Friday, December 6, 2013

THE GAUNTLET (1977)

[Update 04/25/2022: Need rewatch this film and redo this review completely. Fix the screenshots also.]

The story is about as simple as it can get: an honest Phoenix cop (Eastwood) is sent to transport a prisoner (Locke) from Las Vegas back to Phoenix.  Along the way every cop and mafia hood in the state tries to kill them by shooting tens of thousands of bullets at them. The End.

I would love to know more about the development of this story, not physical making of the movie, just the writing of the story itself cause there's nothing to it!  The entire film is Eastwood/Locke traveling from place to place getting shot at by people who can't hit shit!  There were times (the helicopter scene) when the bad guy had a clear (and I mean fucking clear) shot and totally missed it.  There was a reasonable amount of action, but since the bad guys were so inept I never once thought that Eastwood was in any real danger.

Topless Sondra Locke, ridiculous amount of bullets fired, average pace, really nice poster artwork, mildly boring action scenes, good supporting cast: Bill McKinney, Roy Jensen, Pat Hingle, William Prince.  The whole thing just felt like a waste of time.  Skip it.