Death Hunt Review

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(More customer reviews)The movie DEATH HUNT turns history on its head, but in doing so it manages to deliver an entertaining movie that details the determination of two men in a manhunt across the Canadian tundra.
Directed by James Bond veteran Peter Hunt, who after working as an editor on the first few 007 pictures was promoted to director of the fan favorite ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE and went on to direct such classics as GOLD and SHOUT AT THE DEVIL.
The movie DEATH HUNT provides Hunt the opportunity to reteam with his SHOUT AT THE DEVIL star Lee Marvin. Marvin plays a world-weary Canadian Mountie who is obligated (I use that word because Marvin's character seems to feel some sympathy for his quarry) to bring in a trapper (played by a quiet brooding Charles Bronsan) who is being harassed by some local thugs.
The execution of this story is excellent, the acting first-rate and the shots of the Yukon breathtaking. Where this movie does falter is in purporting to tell history by tying in the story of the Mad Trapper of Rat River into the fabric of the story - and in doing so unraveling all the history books tell us about the real incident.
Just type in `Mad Trapper of Rat River" on an Internet search engine to learn all you want to know about the 1931 incident, but everything we know about the real incident tells us that Albert Johnson was the guilty party. But here Johnson is portrayed as an innocent man whose pursuers use the charge of his being the mad trapper as an excuse to mobolize the law enforcement resources of the Yukon to catch him.
Given that nobody to this day really knows the identity of Johnson, the filmmakers invent a rather fanciful past for him. The character Marvin plays - Millen - was also shot and killed by Johnson in a shootout midway through the chase, but in the movie DEATH HUNT Marvin's character is in the chase to the very end.
Still, taken as a piece of fiction the movie DEATH HUNT is resounding stuff. I saw it on television some years ago and was hoping it would one day be released on DVD. Hunt is an expert at building suspense and a master at drama - and DEATH HUNT have both those elements in plentiful supply.
In addition to Marvin and Bronsan the movie also features an impressive supporting cast with young heartthrob of the late 1970s/1980s Andrew Stevens as a young, eager Mountie and Carl Weathers (of Apollo Creed in the Rocky movies fame) as another weary Mountie. Add to the mix Ed Lauter and Angie Dickinsoin and the pedigree of this feature is obvious.
So, the overall verdict? This is an entertaining action adventure with plenty of suspense and drama. Just don't expect an accurate history lesson.
Sadly this is a largely bare-bones DVD release with only the theatrical trailer and a print of the original poster to complement it.


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The Big Red One - The Reconstruction (Two-Disc Special Edition) (2005) Review

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(More customer reviews)Whenever I would catch it on cable years and years ago, Sam Fuller's "The Big Red One" was a quirky war movie with strange pacing and a very uneven balance of comedy and tragedy, of high and low-- several great moments strung loosely together. Working on the upcoming DVD, I was not aware of the fact that Fuller had shot 4 hours or that he wished to his dying day that the film would be lengthened, and I was skeptical as I always am with extended versions (this one carries the subtitle "Reconstruction"). I got to look at it several times, once for business and twice more for pleasure, because the film is transformed and made great, and there are so many memorable scenes that one wants to go back to it again and again. 40-plus minutes have been added on, some full scenes, some simply extended bits to old scenes. The narrative structure of the movie is still very free and loose, very episodic, but the greater length is absolutely crucial to the plot, since we are meant to get at least some slight idea of the tedium and homesickness that goes along with being a soldier in an ongoing war. Fleshed out is the character and performance of Lee Marvin--everything that he is capable of as an actor, everything that that stone wall of a face can convey is on display here--tough as all hell but with a simultaneous sweetness that can be, when called upon, heartbreaking. Look at his expression when a gunfight breaks out after the Italian girl places flowers on his helmet--he jabs the rifle into position along his chin and begins firing rounds, his face jerking only slighty with each shot. We don't see anything of the gunfight, only close-up on his face and the expression says nothing and everything all at once--we're meant to meet him halfway and fill in the blanks ourselves. He makes it easy for us because by this point in the movie we know what kind of a man he is. And because this is Sam Fuller, the movie has a diabolical sense of humor, sometimes downright hilarious, as when some of the boys swap sexual fantasies, some of which have become warped and deranged after so much time in battle. Another sequence has the Sergeant and the boys of the One helping to deliver a baby inside the belly of a German tank--the mispronunciation of the French word for "push" setting the stage for some verbal slapstick. This juggling of moods doesn't seem quite so out of place in the longer version, and I get the impression that if they ever decide to cut together the 4-hour picture that Fuller had intended, we still wouldn't tire of the characters or their tours of duty. But as it stands now at 2 hours, 40 minutes, it has been rounded out for us and has jumped to the top of the heap alongside the small handful of truly important movies depicting war. The most common complaint I hear is that the German tanks are clearly American tanks dressed-up. This is true-- if you are searching for dead-on accuracy and detail in set design such as in Private Ryan, this is not for you. "The Big Red One" is a gritty personal little movie that is not burdened by the kind of strained sentimentality that sometimes hampers Spielberg. It can be at times surreal and absurd, but not the kind of surrealism that floats above and transcends the actual war as in "Apocalypse Now"-- it keeps its feet firmly on the ground. The tanks don't pass the test, but the characters more than make up for it... Lee Marvin's nameless Sergeant, stone-faced, intransigent, whose tragic prologue sets up a touching epilogue... Keith Carradine's cigar-chomping, novel-writing Private Zab-- a fill-in for Fuller, who lived all these experiences in his days with the Big Red One-- and Mark Hamill's Griff, the most fleshed-out character, whose unforgettable finale in the Falkenau concentration camp gives new meaning to Conrad's notion of "shelling the bush". The Falkenau scenes, by the way, were shot, like much of the movie, in Israel with Jews playing the Nazi wardens--a surrealistic slap in the face to anyone itching for strict realism in their war flicks. Inconsistencies be damned. This is a great one, and now, thanks to Richard Schickel and his gang, a fuller Fuller movie, a very generous update of a picture that never got a fair chance its first time around.

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DVD Features: Audio CommentaryDocumentariesPhoto galleryTV SpotTheatrical Trailer

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Emperor of the North (1973) Review

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(More customer reviews)EMPEROR OF THE NORTH POLE is my favorite movies, and LEE MARVIN is one of my favorite actors. I have been waiting for years for this movie to come out on DVD. I hope the DVD includes features such as the movie trailer, and the "making of feature" (which I have seen for sale separately on video tape), and a photo gallery.
Why is this my favorite movie? I grew up where the real A-No.1 hung out, where his 12 books on being a hobo were published, and where he finally settled down, and died. A-No.1 was a real life folk hero featured in a college class on American Folklore. A-No.1 a.k.a. LEON RAY LIVINGSTON (1872-1944) was born in San Francisco, and at the young age of 11 young LEON RAY LIVINGSTON ran away from home and took to the rails. He had a done something, he couldn't recall exactly what it was, and feared that his parents would punish him, and rather than face his father he ran away being inspired by the song, "THE BIG ROCK CANDY MOUNTAIN." My great grandfather (The Jew) lived in a rooming house in Cambridge Springs, Pennsylvania, where A-No.1 would stay when he was in town, and where A-No.1 would meet his future wife. My mother's father (Steve German) rode the rails when he first came to this country in 1910. My great uncle Henry L. spent most of his life living as a hermit in tar paper shacks and hollowed out earth mounds. When the Gypsies came to town, I would go with him to listen to the music around the campfire at night. As a young kid I (Grahamqckr) had to ride the rails as well. It will remain the happiest time of my life being chased by railroad dicks though train yards. And I worked in a flour mill where the owner Harry Moffatt remembered seeing A-No.1 when he would come into town. A-No.1's books inspired my father (Erie Ted) who was a teenager in the 19-teens to run away from home on a number of occasions. He would end up in places like Canada, and Mexico, and his mother would have to send money for his ticket home.
The books of LEON RAY LIVINGSTON (a.k.a. A-No.1) published in Cambridge Springs and Erie, Pennsylvania, by A-No.1 Printing Company are as follows: "Life and Adventures of America's Most Celebrated Tramp! "A-No.1 The Champion Tramp Of The World" The Actual True Life Adventures of A-No.1. The famous tramp who traveled 500,000 miles for $7.61. A-No.1 the King of the Hoboes. A-No.1 Leon Ray Livingston."
1. Life and Adventure of A-No. 1.
2. Hobo-Camp-Fire-Tales
3. The Curse of Tramp Life.
4. The Trail of the Tramp.
5. The Adventures of a Female Tramp.
6. The Ways of the Hobo.
7. The Snare of the Road.
8. From Coast to Coast with Jack London.
9. The Mother of All Hoboes.
10. The Wife I Won.
11. Traveling with Tramps.
12. Here and There with A-No. 1.
He gained fame seldom equaled by anyone who devoted almost a lifetime to travel. He set out to see the world when he was only eleven and for thirty-one years and four months he traveled every where. He said of himself, "I thought when I ran away from my home in California that I'd see everything in one day, but I was wrong and it took me thirty-one years to find that out."
LEON wrote articles published in the 1890's which would basis of his book series. LIVINGSTON published twelve books, which sold by the hundreds of thousands. He turned to the lecture platform when his traveling days were over and spoke before thousands of schools and churches always on the same theme - "Home is Your Best Place." "KING OF ROAD" - A life of wandering and traveling, which led into an example for young people through books and lecturing "Beware of the Open Road." LEON RAY LIVINGSTON, became famous as "A-No.1 the Tramp. Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft asked to meet him.
He soon realized he was trapped in the life of being a hobo, but realized that many young kids, both boys and girls would run-away, and got killed on the trains. He spent much time giving lectures on the evils of running away from home a become a hobo. He was the greatest success story of someone who took to the trains, and learned to be a hobo. A-No.1 would not admit it, but he actually taught many people how to hop fright trains, because he spent much time trying to convince young people to go back home. From money from his books and lectures, he bought one way tickets home for these kids. His greatest success story was a young JACK LONDON who when home to lead the straight and narrow to live as an author. Many young hoboes may also have written this moniker on water tanks, railroad freight buildings, and chalk it on box cars. At one time it was more common to find "A-No.1' inscribed somewhere, than "KILLROY WAS HERE!" A-No.1 In hobo lingo it means "number one man," and later it came to mean, that you are "all right (or okay) with me." The thumbs up sign, "A Number One."
JACK LONDON whose "Moniker" or hobo's nickname was SAILOR JACK or CIGARET. In the book "FROM COAST TO COAST WITH JACK LONDON," by A-No.1, he finally gets tired of hearing CIGARET run at the mouth all the time, trying to maintain the character of JACK LONDON, so he grabs him, and throws him off back of a moving train. So line in the movie (EMPEROR OF THE NORTH POLE) has real meaning, LEE MARVIN says as A-No.1 to CIGARET (KEITH CARRADINE) (to his face.), "Hey kid you got no class......(Kids face goes blank as he is suddenly grabbed, and tossed from the moving train into the stream below. The kids face rises out of the water. A-No.1 walks back in the car.).......Hits the bums kid. Run like the devil. Get a tin can and take up mooching. Knock on back doors for a nickel. Tell them your story. Make em weep. You could have been a meat eater kid (A-No.1 pointing at him.).......But you didn't listen to me when I laid it down......(Kid swings hand in water.)......Stay off the tracks. Forget it. Its a bum's world for a bum. Your never be Emperor of the North Pole Kid. You had the juice kid, but not the heart, and they go together. Your all gab, and no feel, and nobody can teach you that, not even A-No.1. So stay off the train, she'll throw you under for sure. Remember me for that. So long kid."
EMPEROR OF THE NORTH POLE never mentions that the LEE MARVIN character is an author of books. The real A-No.1 kept a series of travel journal notebooks on his person, where as the LEE MARVIN A-No.1 is just living his life. "FROM COAST TO COAST" is an interesting adventure novel. It centers around the hobo partnership of the author, LEON RAY LIVINGSTON, a.k.a. A-No.1, and JACK LONDON (who was a slightly better writer than A-No.1). They travel from New York City out to San Francisco by rail, and have a crazy an adventure on the way. A-No.1 feels very conflicted about his life on the road as a railroad tramp. He clearly hates it, yet cannot quit the life. All of A-No.1's books are a must-read for people who are interested in the psychology of the hobo-tramp, language and culture of the period. JACK (JOHN GRIFFRITH) LONDON (1876-1916) in his book, "THE ROAD-HOBOES THAT PASS IN THE NIGHT," published in 1907, does not even mention A-No.1 once in the long list of hoboes and tramps that he encountered! However, he does talk about SKYSAIL JACK who in the movie only rode SHACK'S train only in a coffin.
Some minor technical problems with the movie are:
(1) The radio speech of President Franklin D. Roosevelt as heard in SMILE's caboose took place on a different date than in the movie, October 22, 1933. The fireside chat from President Franklin Roosevelt is from 28 April 1935. Hey, it works for the scene, and for the move as a whole.
(2) ERNEST BORGNINE who plays the murderous bug-eyed SHACK.......A Shack
is a brakeman, and not a conductor. The brakeman is the occupant of a caboose. Shack's master is a conductor. SHACK may have started working as a brakeman, and retained the name of SHACK. BORGNINE is a sadist, who sports a menacing grin, and believes that the hoboes are the scum of the earth. He will sledgehammer anyone to death who thinks they can get a free ride on his train. SHACK's claim to fame is, no one gets a free ride on his train unless they want to be dead. LEE MARVIN is laconic, immensely proud to be a hobo, and proud enough to claim he can ride any train for free. The real A-No.1 was also known by everyone he encountered, and in a short time it was like he had a rail pass to ride any train in the country for "free" and no one would put him off. Even in JACK LONDON's chapter article and book, "THE ROAD-HOBOES THAT PASS IN THE NIGHT," mentions that "SHACK" is a "brakemen" who don't bother them, and let them (the hoboes) sleep all night.

(3) CHARLES TYNER who plays CRACKER........A Cracker (1) - A contemptuous name for a railroad worker who works below or underneath a higher grade person. A slang term for poor southern white trash. Cracker (2) - One who is lazy, brutal, inquisitive, intolerant, illiterate, ignorant, and of the lowest class. CRACKER is just CRACKER, and we love him for that. HARRY GAESAH who played COALY which is a the railroad name of the fireman. They shovel coal like the stokers on a steam ship, and everything around them would become black like coal. MALCOLM ATTERBURY who played the engineer which were known by the name of HOGGER.
An early draft of the script for the 1973 Robert Aldrich classic THE EMPEROR OF THE NORTH POLE, screen play by CHRISTOPHER KNOPF, the movie takes place in 1905 rather than the great depression. GEORGE C. SCOTT was originally asked to play A-No.1 because of his work in the movie FLIM FLAM MAN, but turned it down. GEORGE C. SCOTT would have been wonderful as A-No.1, but LEE MARVIN has become the real movie version of A-No.1, forgetting the fact that the real A-No.1 LEON RAY LIVINGSTON was short, had a moustache,...Read more›

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A legendary depression-era hobo and his young accomplice battle a sadistic railroad worker in a determined bid to hitch a ride.

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