The Great Snore-dini. The great magician, escapist and mysteriarch, Harry Houdini (1874-1926), lived such a storied life that it is impossible to capture any semblance of it in the fleeting medium of the feature film. The best we can hope for is Tony Curtis flashing a winning smile or for Johnny Depp to flash a winning bangle, and to then … Read More
THE NEW GUY
Once a Dork… So I’m totally writers-blocked one night while trying to finish my script, SHIFTER. And I’m channel-surfing cable, my mind a blank, settling in to a long night of unproductivity, wondering fearfully – like everyone who experiences the steel wall of Writer’s Block – how I’ll ever be able to string words together again, when suddenly – THE … Read More
ANY WHICH WAY YOU CAN
ANY WHICH WAY is a “Right Turn, Clyde!” “Right turn, Clyde!” – and the orangutan’s fist shoots out the passenger window, impacting anyone dumb enough to have their face there. It’s just one of many running gags in this inexplicable, fuzzy film. ANY WHICH WAY YOU CAN (sequel to EVERY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE) opens with an illegal street fight, … Read More
HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER
High Pains Grifter. John Wayne didn’t like HIGH PLAINS DRIFTER and let me know it. He wrote me a letter putting it down, saying it was not The West. I was trying to get away from what he and Gary Cooper and others had done. — Clint Eastwood. Dee Barton’s ominous score heralds an angel of death materializing from the … Read More
EVERY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE
American Knuckle Sandwich. A street fighter. A love story. An ape. Disguised as a simplistic road story, EVERY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE is a paean to freedom; freedom from the strictures of routine, freedom to settle disputes like a man (If the problem can’t be fixed with a fist or a monkey wrench, it ain’t worth fixin’), freedom to fight … Read More