Point Blank is one of the weirdest, yet most satisfying examples of film noir you’ll ever see. The “golden age” of the genre was long over by the time the hippie era came around; twisty Chandler-esque capers loaded with shadows, backstabs and plot switchbacks were viewed as dated relics from the bygone days of the Hays Code. Studios were becoming more lax about reigning in the violent and sexual content of their films. Best of all, there was a certain chemical floating around that inspired insane bursts of creativity.

Enter ambitious young director John Boorman, a personal friend of Lee Marvin, who was given the duty of directing Marvin in a lavish MGM production of Richard Stark’s pulp novel The Hunter. With the formulaic script he was given and his relative inexperience behind the camera, Point Blank could have been a disaster, but the exact opposite thing happened: they turned straw into gold. Boorman’s glossy and acidic Euro treatment elevates what could have been a mundane revenge caper into the realm of high art. Lee Marvin dominates the screen as the indomitable Walker; his journey through a hallucinatory fantasia of All Honky Deceit and Treachery is strangely timeless, remaining fresh today in spite of its 1960s trappings.

Right off the bat, Point Blank throws you several temporal curveballs; moments after Leo the Lion is done roaring, we’ve got a flash-forward to Marvin’s face illuminated by a psychedelic lightshow (this happens during an epic fight scene about 30 minutes later), followed by a jump cut to “the present” where Walker is in a prison cell, pondering his current situation in voiceover. He’s been set up, double crossed. You know the deal. Suddenly he flashes back to the botched robbery that landed him in the can. Walker and his buddy Reese are planning to steal a shipment of cash from the Mob that is, for some reason, dropped off via helicopter in the abandoned remains of Alcatraz Prison.  As per ancient noir tradition, nothing goes according to plan. Reese gets a little trigger happy and decides to take all the cash after wasting the two delivery boys.

After a brief return to the cell, there’s a deeper flashback to the wild party where Reese first proposes his brilliant plan to an incoherent Walker, who’s so blind drunk that he collapses on the floor. Amidst a sea of dancing legs, Reese gets in close and must scream “TRUST ME!!!” over the loud music. In the first of many unusual yet brilliant touches, this two-second scene is recalled time and time again at appropriate moments, in order to convey Walker’s doubt or paranoia. It’s also an omen of doom that tends to prelude moments of brutal violence. Despite the heavy experimentation going on, the editing is crisp and efficient, the action is never hard to follow. A cool credits sequence, consisting of various shots of Walker being suspended on a fence outside a prison, makes excellent use of the 2.35:1 ratio.

Point Blank cuts out a lot of B.S. by concerning itself solely with Walker’s obsessive pursuit. Nothing occurs in the film that doesn’t relate directly to Walker attempting to obtain his 93 Grand from a shadowy All Honky Organization. Until we lapse into full on Psychedelic Freakout in the brilliant third act, anyway; the first hour or so is a model of streamlined precision. After the credits, we’re on a boat with Walker and a mysterious bald accomplice, who has acquired Reese’s address and another tasty bit of info: the slimeball is shacked up with Walker’s ex-wife!

There’s an awesome sequence of Walker travelling like a guided missile toward his destination, intercut with the former Ms. Walker going about her daily drug-addled routine. His footsteps get louder and louder as he plows down the hallway like a freight train, then hops into his giant sedan. The sound of the clacking shoes is almost overbearing, and then the scene explodes into an orgasmic finish.

Walker kicks down the front door, grabs his hysterical wife, and charges into the master suite to unload six hot loads from his rod into an empty bed. Reese has split town, so Walker must unload his anger at the only available target.

The film was considered extremely violent at the time of its release, and was treated like a trashy piece of exploitation, accused of misogyny and simple barbarism. To be fair, it’s hard to disagree with the latter, but the way Walker treats Angie Dickinson’s character is hardly chauvinistic. It’s simply a sexless relationship, more of a business arrangement, and when the inevitable carnal connection occurs it’s during a surreal scene that’s more sad than erotic. Her real purpose is to act as bait during an involved espionage/infiltration scheme that’s the centerpiece of the whole film. This is also where we begin to fear that Walker could screw up, or leave poor Angie to her own devices while she’s being defiled by human pond scum.

Natch, it all goes like clockwork, and before Reese can make a move for third base he’s caught, literally, with his pants down. Walker’s almost supernatural ability to evade detection, or the consequences of his homicidal actions, add to the dreamlike atmosphere of Point Blank. Some see it as a metaphysical life-after-death sort of deal, some say it’s a metafictional revenge fantasy within another revenge fantasy. Some see Walker as a vengeful spirit, or a personification of Karma. Whatever the case, it’s clear that there’s a lot more going on under the surface than meets the eye.

There is a clear point where the film goes completely bonkers and we see hints of the grand absurdity of Zardoz, which would be soon to come from M. Boorman. Angie’s getting a little freaked out about Walker’s apparent death wish, so she begins hitting him over and over until all her energy is sapped. Without saying a word, Walker sits down on the couch and turns on TV. All of a sudden there’s a racket coming from the kitchen. All the appliances have been turned on, so Walker must turn them all off to preserve his (and our) sanity. As soon as that’s done, a still unseen Angie begins to taunt Walker over a PA system, giving voice to his insecurities. He wanders into a lounge where Angie is trying to play pool while intoxicated. The two, acting as if drugged by heavy tranquilizers, then fall atop each other in the classic Meet Cute position, then we’re off to the psychedelic love scene that cuts between Lee Marvin with two different women.

So yeah, there was a bit of LSD experimentation being conducted on the set of Point Blank. But after that bit of weirdness, the story kicks into high gear. Carroll O’Connor is wonderful as a completely amoral, yet extremely competent shady businessman named Brewster. There is a priceless exchange when Walker shows up in his office.

Brewster: You’re a very bad man, Walker, a very destructive man! Why do you run around doing things like this?

Walker: I want my money. I want my $93,000.

Brewster: $93,000? You threaten a financial structure like this for $93,000? No, Walker, I don’t believe you. What do you really want?

Walker: I – I really want my money.

Brewster: Well, I’m not going to give you any money and nobody else is. Don’t you understand that?

Walker: Who runs things?

Brewster: Carter and I run things. I run things.

Walker: What about Fairfax? Will he pay me?

Brewster: Fairfax is a man who signs checks.

Walker: No, cash.

Brewster: Fairfax isn’t going to give you anything. He’s finished. Fairfax is dead. He just doesn’t know it yet.

Walker: Somebody’s got to pay.

In terms of Walker’s character arc, it’s a tragic scene where he must confront the futility of his quest. Yet it’s also pretty damn funny since O’Connor and Marvin play against each other so well. Marvin’s stoic mug, which has the same expression through 90% of Point Blank, is now slowly crumbling, but you can also see him trying to maintain his stoic appearance even while he’s being emasculated by a bureaucratic crime syndicate. That’s damn good acting, a sight better than his performance in The Dirty Dozen the same year.  Even more brutal twists of fate lie ahead, leading up to a twist that neatly ties everything together, and a traditional noir ending that manages to be both poetic and nihilistic.

Point Blank is so damn weird yet so damn perfect. Despite sharing a source novel with Mel Gibson’s ultra-violent Payback, the two films couldn’t be more dissimilar. The adventures of Walker will age like a fine wine, while the adventures of “Porter” will find their rightful place amongst other such late-90s cultural detritus. One wishes Boorman had done more noirs but, alas, The Tailor of Panama proved to be a rather weak comeback attempt. Admittedly, it would have been quite difficult to top the hard-boiled kick in the ass that Point Blank consistently delivers, even through many repeated viewings.

We all know what prison movies are all about. A bunch of sweaty men packed into together, ready for shanking, power playing, and raping. In Jamaa Fanaka’s Penitentiary, you won’t be disappointed with these incarceration clichés, but I still highly recommend this flawed film. For all its goofiness, Penitentiary is a tightly shot and surprisingly well-acted film, and the actors often go beyond the outlandish screenplay to add a touch of emotional urgency to what are otherwise exploitation stereotypes. Even better, the screenplay takes the Jive Turkey Theater boilerplate dialog and occasionally elevates it to a poetic, sarcastic, and even optimistic eloquence. It’s as if Huggy Bear were running the show, and then Barack Obama suddenly shows up to give some stirring oratory.

The opening of Penitentiary is absurd enough. Our African American hero Martel “Too Sweet” Gordone (a smooth and level-headed Leon Isaac Kennedy) is minding his own business, snoozing underneath his makeshift tent on the side of the highway. A bunch of long haired punks on dirt bikes start tearing up the pea patch around his one-man slum tenement, so it’s time for Martel to move on. He is hitchhiking on the highway, and naturally some red-hot hooker named Linda (the red-hot Hazel Spears) stops to pick him up in her luxury conversion van. ‘Cause you know, those sorts of things happened in the 70s. She offers him a freebie in the back of the van, but her amorous advances are interrupted by a business prospect making itself known over her CB radio. It’s business before pleasure, so the couple stops at a roadside diner so Linda can meet her date and make a living.

From this innocuous opening, things go south quickly. Linda thinks these two honky rednecks are her dates, but they instead they impugn her honor, as roadside diner rednecks do. Martel jumps in and prevents her rape, and he gets knocked unconscious for his trouble. Next thing you know, Martel is now serving hard time in the penitentiary, taking the fall for the murder of one of the rednecks. From here, Penitentiary turns into a strictly prison survival film, with Martel having to protect his sweet, sweet ass from a twisted gang of rapists who want to make him their “property.”

For all its rough living conditions, the penitentiary of Penitentiary has some pretty liberal policies. In the first prison yard scene, there is full funk band (with electric instruments) jamming away as other prisoners are making coordinated dance moves straight out of some bad episode of Soul Train. Then the warden organizes a full-on boxing tournament, inviting the women prisoners to watch the proceedings. The grand prize of the tournament is a “connubial visit” with a woman in a trailer. During the boxing tournament, several of the prisoners actually get to have some consensual heterosexual sex in the restroom.

But Penitentiary somehow manages to transcend its ridiculous trappings. The key scenes involve a wizened old man Hezzikia “Seldom Seen” Jackson (a wonderfully grumpy Floyd Chatman) who Martel eventually shares a cell with. I really liked Seldom Seen in his soaring, well-earned bitterness, and Chatman gets to fire off some of the sharpest and darkest dialog in the film. And Martel is a strong and appealing character as well. He not only protects his own dignity, but also inspires another prison bitch to finally stand up for himself. How this rape victim finally changes his mentality is a lesson we could all learn from, believe it or not. There are some superb exchanges here that make you realize that though the Fanaka is mostly goofing off, he can turn deadly serious when need be. The grueling fight scenes are fantastic in their street-hard authenticity, in both the boxing ring and the cells.

Penitentiary is an entertaining, very well-edited, and oddly poignant film. The film strikes a hopeful and honest note that I found myself in accord with; you have to continuously struggle for your freedom, for despair will only lead to slavery of the body and mind. And that’s what Jive Turkey Theater is all about.

The Getaway is perhaps Sam Peckinpah’s cleanest and tightest work. It’s a slick, unabashedly commercial product, but no matter; it’s still Sam Peckinpah all the way, in its testosterone-charged moodiness, the inevitable slapping around of women, and its grim and melancholy view of life. The Getaway is the perfect Steve McQueen vehicle, showcasing the King of Cool as a competent, methodical bank robber who must navigate his way through dangerous fools. Surprisingly enough, one of these dangerous fools turns out to have as much presence as Steve McQueen.

That actor’s name is Ali Lettieri, whose best known role was Virgil “The Turk” Solozzo, the man who negotiates with Don Corleone in The Godfather, and starts up a war with the Godfather’s family when they decline joining up with the Tattaglia family’s drug business. In The Getaway, Lettieri plays Rudy, a ruthless killer who is working for Jack Benyon (a wonderfully sleazy Ben Johnson), a corrupt politician who is able to bail Carter “Doc” McCoy (Steve McQueen) out of prison so Doc can do a bank job. In most All Honky Capers, the heavies are usually bowling pins for the hero to knock down. But this is not the case with Rudy; he’s not as methodical as Doc, but he’s just as resilient and cunning. For the entire film, Lettieri devours every scene he’s in, including the scenes he shares with McQueen, and for that reason alone The Getaway is worth viewing.

One of the most notable aspects of The Getaway is its unusual and experimental use of audio. The opening scenes showcase Doc suffering a serious case of stir craziness in the penitentiary. The scenes focus upon not only the monotony of prison life, but the monotony of sounds…the machinery that the prisoners use, the bells and whistles of their daily routine, the orders that are barked at them. You get bombarded with the audio nightmare of being locked up, rather than just the actual visual depiction of prison life. The audio bleeds into adjacent scenes, and Peckinpah uses this unusual editing throughout the film to disorienting and effective results. You can feel this movie ringing in your head.

The Getaway also features some rather unusual sexual chemistry. The first couple, oddly enough, are almost quaint and old fashioned. Doc and his wife Carol (a way too cute and future Mrs. McQueen Ali McGraw) have an almost traditional, square romance, trying to have a normal spousal relationship even though they’re a bona fide Bonnie and Clyde. The opening scenes of Doc and Carol’s reunion after his release are dreamy and illusionary. They are soon bickering, then Carol fucks things up royally twice, and Doc has to decide if Carol is worth the hassle. Doc and Carol’s unexpectedly mundane marital strife are interspaced with the horribly inappropriate yet morbidly fascinating relationship between Rudy and his hostage Fran (a stupidly hot and buxom Sally Struthers…yes, Meathead’s wife and eventually obese spokesperson for Christian Children’s Fund, sigh). Fran desperately wants to be Rudy’s Bonnie, and she has no problem having sex with Rudy in front of her utterly emasculated husband Harold (you should immediately recognize veteran character actor Jack Dodson, who played local yokel regular Howard Sprague in The Andy Griffith Show). Fran is completely captivated by bad boy Rudy, and their fling has a very deliberate and pathetic texture to it.

The original score, composed by Quincy Jones, is fabulous in its variety. The music swings from smooth jazz to wakka wakka action music, and features harmonica legend Toots Thielemans. Like the experimental audio, the music defines each scene as much as the visuals.

The Getaway is a bridge between the melancholy of The Wild Bunch and the unbridled nihilism of Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia. It’s an eminently watchable party film, one you could bring your buddies together to watch, if for no other reason than to gawk at Sally Struthers’s early 70s cleavage and gasp at Lattieri’s greasy vindictiveness. But for the Peckinpah aficionado, The Getaway is the work of an assured director on cruise control. For the McQueen disciple, The Getaway is Stevie Baby stayin’ Bullitt cool.

And by the way … of course Slim Pickens drops in to play a philosophical good ol’ boy that I suspect was the inspiration for Sam Elliot’s cowboy in The Big Lebowski. So, you ready to rent this film, or what?