Reform School Girl - Directed by Jonathan Kaplan and starring Aimee Graham and Matt LeBlanc.

▪        Motorcycle Gang - Directed by John Milius and starring Gerald McRaney and Jake Busey.

▪        Jailbreakers - Directed by William Friedkin and starring Antonio Sabato Jr. and Shannen Doherty.

▪        Cool and the Crazy - Directed by Ralph Bakshi and starring Jared Leto and Alicia Silverstone.

Confessions of a Sorority Girl - Directed by Uli Edel and starring Jamie Luner and Alyssa Milano.

 Check out my thoughts on the soundtrack later this week.

Tender Mercies by Priscilla Peterson

While continuing to clean out my mother’s estate I came across this review and felt like I should share it with everyone. My mother grew up in a household where films were of the devil and as a student in the 1950s during lunch on raining days she wasn’t allowed to watch the Shirley Temple short with the rest of the children, nor was she allowed to have the Ice Cream Cup treats that her peers were because photos of film stars were some how involved. She often told my siblings and I that the first film she saw in the theater was The Sound of Music when she was 21. She like a lot of parents was concerned about what we saw on TV and at the movies and often times would not let us watch the same films and TV shows our peers were, but often she let us see films that our peers were not seeing, because they were too mature or parents didn’t think that their kids would like them.

            Tender Mercies was on of those films that we were not only allowed to see, but were taken to by our mother because she felt it was important somehow. I recall going to the State Theater in Ann Arbor, and I am sure that it did effect me, but I honestly can’t say what I thought of it at the time.

Having seen it again a little over 4 years ago I did more fully understand the film and found it still had something to say for current audiences. It still resonated with me strongly enough that when I saw the recent Crazy Heart I recognized that film as being tied to Tender Mercies in more than Robert Duvall’s performance… anyway, without further ado my mothers 1987 review of Tender Mercies…

From Cross References the newsletter for University Reformed Church in Ann Arbor Michigan

Originally published in the August 1987

 

Tender Mercies

            A deceptively simple story, Tender Mercies with its stark plot and poetic dialogue has the ability to grab onto your heart. Don and out country singer Mac Sledge (Robert Duvall) fetches up in Rosa Lee (Tess Harper) and her son’s corner of Texas. Rosa Lee, a Vietnam era widow who runs a gas station/ motel in what seems like nowhere. She and Mac Marry, while he reconstructs his life as a singer and rehabilitated alcoholic.

            Meanwhile, in nearby Austin, Mac’s ex-wife, Dixie (Betty Buckley of Cats) is singing Mac’s songs and pursuing a successful career. Their teenage daughter languished backstage while mama “belt’s ‘em out.” Dixie is as haunting in her empty lyrics as Mac is in his heartfelt, newfound truths.

            The theme, “It Hurts to Face Reality” is a poignant as sung by Duvall. Although there is plan, Mac, Rosa Lee and Sonny never flinch – sometimes you wish they would. Their day to day existence is carried out against sparse furnishings: neat, clean survival living. Unified by their respect for one another and their faith in god the look life in the eye, relentlessly.

            The understated dialogue sketches in a richer world than meets the viewer’s eyes. The statement, “I don’t Know,” is a response which is followed by an action to discover the truth or accept the unknowable. When Sonny, Rosa Lee's son, asks how and hen his Daddy died, the three visit the cemetery. Many issues are dealt with directly without the tedium of analysis, accusation or blame.

            Robert Duvall is so believable in this role that it seems autobiographical/ He becomes the taciturn Texan, who’s half-smiles and gestures tell the rest of the story. His singing is as pleasant and easy as the songs, some of which he wrote himself.

            It would be a mistake to underrate Rosa Lee as the little housewife. She can more than convey more in a glance than any word could. Her singing takes place in the country church choir and she shines where she is.

            Sonny has the sagacity of a child touched by tragedy. He also possesses the privilege of the childe of a single parent -- intruding when he senses Rosa Lee and Mac are getting close and addressing them as peers. His joy and chatter enlivens’ their lives.

            The photography is another dramatic element. Many statements are mad in the silence. The spaces almost become characters in themselves. This is the Texas most non-Texans will never know – simple, earthy, spacious.

            God is not given lip service in this film. When Dixie’s cries out in anguish to Mac, “Why did God do this to me?” he ahs no answer, only compassion in his eyes. There is forgiveness and love, with thankfulness and joys as subtle undercurrents, as Rosa Lee says to Mac, “When I say my prayers at night and thank God for his blessings and tender mercies, you and sonny head the list.  This movie touched my children and me deeply after my husband’s dearth. I think we all agree: it hours and heads) to face reality.           

            This is a movie which could open up dialogue among families. We shy away from talking about pain and death until it is upon us. This is not he pattern God has given us. We have as Christian people a long history of wrestling with God on the hard ground. Tender Mercies helps us see it again --- PBP

26 Films: Don's Party

Don's Party (wiki, imdb) from 1976 is one of those films that it tripped over a VHS copy of in a donation bin somewhere. To be honest I didn't get all that much out of this film. It follows the guests at a part for the assumed winner of the 1969 Australian federal election. As the night wears on truths come out, people get drunk and there is some fighting and sex. 


I am sure that at the time it was shocking or at least edgy at the time when the play was written and the film was made. However like so many of the edgy sex comedies and dramas of the 70s it's dated when you think about films that have dealt with sex in the last decade and a half. 


One thing that I did really like was the sets, they were loud mod looking and had a fun vibe to them. I also dug the use of pop music on the soundtrack which featured great pop and rock tunes.


Over all it I don't know that I will be revisiting this film, at the very least if I do it will have to be a much cleaner copy of the film.

Video Rage: The Death of the Video Store

(Current Big Georges in Ann Arbor)

As I recall the first films my mother ever rented for us were the Robin Williams and Walter Matthau film Survivors and. ahhhh hell I don’t recall the other one, I used to know, but I do know that both came from the local electronics store called Big Georges where my mother had purchased a Betamax VCR, it was a great machine and lasted for years and years, it even outlasted it’s format. When it broke my mother took it to get fixed, and they sold her another beta for the same cost of fixing the original so we had two beta machines in the house for the longest time.

But this is about the video store, not about the machines. Over time the VCR became as ubiquitous as the TV in the American home, and it has now largely disappeared, replaced by the DVD and the Computer and what ever else, Tevio? Along with the vanishing of the VCR we are seeing the vanishing of the Video Store, and it strikes me that while there are those that are concerned by the passing of the bookshop and the record store, but there seems to be little interest in the passing of the era of the video store.

My earliest memories of renting videos were of going to Big Georges and picking out films. I recall seeing the box for Texas Chainsaw Massacre and being freaked out by it, I recall renting Dudes, and Moscow on the Hudson, along with a lot of the HBO Fairy Tale Theater episodes. Big Georges quit renting videos after a year of two; mostly as Mom and Pop video stores were starting to open in the area. I am under the impression that electronic stores did the same thing with records once music stores started to appear on the scene. The arrival of the Mom and Pop was the first major step in the growth of the industry. We were not sad to see Big Georges sell of their video stock, and we were able to buy several of out favorite films when they sold off their collection.

This was when videos were really expensive, a Beta or VHS tape retailed for over $30 often in the 80s, they were high quality retail grade videos and the industry was still paying for the R&D costs of home video. I don’t think the industry got the clue that people would build libraries if the tapes were cheap enough until later on. It took some time, but the price of the units did come down, and now we live in a world of $5 DVDs at Target.

The next video shop I recall was a two-store chain in the area. I don’t recall it’s name, only that it was tucked in the back of a shopping center and that the tapes where kept in locked cases. There would be a tab with the video’s name on it and you would take that to the counter and they would unlock the case and get the video for you. They had a selection that was pretty good, but video rentals were on the expensive side and so you had to be careful with your selections. I can still see some of the tape boxes that I never got to see, Yor Hunter from the Future stands out for some reason that I always looked at but never rented. There was also the two-tape set of Apocalypse Now! that I was not allowed to rent, and I had to settle for the spoof tape Hardware Wars which had an anthology of funny riffs on; Star Wars, Close Encounters of the Third Kind (closet cases of the Nerd Kind) and Apocalypse Now! (A Porkalypse Now) along with the classic Bambi V Godzilla. I also had my first voluntary encounter with The Bard (I think I had seen the Tempest with Molly Ringwald at the theater) a cartoon called Rome- O and Julie 8.

The Mom and Pops rose and fell as the industry refined its practices. Video stores came and went, stores would pop up in a shopping center and last for a year or two before closing, and it wasn’t long before the chains came into the market. Only having a Beta machine the number of places that we could rent was limited to stores that carried both VHS and Beta.

I am not sure if Video Outlet was a chain, but that was the next place that I recall renting from often. They had a ok beta section, which was a big deal because as everyone knows VHS did win the format battle, in part because of the dominance of the format at video stores. Beta was better quality and the tapes were smaller, but Sony kept the format locked up and fact that VHS machines and tapes were cheaper quickly caused beta to vanish from the market. We only had beta for years, and it wasn’t until my brother saved up several months of paper route money did we have a VHS in the house.

Anyway, Video Outlet was the first place that I recall having an Adult Film section, not that I ever went in to that room, but it was there. I do recall getting to see a lot of ninja, action, horror and comedies due to Video Outlet. I also recall renting a wide variety of off the wall films, both good and bad that I would not have seen other wise. It might have been at this point that I was finding my interest going off the mainstream track and looking for films that were not part of the conversation for film fans. To this day, I wish that I had gotten around to renting Summer Camp Nightmare, which I always saw on the racks. I should add that browsing the racks was as time consuming and delightful, just like spending time in a bookshop. It’s strange to think that I would love to have the chance to wander through the aisle of Video Outlet again maybe from a year before they closed and just see what was on the shelf.

Video Watch (later Hollywood Video) was the first chain store that I recall having a membership at. It was a big deal to as a teen to have my own card that let me rent without my mother’s approval. They were main video outlet that my friends and I rented from in high school. They had a better selection than I would expect from a chain these days, it was like Best Buy and music in their early days before they refined the formula of; popular titles, constant renters and few indie, non-English language, or odd ball titles that were so perfectly lampooned in Be Kind Rewind. I recall renting a lot of films there including the 1980s after the bomb oddity America 3000 (they also had Texas Gladiator 2020 which I never rented and am sure if pure crap, but the 15year old in my still wants to see it), and the first adult films that my friends and I checked out when I was 18.

When I returned from college, I had a slightly more sophisticated taste in film, and the local Panorama Video proved to have an interesting selection of films. They tended to stock enough indies and off the radar films to make them an attractive alternative to Hollywood Video. My main memories of films I rented there was that I was always happy to see stuff like Nice Girls Don’t Explode, and The Disappearance of Kevin Johnson because it was on their shelves.

I have to give the crown for the best Ann Arbor Video Store of all time to Liberty Street Video. A little hole in the wall to start, Liberty Street started in the 80s and eventually moved to its second location across the street from the first. They had a great selection of Foreign, Cult, LBGT and Documentaries that you didn’t see other places. I have a good friend who worked there for years and used to get in trouble for shelving the J Edgar Hoover biography in the LBGT section. Over the years I rented many many films there, and when they went out of business a couple of years back I was able to pick up VHS copies of some of my favorite forgotten gems, including a couple that I plan to cover in my 26 Films series this year. Of all the stores now gone, I think I miss Liberty Street the most. It was the kind of store that had a character all it’s own, and you could always count on finding films that were not on the shelves anywhere else in town.

There have been other video stores that I have liked and used over the years, outside of Ann Arbor. Howard Huges in Moscow Idaho had Zombie and the Ghost Train from Finland, and who recalls what else that I availed myself on. Gen X in East Lansing was regular hang out for me at the end of my time at Michigan State University where I bought comics and magazines more often than rented films, but is a fond memory. There was also a place, whose name completely is lost to me where you could rent 5 for $5. 5 rentals of titles no longer on the new release shelves for 5 days for $5.

I have been a Netflix fan for years, and for the most part have been very happy with them, but they are a different experience than going to the video store. I like a lot of people haven’t been a regular video store customer for a long time, and so I am at least in part to blame for their vanishing from the landscape. At the same time, while Amazon has killed book and music stores, I do find that my local Mom and Pop record and book shops have given me something that the local video stores didn’t. A place where I can meet with people who love books, or music and that I have made a point of shopping at. I find that if they don’t have what I am looking for on their shelves I am more than willing to have them order it, and more than willing to wait for things to come in. I know that there are indie video stores out there that have built their loyal customer bases, or have diversified their stock and business to include not only rentals, but also selling used DVDs, Books, Music, and that might be the only way for many of them to survive.

As it stands it seems that we are witnessing the end of the video store era and it’s worth looking back on and remembering.

(Howard Huges Video in Moscow ID)

26 Films: Plain Clothes

Plain Clothes

1988

When looking for trends in history the more distance you have from a place the better able you are to see what was going on in the culture. What I can see very vividly now is a generation, the Baby Boomer, who refused to put away childish thing staying in power, one of the ways to keep themselves young was to make sure that no one born after them was allowed to grow up. This has manifested in many ways, from a near pathological insistence that they ‘changed the world’ and the constant referencing of events like The Summer of Love, Woodstock, and the single handed ending of the war in Vietnam as proof that they have been the saviors of the world…….argh, don’t’ get me started on all of that..

All this is to say that by the late 80s with the first wave of generation Xers graduating from high school and college and entering the work force there were a spat of films (ok, maybe only 2 that I know of) and one TV show that featured these Gen X kids being seen as so young and young looking that they were able to pass as high school students. On TV it was 21 Jump Street, on film it was Hiding Out (see the review of the soundtrack to that film later this week) and today’s forgotten film, Plain Clothes.

Set in Seattle, Plain Clothes is the story of cop Nick Dunbar, a young officer who frustrated at being assigned again and again to details because of his young looks. When his brother is implicated in the murder of a teacher, he looses his temper and get’s suspended. He takes his suspension time to enroll in school and try and clear his brother’s name. The film is part look at how crazy American High Schools are in 1988, part who-done-it, and part 80s Romantic comedy. There is also a plot about the Baby Boomer Teachers worry about their pensions (20 years on this part resonates even more than I did then), and of course Nick falls for a young teacher who thinks he is a student, when they are really about the same age.

I am not going to make the case that it’s a great film, it existents now as a time capsule of the time and place. There are a number of very funny lines and a couple of scenes that raise the film above the level of trash. The cast is solid and there are noteworthy performances by George Wendt and Seymour Cassel. Also watch for the moments with Abe Vigoda, Harry Shearer, and the PA announcements from Robert Stack.

Plain Clothes is not out on DVD as of this writing, it is on Netflix instant if you want to check it out. I do think that someone is missing an opportunity not packaging it as a double disc with the Jon Cryer flick Hiding Out.

Up Next: The Robert Altman not classic, but I love it anyway for my own reasons…. O.C. & Stiggs.

More Overlooked Films at Todd Mason's blog Here

Films Discovered in 2010

Over at Rupert Pumpkin Speaks there has been a wave of posts showing non-2010 films that people discovered during that year.... so here is mine.

Women in Trouble

14 Hours

The Missing Person

Astropia

Passing Strange

Kamikaze Girls

Harry and Tonto

Noise (Aus)

Running on Empty

Pontypool

Suddenly

Trouble Waters

Cool Ideas

Shotgun Stories

The Nomi Song

O'Horton

Wristcutters

26 Films Boiling Point

Boiling Point, 1992

93 minutes

Tag line: He’s a Cop that has reached the… Boling Point

The boiling point of lead is 2022 K and the boiling point of Treasury agent Jimmy Mercer is the murder of one of the agents on his team. The box art for my VHS copy of this film we see Wesley Snipes with his Smith and Wesson Model 13 .357 Magnum pointed outward, his badge barely visible below the pistol. The image is very telling. It’s an outdated duty weapon (or thought to be) from an outdated era of Law Enforcement, or I should say the dregs of the era, as the torch was being passed from the Greatest Generation to their children and the madness of the 80s and 90s.

This is a noir via the James Ellroy explanation of Noir as being ‘Your Fucked!’. The criminals are going to get caught, but so are the treasury agents who after a buy goes wrong find themselves with just 24 hours to catch the killers. In many ways it’s a throwback and a different era of crime film.

The film stars a very miscast Wesley Snipes who can’t seem to pull off the world weary at the end of his rope treasury agent. It’s not that Snipes is bad in the film, just that the role really calls for someone more gritty more worn out.

On the other hand the late Dennis Hopper is perfect as the recently released old school con man with big plans and big ideas. He’s a man out of time a man who has been passed by and who has at least a idea of what is right and wrong. Stealing the film is Viggo Mortensen, playing a psycho thug, the new breed.

The film unfolds as Red and Mercer are set on a path to collide. Along the way the film drags a bit in the middle and there is a muddled sub plot or two that get a little more screen time then they should. Over all it is a solid B Crime film with a couple of great moments, including a final shot that is one of the most pure noir moments in film during the 90s.

Restless Kind 2011

For most of the history of this blog I have been working with out any real plan. I just post when I feel moved to do so, but for 2011, I have a roadmap for what I want to post over the course of coming year.

I am not going to go into exactly what I am going to cover, but I hope to have:

26 Friday Forgotten Books which will be posted ever other Friday

26 Film reviews which will be of older mostly forgotten films and will be posted on the Tuesday of the week opposite the Forgotten Books.

26 Soundtrack Reviews will appear on Thursdays following the film reviews and will often be related to the films from that week, but will mostly also be for films that have fallen off the radar.

and

12 Flash Fictions which I am still working on and will most likely be posted when they get done.

In 2009 I read a Hard Case Crime paperback and a Donald Westlake book each month, in 2010 I carried on with the Hard Case Crime book along with a John D MacDonald book. This coming year I am planning to read a Lawrence Block book each month, and instead of catching up on my Hard Case Crime collection I am going to read a Stark House Press book each month. As Stark House books contain more than one novel, I am only going to read one of novels from each collection each month.

I am also going to do my month reads posts around the end of each month, and what ever else catches my fancy.

Enjoy

Eric

This will be on the test

11 VHS tapes (most of which are not on DVD.... as far as I know) that I picked up for $2 each. Some that I saw back in the day, some that I have heard of and some that just looked like they were worth checking out

Destroy All Movies!!! The Complete Guide to Punks on Film

I've often told people that the 2 films that changed my life were Dudes and then Return of the Living Dead... both featuring punks. The first is a punk western and the second of course is thee Punk horror flick. So naturally I am lusting after:

Destroy All Movies!!! The Complete Guide to Punks on Film Edited by Bryan Connolly and Zack Carlson

they have a web page and blog HERE

Whip It! (2009)

Whip It!(2009)

I was excited to see the new film Whip It for a number of reasons. First and foremost it was shot locally, and featured a number of the Detroit Derby Girls. I’ve been a loyal fan of the local Roller Derby organization for the last year and a half, and was glad to see our local girls get to be part of what I kinda hope is going to be the first film about the current Derby Landscape.

(that's Detroit Derby Girls Killbox and Racer McChaser on the right side of this image)

The film starts the always watchable Ellen Page (who everyone knows from Juno, but you really need to see Hard candy to get her range) and she delivered great, young, youthful non-manic-indie-pixie performance that anchors the film. Page plays a small town Texas high school student who competes in the local beauty pageants at the behest of her mother—only it is really not her thing. One day she sees a flyer for Roller Derby and sets out with her friend to take in a bout. She of course is inspired to try out and becomes the rookie phenom of the Hurl Scouts. Working from the screen play by written by Shauna Cross and based on Cross' novel Derby Girl first time director Drew Barrymore gives us a coming of age story,a first romance story, a sports movie, and a dealing with your parents movie all in one. Some of it is more successful than others.

What I liked: The performances were mostly first rate. Page is charming, and enduring and note perfect as the every girl. Marcia Gay Harden and Daniel Stern are first rate as her parents, one of the lesser known Wilson brothers as the coach Razor is great a comic coach. Zoё Bell (Zena) and Juliette Lewis (The Running Kind) are maybe the only of the actresses who could hold their own in a real bout. Kristen Wiig really gives the best and most illuminating performance of the film, with her wholly believable portrayal of a single mom, who acts as an older sister to Ellen Page when she needs it the most.

There are a few things about the film that weren't so great. The romantic subplot could have been left out, but the swimming pool scene was well executed. If that subplot had been jettisoned then the mother daughter stuff could have been explored in more depth and also the family dynamatic of the derby team could have had more screen time. The derby scenes while well shot, and this was my local Derby Girls got their screen time and to show their stuff. They were exciting and fun, and put the watcher right on the track.

Over all it is a solid film, and well worth checking out. I hope that at least it get's more people out to check out their local Roller Girls.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle

A couple of weeks back I almost had to kick Elmore Leonard out of the lobby at work for smoking. His son Peters beat me to the punch and wrangled him out the door. They were appearing with fellow Michigan writer Loren D Estleman to talk about crime fiction. One of the topics of their event was that the film The Friends of Eddie Coyle getting released on DVD and how it was one of the best crime films ever made. I had never seen the film and it went into my Netflix Queue as soon at I got home.

The Friends of Eddie Coyle (1973)

Robert Mitchum stars as Eddie Coyle a low level criminal who mostly deals in buying and selling guns. He's been busted driving a truck of stolen booze, refused to give up the guys behind the theft of the booze on the truck and is looking at some jail time for his silence. He doesn't think that he can do the time, it's not the Pen that he's worried about, it's his family. He doesn't want them to have to go on welfare, or for his wife to have to work while he is away. He's trying to get out from under as easily as possible, looking for cop Richard Jordan (who I think is a Fed, but it's really never made explicit) to help him out and speak to the judge in the case, but he needs to watch which bridges he burns if he wants to keep on breathing. Here is the trailer

Set and shot in the Boston area the film has a great and real look, no back lot and sound stage stuff here. The location not only geographically but the location in time is really showcased well . The clothes, cars, hair styles and guns were all current in a real way, not in a Hollywood perfect upper middle class way that too many films suffer from.

Boston looks like a city on it's way down, we don't see the ghetto or the inner city and drug culture Apocalypse of the 70s is really missing from the film. One of the strangest things about the film is that lack of overt drug crime, it's as if it wasn't part of what was going down, but I'm left thinking it's more that Eddie is an old timer who's crime world was pre-big time heroin and he had mostly managed to keep it that way.

One thought that I had watching the film was that the cars have more color and pop to them than the clothes. I have vague memories of the earthtone blahs of that era, and this film really showed what that was like. The bars, coffee shops, the parking garages and the shopping centers are all a blast from the past and several of the shots of these places reminded me of films that came later. A shot of Mitchum driving his boat of a car though a new cement slab parking structure to the top made me think of Fargo for instance.

Mitchum is at his best here, this is the older and more world weary Mitchum. Gone is the evil psycho of Night of the Hunter, or the anti hero of Thunder Road (there is a nod of sorts to that film early on), this is the worn down and aging family man who has more to think about than getting a few bucks and a few laughs. His aging is made more dramatic by the distance in time that I have from the film, seeing his youthful co-stars. A young looking Peter Boyle, Richard Jordan, not to mention Alex Rocco all of whom I recall from films and TV made a decade or more later. It's been said that this is Mitchums greatest performance, and I have to agree. He's very natural, very solid and understated.

I like the fact that there is an oblique quality to the film, not everything is spelled out and neatly wrapped up. There is no closure on a couple of plot points, there is no big explanation for how somethings come down. A young gun dealer is arrested and we never see him again, the kids who wanted to buy guns from him to rob banks drive away and never are seen again. I can't imagine modern film makers getting away with that--- unless it's the Coen Bros--- and even the end of the film has questions left unanswered.

It's a great film from a great era of film, one that I am going to have to watch again, and would love to see on the big screen.

Recast Reservoir Dogs.

Sterling Hayden as Mr. White

Richard Boone as Mr. Orange

Lee Marvin as Mr. Blonde

Robert Mitchum Nice Guy Eddie 

Timothy Carey as Mr. Pink

Jackie Gleason as Joe Cabot

Charles Bronson as Mr. Brown (he's way over on the left side of this still)

Vincent Price as Mr. Blue

Jack Webb as Young Cop .... you figure out why.....

Orson Wells as K-Billy DJ playing Lost Highway by Hank Williams Sr when the ear chopping scene goes down...

this recast is for the Filmspotting / spout blog contest