Movie Review: McQ (1974)

A crime action movie, McQ attempts to contribute to the genre's increasing grittiness but achieves only modest success.

In Seattle, two beat cops are shot dead by police detective Stan Boyle, who is then himself gunned down by a mysterious assailant. Stan's long term partner Detective Lon "McQ" McHugh (John Wayne) chases away a thief breaking into his green Pontiac Firebird, then returns fire and kills a hitman. McQ connects with Stan's wife Lois (Diana Muldaur) and starts to investigate the murders, convinced that local drug lord Santiago (Al Lettieri) must be behind the killings.

McQ resigns from the police force when he runs afoul of Captain Kosterman (Eddie Albert), although detective Toms (Clu Gulager) tries to mediate. McQ partners with private investigator "Pinky" Farrell (David Huddleston) and shakes down informants Rosey (Roger E. Mosley) and Myra (Colleen Dewhurst) for information. He learns Santiago has assembled a small army of henchmen to steal a shipment of seized drugs from under the noses of the police, but not everything is at it seems.

With Bullitt (1968), Dirty Harry and The French Connection (both 1971) redefining what a star-driven police action film looks and sounds like, director John Sturges and John Wayne trade in horses for cars and attempt to join the fun. With a brass-heavy Elmer Bernstein music score, impressive weaponry, and no shortage of roaring American muscle cars chasing each other across Seattle, McQ is not a bad effort, but it lacks verve and originality.

After a solid opening featuring multiple murders and an intriguing set-up, the film settles down to long stretches of mundane, television-level tedium, the flabby script by Lawrence Roman lacking a cutting edge and unable to capitalize on the early momentum. Sturges does not contribute any notable directorial touches, and at 67 years old, Wayne is well past convincing as a police detective.

The title character is also too faithful to Wayne's stand-up persona to be effective in the new reality of cops pushing boundaries and encountering walls of conspiracy. Sure McQ throws a few illegal punches and slams his badge on the table in disgust, but there is never any question which side of the line he is on, where he stands in the conflict between good and bad, and therefore which side will prevail.

But not all is lost. The story of police corruption and double-cross is actually decent, and in the final third the film finally latches on to its purpose as the action kicks out of second gear towards an acceptable if ultimately safe climax. In sharper hands and with more of the plot holes filled, McQ could have been elevated beyond merely average.

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Movie Review: A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge (1985)

The first sequel to the 1984 slasher flick immediately drops into routine territory and bland execution. A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge is neither scary nor fun, just pointless.

Five years after the events of the original film, the oblivious Walsh family has moved into the house where a teenager was terrorized by deadly nightmares featuring Freddy Krueger (Robert Englund). High school teenager Jesse Walsh (Mark Patton) now starts to experience horrific dreams, Freddy coming to him and insisting that Jesse needs to kill in real life at Freddy's behest. Jesse's parents Ken and Cheryl (Clu Gulager and Hope Lange) don't believe him, and initially, neither do his friends Lisa (Kim Meyers) and Ron (Robert Rusler).

People around Jesse start to die, including his abusive athletics coach Schneider (Marshall Bell). Freddy is able to take control of Jesse's body to commit gruesome acts, and both Ron and Lisa are endangered. Lisa tries to help by exploring the old power plant where Freddy used to work, and Freddy then crashes Lisa's pool party, leading to a final confrontation where Lisa tries to help Jesse regain control of his body and evict Freddy.

A desperate mishmash of ideas leading nowhere, Freddy's Revenge lacks any style and innovation, and suffers from a brain-dead script by David Chaskin and awful performances by an inept cast. Allowing Freddy to leap into the waking world through Jesse's body undermines the whole premise of the first movie. Some of the targets that Freddy chooses to harm, such as Schneider, are also incomprehensible if Freddy's intent is to avenge the community of parents who originally burned him to a crisp by killing off their kids.

Youngsters Patton, Myers and Rusler read their lines with studied amateurishness, while Gulager (13 years on from The Last Picture Show) and Lange get to discover how low Hollywood's career ladder can descend. Director Jack Sholder can't come close to matching Wes Craven's relative artistry, and instead delivers rehashed scenes that fail to generate any sense of suspense.

Stretching to a tiresome 91 minutes, A Nightmare On Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge is a dish served bored.

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Movie Review: The Last Picture Show (1971)

The lives and loves of the residents of a small Texas town in the early 1950s, The Last Picture Show is monumentally winsome. Peter Bogdanovich creates a memorable set of complex characters who take a life of their own, and live on in movie folklore despite the irreversible fading away of their town.

High school seniors and friends Sonny Crawford (Timothy Bottoms) and Duane Jackson (Jeff Bridges) are facing an uncertain future. Sonny is sensitive and caring, and always looks after the mute Billy the street sweeper (Sam Bottoms). Duane is brash and confident, and more aggressively seeks a path to a better life. Their town of Anarene is dusty, windy, and exists solely to support nearby oil fields. The town's unofficial leader is Sam "the Lion" (Ben Johnson), who attempts to be a positive influence on the lives of the local teenagers and owns the movie theatre, pool hall, and cafe, where waitress Genevieve (Eileen Brennan) works.

Sonny does not much care for his girlfriend, and is soon having an affair with the much older Ruth Popper (Cloris Leachman), with the semi-tacit approval of her husband, the High School athletics coach. Duane very much likes his girlfriend, town beauty Jacy Farrow (Cybil Shepherd). But Jacy's mother Lois (Ellen Burstyn) thinks that Duane is not worthy of her daughter. Lois herself is not satisfied with her husband and seeks the affection of oilman Abilene (Clu Gulager).

Jacy uses Duane to lose her virginity and dumps him, turning her attention to older men and richer boys, including the oleaginous Lester (Randy Quaid). A shock awaits Sonny and Duane when they return from an impromptu trip to Mexico, and their lives are set on a nasty collision path involving Jacy. The teenagers need to become men in a hurry, as the destiny of the movie theatre and Anarene itself look ever more bleak.

Bogdanovich co-wrote the screenplay with Marty McMurtry, the author of the semi-autobiographical book, and filmed The Last Picture Show in brilliant black and white. The stark contrasts enhance the film's overall mood of an era of innocence ending, and a town crawling to a dusty death. Bogdanovich cajoles mature performances from a relatively inexperienced cast, Bottoms, Bridges and Shepherd creating characters desperately seeking better futures while struggling through a mundane present.

Timothy Bottoms gives Sonny a somewhat resigned persona as someone who makes the most out of opportunities that come to him rather than creating his own path in life. Sonny's relationship with Ruth is arranged by the coach; he unexpectedly inherits a business; and his relationship with Jacy is very much instigated at her initiative. Meanwhile Bridges portrays Duane as a scrapper who will have to fight for everything in life, and who will therefore lose most of what he values and hurt those who care for him.

Cybill Shepherd effortlessly provides Jacy with a dangerous innocence that becomes increasingly formidable the more she listens to her mother. Openly using sex as a siren to lure men, Jacy's means of escaping the drudgery of life in Anarene is to test drive lovers, with her mother's encouragement, until she finds the one who offers the best chance of easier riches. Jacy and Lois are a daunting mother / daughter couple and make for compelling viewing while representing a harsh indictment of some women's mores in small town Texas.

The countryside is wide open, the roads narrow and bumpy, the cars and trucks are battered, the paint on the walls is peeling, the old men are weathered, and the adults wear an expression of being in a constant battle for economic survival. And the ever present howling wind blows incessantly through Anarene, almost insisting that the town be blown off the map.

Only Billy the street sweeper appears to have the optimism to fight on for the future of the town, tirelessly sweeping the streets, until he too is forced to give up. The Last Picture Show is never more poignant than when the last cheerful light is turned off.

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