Jake Speed (1986)

Maureen Winston was traveling Europe.  She was partying in Paris when a pair of goons broke in and absconded with her and another girl.  Back in the United States, her family consulted with government officials, but it looked hopeless.  Mr. Winston (Monte Markham) blamed his other daughter, Margaret (Karen Kopins) for convincing him to let Maureen travel.  Grandpa Winston argued that it was a waste of time to talk to government authorities.  This was a job for Mac Bolan, Remo Williams, or Jake Speed.  Everyone shook their heads at the crazy old man and his heroes from pulp fiction.

Soon after, Margaret found a note instructing her to go to a dive bar at midnight if she wanted to find her sister.  Desperate, she and her roommate, Wendy (Donna Pescow), went.  There they met Jake Speed (Wayne Crawford) and his sidekick/chronicler, Desmond Floyd (Dennis Christopher).  In order to rescue Maureen, they needed Margaret to meet them in Africa.  Though strongly advised against it, Margaret flew to an African nation in the midst of a civil war.  No sooner does she join them than she begins to have doubts.  Why was she sharing a room with Speed?  Why did he want her in a cocktail dress for an outing?  Why are two men bidding for her as if she was for sale?!

The movie supposes that the pulp fiction heroes are real and the novels are exaggerated accounts of their adventures.  Jake proves to be a seat-of-his-pants kind of guy who finds that all of his plans disintegrate and usually leave him worse off.  In addition to playing the lead, Crawford was a writer and producer.  He took the lead because they couldn't get anyone else to take the role.  Dennis Christopher was not suited for an action film.  He looks out of place throughout the movie.  Karen Kopins has a few moments, but the script is quite unfriendly.  She is stuck being panicked, anxious, or terrified for most of the film.  John Hurt proves to be the villain - a white slaver named Sid, though he shows up rather late in the film.  Sid and Speed are familiar with one another, bantering like old chums who now hate each other.

The pacing is slow.  There is entirely too much time of Speed and Margaret sitting here and sitting there with her being suspicious and him being indifferent.  To show Speed just how dangerous he is, Sid keep killing his own men.  The various soldiers fighting the civil war prove to be terrible shots, unable to hit any of the important characters.  Overall, the movie doesn't know what it wants to be.  Sometimes it's a comedy, sometimes it's an action adventure, sometimes it's a parody of pulp fiction novels, but it never settles into a groove.  Choppy.

Intended to be the first in a series of Jake Speed adventures, this bombed and killed future installments.  Mediocre.  Skip.

Happy 95th Birthday!

Today, William Shatner turns 95 years old and he's still working.  In fact, Shatner is a workaholic.  In his 70+ year career, he has been a headliner in a dozen TV series, some successful (Star Trek, TJ Hooker, Boston Legal), some not so successful (For the People, Barbary Coast, $#*! My Dad Says) and some that didn't get beyond the pilot (Nero Wolfe, Alexander the Great).  He starred in one of the most memorable episodes of The Twilight Zone: Nightmare at 20,000 Feet.  In addition to acting, he has hosted many shows such as Shatner's Raw Nerve, Rescue 911, Full Moon Fright Night, and Weird of What?  Then there are the books.  He has written almost a dozen biographical books that, of course, mostly focus on his time with Star Trek.  He's written a dozen Star Trek novels.  Then there is the TekWar series from the late 80s and into the 90s that spawned a TV series.  Yes, he starred in that TV series too.  When not acting or writing, he is a noted equestrian; yes, he wrote a book about horses too.  Oh, and he's been to space.  His credits on IMDb are vast and diversified: actor, director, writer, producer.

Shatner will forever be most identified as Captain Kirk, much as Sean Connery is always remembered as James Bond.  However, Denny Crane is a close second.

Happy Birthday!

Lone Wolf McQuade (1983)

In the deserts of Texas near El Paso, a band of thieves drive a herd of horses into a corral.  Nearby, several state police officers prepare to arrest the rustlers.  It goes badly when the rustlers outmaneuver the police and quickly surround them.  Before the lead rustler can kill the police, Ranger J.J. McQuade (Chuck Norris) entered the fray.  In short order, he dispatched the rustlers and rescued the police officers.  One officer, Arcadio Ramos (Robert Beltran), is particularly grateful.  Upon returning to the office in El Paso, his captain (R.G. Armstrong) upbraided him for his slovenly appearance and Lone Wolf antics.  He was assigned a partner, none other than Arcadio "Kayo" Ramos.

Happenstance at a horse racetrack led to a meeting with Lola Richardson (Barbara Carrera) and her business partner, Rawley Wilkes (David Carradine).  Wilkes was a former Karate champion and McQuade was widely known for his hand-to-hand prowess.  Though tempers flared and both displayed their martial arts skills, Lola prevented them from fighting one another; that must wait for the finale.  It was now clear that Wilkes is the bad guy and Lola the love interest.

The movie plays like a Spaghetti Western and has a soundtrack that feels like it came from a Sergio Leone film.  There are several characters who follow standard tropes.  Dakota (LQ Jones) is the old veteran who is a reliable ally and doomed to die.  Kayo is the greenhorn youth who follows the hero and matures into a hero himself.  Snow (William Sanderson) is the sniveling snitch who reveals the plans of the villain and provides for some initial action in the investigation.  Sally is McQuade's daughter who is repeatedly entangled in the story and needs rescuing.  Of course, there are training montages and travel montages, accompanied by a powerful musical score.

The same year this appeared in theaters, Barbara Carrera was also opposite Sean Connery in Never Say Never Again.  In that, she was an over-the-top femme fatale.  In both movies, she dies.  Tough year for her characters but a high point in her career.

As David Carradine was best remembered for his role as Kwai Chang Caine in Kung Fu, there was much excitement over his match with Karate World Champion Norris.  Norris commented that Carradine's martial arts was about as good as Norris's acting.  Nice.

Great popcorn fun and recommended.

Damnation Alley

Hell Tanner rode his Harley toward the Mexican border, but there was soon police pursuit.  The Harley was fast, but the roadblock ahead stopped him.  The police handled him with kid gloves, needing him intact and healthy.  Returning to LA in a bizarre storm that saw rocks plunging from the sky, they arrived in time to take cover.  Denton was disappointed.  Tanner had agreed to drive to Boston in exchange for being released from prison.

It is the post-apocalypse, and the world is drastically changed.  The skies are purple or black with wild weather that prevents flight and most radio communication.  There are only pockets of humanity remaining, notably Los Angeles and Boston.  However, it is almost impossible to travel from one to the other.  The irradiated middle has come to be called Damnation Alley.  A man from Boston recently made that trip and then died from radiation poisoning.  Boston is suffering a plague and needs a serum that LA has.

Tanner drives one of three cars headed to Boston.  Car is a misnomer.  It is more like a tank with missile racks, flamethrowers, machine guns, and heavy armor plating.  The vehicles set out with a planned first stop in Salt Lake City.  They are assailed by lines of tornadoes, huge bats, snakes that are gargantuan, volcanos spewing radioactivity, near impenetrable hedges, and bandits.  On top of that, Denton gave orders to burn Tanner if he tried to run away again.

The book is very different from the movie.  Where the movie has Denton and Tanner traveling to Albany, NY with some notion of joining a surviving community, this has Tanner on a mission of mercy.  Where the book Tanner is a criminal on a journey of redemption, movie Tanner is just some guy who happened to survive the apocalypse and rides a motorcycle.

Several chapters of the book detail the deteriorating situation in Boston as the plague wipes out the population.  Each chapter follows someone else, giving it no connection.  Here is the story of how this character died.  Here is a preacher offering a sermon while a bell in the background rings with each death.  Who would set up such a bell?  When Tanner finally gets there, he meets none of the characters detailed in these Boston chapters.  Annoying.

The bike gangs were also an oddity.  Tanner encountered a bike gang, which operates as road bandits like in Mad Max, but that doesn't make much sense.  With the lethal weather, motorcycles look to be the worst road option.  During an encounter with a bike gang, Tanner absolutely mauled them with missiles, machine guns, flamethrowers, and grenades.  Despite 90% casualties, the bikers kept coming!  Really?  Yes, at that point, the willing suspension of disbelief snapped for me.

I was reminded of scenes from Steven King's The Talisman and The Black Tower series.  His alternate universe also had characters traversing an irradiated wasteland between California and New England.  Was this book an inspiration for him?

Just okay.

Good Guys Wear Black (1978)

It is 1973 and the Paris Peace Talks are underway between the United States and Vietnam.  The Vietnamese legation has requested that lead negotiator, Conrad Morgan (James Franciscus), approve the death of CIA operatives currently in captivity.  Instead, he had a meeting with CIA Agent Murray Saunders (Lloyd Haynes) and suggested a rescue operation in the next 48 hours.

In Vietnam, Major John T Booker (Chuck Norris) and his elite commando squad known as the Black Tigers climb into a Huey.  The team arrived at the site and quickly infiltrated.  No sooner had they determined that no POWs were present than Viet Kong attacked.  Not only were many of the Black Tigers killed, but the pickup helicopters never arrived.  Abandoned, the remaining Black Tigers had to trek through the jungles to escape.

In 1978, Margaret (Anne Archer) approached Booker and asked him about that last mission.  Of course, it was classified yet she somehow knew more about it than he did.  Moreover, Agent Saunders contacted Booker and revealed that someone is killing the surviving Black Tigers.  With the mysterious Margaret at his side, Booker set out to warn the remaining Tigers and uncover whoever was killing them.

This was the first Chuck Norris film I saw.  Of course, it was absolutely awesome; I was 11.  Watching it today, it is still a lot of fun, but it is short on martial arts.  After this film, I was a fan of his and saw a string of his movies over the next several years.  Lone Wolf McQuade (1983) was by far my favorite Chuck Norris film.  Walker, Texas Ranger was an outgrowth of that movie.  I was a consistent watcher of that show for the first couple seasons.  His last noteworthy movie appearance was in The Expendables 2 (2012) where he played a legendary mercenary, Booker the Lone Wolf.  That was one of the all-time great cameos. 

Chuck Norris died this morning at the age of 86.  RIP

Fackham Hall (2025)

It is 1931 and Humphrey Davenport (Damien Lewis) has a problem.  All his sons - John, Paul, George, and Ringo - died in various tragic accidents, leaving no direct heir to the family estate, Fackham Hall.  His nephew, Archibald Davenport (Tom Felton), will inherit, leaving his wife and two daughters homeless. He will resolve this quandary by having his younger daughter, Poppy (Emma Laird), marry Archibald.  Meanwhile, wily Eric Noone (Ben Radcliffe) is something of an Artful Dodger in London.  He has grown up in an orphanage, where he still resides.  Upon returning from his antics in the city, a lawyer offered him the princely sum of one pound to deliver a letter to Lord Davenport at Fackham Hall.  En route, he ran into - literally - Rose Davenport (Thomasin McKenzie), Poppy's elder sister and presumed spinster.  Meet cute, followed by slapstick comedy.  Upon arriving at Fackham Hall, Eric is mistaken for a job applicant, which he accepts, and completely forgets the letter he was to deliver.  I'm sure it was nothing important.

This is Downton Abbey as slapstick, goofball comedy.  One of the wedding guests is none other than JRR Tolkien "the Writer!" who finds plenty of inspiration for his writing.  Jimmy Carr plays the town vicar who must have forgotten all the punctuation in his sermons: "You may kiss the choir boys...  You may kiss.  The choir boys will now sing."  The Bechdel sisters who do nothing but talk about men and a desire to marry was a funny gag.  Of particular note, I did not recognize Draco Malfoy (Tom Felton); he looks quite different and Archibald is entirely unlike Draco.  At one point, it is mentioned that Archibald's older brother, Nathaniel, was presumed killed in the Great War; a flashback shows a grinning toddler in a British uniform standing in the trenches.  Yes, they were so young in the war.

Silly popcorn fun.  Recommended.

Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez was a labor organizer for farm workers who morphed into a civil rights leader for Chicanos.  He died in 1993.  As a union leader and civil rights activist, he was held in high esteem among Democrats.  Unsurprisingly, over the last 33 years, many streets, parks, schools, and libraries have been named in his honor.  His birthday, March 31st, is a holiday in California, Denver (CO), and Texas.  Now, more than 30 years after his death, it has suddenly been revealed that he sexually abused young women and girls.  One of his prime allies during his life - Dolores Huerta - has stated that she was raped by him 60 years ago.

No sooner has this been announced than marches and holidays in his honor are canceled and talk runs to changing the names of streets, parks, schools, etc.  The speed at which he went from hero to monster is breathtaking.  It is as if everyone knew all along and, now that it is out in the open, honors must be stripped.  There is no one on the other side arguing on his behalf.  Well, he has been dead for 30 years.  Why now?  Dolores is 96 years old and never thought to say anything in the last 33 years?

One reason why Chavez's fall from grace is unopposed is because it is the left that is tearing him down.  He was never a hero to Republicans or the right.  The Democrats are tearing down one of their heroes and the Republicans will just shrug.  Again, why now?

Cesar Chavez was adamantly opposed to illegal immigration.  Illegal immigrants were a thorn in the side of his labor efforts.  Farms were only too eager to hire low-wage illegals rather than unionized Americans.  In those days, it was possible to be anti-immigration and a Democrat.  That combination is no longer valid.  Chavez held views that are antithetical to the modern Democratic Party and some on the right have brought up Chavez to argue against illegal immigration.  That is surely vexing.

Next year will be Cesar Chavez's 100th birthday.  Would it be a day to denounce illegal immigration?  Better to take that birthday off the calendar than risk having a famous Hispanic Democrat as a symbol for the opposition.  Yes, it was time to cancel Chavez.