Runners are those who refuse to report to a Sleepshop and attempt to avoid their fate by escaping to Sanctuary. Logan 3 is a Deep Sleep Operative (also called Sandman ) whose job is to terminate Runners using a special weapon called simply, the ‘gun’, a handgun with selectable ordnance keyed to self-destruct if touched by an individual who is not the proper owner.
Runners are most terrified of a weapon called the ‘Homer’, which homes in on body heat, and deliberately ignites every pain nerve in the body, killing the target.
I was disappointed when the guns in the movie were plain old scifi ‘blasters’.
After The First Great Train Robbery made an appearance in the 20/20 thread, I was looking at other Michael Crichton projects. Has anyone ever checked out Mike Hodges’ The Terminal Man (1974)? It stars George Segal and was adapted from a Crichton novel, so consider me interested!
I love 70s Segal, Get Carter, Michael Crichton and Sci fi. And I took a great power nap while watching this a few years ago, Tibbs, my man. :( I did awaken refreshed.
Crap or not, I really want to see his creepy plastic surgery movie_The Looker_ (1981). It has 80s Albert Finney and a super suave-looking James Coburn, along with cheesy computer graphics.
Do any posters have any recommendations for 1980s films that share the spirit of the classic 70s Hollywood Renaissance? I really love Cutter’s Way (1981), Star 80 (1983), Melvin and Howard (1980), and Prince of the City (1981), and feel most of them wouldn’t be out of place for viewers desiring some desaturated, documentary realism visuals. They feel like a hangover from the previous decade and lack that hyperbolic exaggeration that I associate with 1980s filmmaking.
Wow, thanks Navaronegun! I really need to see Ragtime and Absence of Malice. I forgot to list The Stunt Man (1980), which is super quirky and a bit of a Vegemite film (uber divisive), so I could understand why people might hate it, but I love the score and O’Toole’s performance so much. You can just feel that the director is really enjoying himself.
I have a big soft spot for everything Cimino did pre-The Sicilian, including Heaven’s Gate. It’s very flawed and runs on an unusual rhythm but the cinematography is absolutely stunning. For me, it’s tied with Days of Heaven as the most beautiful film ever made.
What I think is interesting is that with Redford and Beatty at the top, ; the mantle is being passed and the students becoming the teachers (directors).
The issue I have with The Stunt Man is that it kind of arrived dated…Vietnam was so over in 1980 (ha ha…it haunts us today…). Certainly something about a deserter just seemed passe in a way that wouldn’t have in 1976, lets say…
Absence of Malice is worth it for the climax with Wilford Brimley (believe it or not…). And Bob Balaban in a excels in a small role.
That’s a fair criticism. I believe Warner Bros. shelved the film for two years (Peter O’Toole said, "The Stunt Man didn’t release, it escaped!:), but even if it released in 78, it wouldn’t have been particularly timely.
Bear in mind, it ain’t an action thriller. In true Pollack fashion, it is a detailed think piece about Prosecutorial and Journalistic ethics. Set in Miami and it is indeed a beautifully shot 1980 Miami of my childhood on location.
I saw this in the theater! Being raised by a single, movie buff mom meant that I occasionally got dragged to some movies that may have warped my little mind. Another Crichton movie, Coma, comes to mind as one that gave me nightmares. But Looker was, looking back decades later, just weird. Something about models and assassins and yeah, I remember Albert Finney. Don’t remember James Coburn! Maybe I should revisit this one too.
I think a lot of Heaven’s Gate’s bad rap came from Vincent Canby’s review in the New York Times. I’m paraphrasing a bit here, but he wrote that the movie was so bad that it was as if Michael Cimino had sold his soul to the devil for the success of The Deer Hunter and this time the devil had come around to collect.
Well, that and the fact that the plot almost unintelligible due to the careening and meandering the script does. And I like it! But its only an average film, because it is so flawed. But I give him credit for swinging for the fences.
And you just can’t make this kinda stuff up. “How not to get rehired to direct a picture” 101:
Reading that Wikipedia entry was fascinating, and I’m now sorely tempted to see what all the fuss was about. I had heard of the movie at some point in my life more recently, but knew absolutely nothing about it. Possibly because every time I see the title, I immediately think of the cult.
It appears there are many different cuts, so I may need to do a bit of research first.
I would also need to talk my girlfriend into it, which could be either very difficult if not impossible, or quite easy if I can raise her curiosity level somehow. In any case, we are so backlogged now that it will almost certainly be a while.
Anyone interested in Heaven’s Gate and what went wrong should really check this out. Excellent documentary, freely available on YouTube. Interviews with UA executives, Kristofferson, Bridges, cast, etc. The fight over the cuts, (the Camby review, @Jason_Levine) Rare footage and photos, the works.
Canby and Ebert had pithy quotes about the film, but this is my favorite:
Writing in The Guardian in 2008, Joe Queenan declared Heaven’s Gate the worst film made up to that time. “This is a movie that destroyed the director’s career,” he wrote. “This is a movie that lost so much money it literally drove a major American studio out of business. This is a movie about Harvard-educated gunslingers who face off against eastern European sodbusters in an epic struggle for the soul of America. This is a movie that stars Isabelle Huppert as a shotgun-toting cowgirl. This is a movie in which Jeff Bridges pukes while mounted on roller skates. This is a movie that has five minutes of uninterrupted fiddle-playing by a fiddler who is also mounted on roller skates. This is a movie that defies belief.”[41]
