They Shot the Piano Player (2024)
Spanish director Fernando Truaba is one of those [...]
Archive for August, 1980
He Knows You’re Alone (1980)
At this point, they all start to run together. Right now I’m dealing with dollar-store rip-offs of both Star Wars and Halloween; having just written a review of Battle Beyond the Stars, I have now landed at He Knows Your Alone. Look, I get it. You want to cash in. There’s a popular entity out […]
Willie & Phil (1980)
I always say if you’re going to steal from someone, you might as well steal from the best. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Paul Mazursky’s obvious inspiration for Willie & Phil was Francois Truffaut’s beloved Jules and Jim and no one could blame him. Nearly every filmmaker of his generation has been influenced […]
Smokey and the Bandit II (1980)
I think I would much preferred to have seen Bandit take that 18-hour run to Boston for clam chowder. Like no other movie that Hal Needham ever made, Smokey and the Bandit II fully exposes both his great strength and his varied weaknesses as a filmmaker. He can’t write comedy. This is obvious. I never […]
The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu (1980)
The first thing that everyone knows about The Fiendish Plot of Dr. Fu Manchu is that it was the farewell feature of Peter Seller’s brilliant career. The second thing is what everyone should know – that this is one of the worst films of his brilliant career. Seriously, this is 90 minutes of pure torture […]
Xanadu (1980)
Xanadu is kind of interesting. Not good, but interesting. It is a production with a lot of great music – most of it from angelic hit-maker Olivia-Newton John, but it has its catchy tunes grafted onto a story that is lame, unwieldy and at times laughable. No, wait. I would even say ‘at times’, it […]
Why Would I Lie? (1980)
I genuinely hate this movie.I hate its premise.I hate its characters.I hate its presumptions.I hate it illogical nonsense.I hate movies like this. Why Would I Lie? Is a movie that gets under your skin, like a bad rash. It zeroes in on a guy who is fundamentally a rotten human being who is presented by […]
The Hunter (1980)
I sort of wish that Steve McQueen had ended things with Papillion. The actor spent much of the 1970s in blockbusters that weren’t worth his time (The Towering Inferno) or in failed attempts to get his box office mojo back. First was his maligned attempt to prove that he could act with Enemy of the […]
Raise the Titanic (1980)
Raise the Titanic is a terrific film . . . at least in the 10 minutes in which it is actually fulfilling the promise of the title. It is kind of amazing to imagine the very ship that has sailed into myth and legend finally unshackled from its watery grave – risen back to the […]
