Straight Time

Plot synopsis:
Dustin Hoffman plays Max Dembo , a convict ,at the mercy of his parole officer to set him free. While on parole for the first time , Jenny Mercer(Theresa Russell) helps him get a job which is a requisite for ending the parole. They both fall in love.When the parole officer makes a search at Max's home he finds evidence of a dope being used. Max lets his friend Jerry use the dope in his room earlier. So, Max is arrested again and a urine test is taken. When found not guilty Max is let out in parole again. Completely irritated by the officer Max runs away from him . Soon, he comes to know that the only thing he could do well is burglary. While robbing a jewellery shop, a mistake leads to the death of his close friend and confidante. However , Max escapes and absconds with his girl friend Jenny. At last, completely disgusted with the world, Max sends his girl friend home to L.A and admits that he knows he will get caught again! Awesome performance from Hoffman throughout the movie, indicates why he's the greatest of all time !

Tags: revenge, neo noir, murder, violence

Review:
"Straight Time," hoisted high by a brilliant and dexterous performance by Dustin Hoffman, pulls off a very unusual trick: It's one of the only movies in memory where a character we fully identify with turns out to not be such a good guy - and stays that way.
I wasn't expecting much from this film especially since it's only 6.9 on IMDb, and barely any posts about it, but don't let that fool you, this is probably one of the most under-appreciated movies i've ever seen in my life.I really see why Dustin Hoffman is sometimes regarded as one of the best actors of all-time..
Dustin Hoffman is at his peak here, and shows why he's one of the five greatest actors of his generation as he inhabits the character of Max Dembo, a career criminal who's just been released on parole.
Emmett Walsh (maybe the greatest character actor of all time) as his parole officer, and Theresa Russell (looking like she's about 18) as his naive love interest.
Hoffman is great in the lead role of new parolee Max Dembo trying to succeed in the outside world despite some strong barriers (Walsh).
I also found the editing to be a bit rough in spots, as scenes unfold with no resolution to certain issues (e.g. Sandy Baron showing up late for a job and disappearing from the film).Overall, "Straight Time" is a hard-hitting drama with a great performance by Hoffman in a "real" role that was overshadowed by his less fulfilling later roles ("Rainman," "Outbreak," "Sphere").
Dustin Hoffman's performance as Max Dembo is perfectly detailed and developed from start to finish, as he charmingly deceives others, and himself, into believing that he can leave the adrenalin-rush life of crime that he is ultimately most comfortable with.
The subject – or perhaps that should be the victim – of this film, was never going to have such a happy ending.Max Dembo comes out of gaol, and like Eddie Taylor in "You Only Live Once", he makes a determined effort to go straight, even like Taylor finding himself a high quality but low maintenance love interest.
Tough and vivid character study based on real-life convict Edward Bunker's novel "No Beast So Fierce" gives Hoffman a wonderful chance as an actor to stretch some technical muscles (he hadn't been this focused in years).
****SPOILERS**** Being a criminal all of his adult life trying to go straight wasn't all that easy for ex-con Max Dembo, Dustin Hoffman.
First getting himself a room at a local hotel to live and then with the help of his new and somewhat naive girlfriend Jenny, Theresa Russell, who worked for an employment agency to get a job at a neighborhood can factory Max looked like he was on his way back to civilization.
But like a bird flying south for the winter Max just couldn't stay away from his fellow criminals and ex-convicts and it was that compulsion that turned out to be his downfall in the movie.Getting in touch with friend and ex-con Willy Darin, Gary Busey, to talk over old times Willy, who does some carpentry, tells Max that he'll get him a bed-board for his bed at the hotel room that Max is staying at.
After breaking his parole as well as his parole officers nose and leaving him stranded on a heavily traveled LA highway with his pants down Max had only two choices left to him: jail or crime and of course Max took the latter.It was interesting to see in the movie how Max's friend Willy came full circle by being responsible for Max breaking his parole at the start of the film and then having something to do with the death of Max's friend and partner in crime, in their short career as a armed robber, Jerry Schue, Harry Dean Stanton.
This film is inadequate on so many levels - not *bad* mind you, but inadequate; it posits a very strong and promising story - following  ex-con Max Dembo (great name, that) from the moment of his release from prison and chronicling his attempts at re-integrating himself to the outside world, ending in the wasteful tragedy of him returning to a life of crime.
But "Straight Time" - probably one of the first films to ever deal with the subject head on - never really uses it to much benefit.What makes the film something to see, though, in spite of itself, is the toweringly great performance by Dustin Hoffman as Max.
For one thing, he eschews the mannered gestures and speaking patterns that tend to bring a staginess to even his best performances; in "Straight Time" Hoffman is a model of stillness and calm - and yet, with a ferocious electricity in his eyes and a wiry tension in his body that at all moments practically scream, "Kill!" Though his character has relatively little dialogue (that is, for a leading role), you can't take your eyes off of him, because you're perpetually scared at what he might do.
Again I say, the first part of this film - which establishes Max's desire to fit in on the outside and his frustrated attempts at doing so - is so strong and Hoffman's performance so focused and intense (cementing our connection to him almost immediately) that it leaves you breathless for a great movie that, alas, never comes.
Hoffman becomes Max the sleazebag in this film, he was that good, a criminal lowlife with high hopes of a better way but no real chance of real personal freedom due to old habits that would not die, even though he wanted them to die in the worst way but just could not find the way to do it.See this film for the very best look ever at a criminal's inner thinking and the horrible lives they choose to live when they have been told all their lives that they are worthless crud losers and no good to the core.The innocent and true love of a pretty young woman eventually brought out some long-hidden decency in Max, and he showed her and us that he would rather die first than bring her down with him on his sure road back to the pen or, more likely, death.
Little seen late 70's Dustin Hoffman film which I was pleased to catch airing on TCM and which shows its star was more than up to the "challenge" of playing "street", a la the younger competition De Niro and Pacino in a tough urban tale of a small-time thief released back into society but who drifts back to crime with disastrous results.The film moves us deftly through the key relationships that Hoffman's Max Dembo character enters, which all inform the narrative, starting with his petty tyrannical parole officer M Emmet Walsh, strung-out driver/buddy Gary Busey, young female interest Thelma Russell and cut-from-the-same-cloth fellow hoodlum Harry Dean Stanton, none of whom really profit from the experience (Busey & Stanton in particular!) before he heads out on the run to L.A., all chance of a "normal" life blown to bits.Looking a little Latino with his handlebar moustache, I've rarely seen Hoffman act better than this and it's something of a revelation seeing him here on top of his game given how much he's mellowed into his avuncular old age in recent years.
The four main supporting roles mentioned above are all excellently played, by Walsh, Busey, Russell and Stanton and there's no time in the film when you don't believe you're seeing real-life characters.
What humour there is, is sparing and grim, (it's doubtful that pesky parole officer will be able to hold his head up again in public, for one thing) and there's also a fluid, sympathetic musical soundtrack too to maintain interest, with themes a little reminiscent at times of "Midnight Cowboy".I didn't quite accept however the phot-montage ending which seemed to indicate that Dembo always was the proverbial leopard unable to change his spots from youth, as with the right breaks, one has to hope in modern society that offenders released back into the community can be rehabilitated.As an indictment of the U.S. parole system of the time however, this gritty, uncompromising movie makes its point effectively and further confirms me in the belief that the genre of Hollywood 70's contemporary drama was a rich one indeed..
Straight Time (1978) Dustin Hoffman plays Max Dembo, a convict, at the mercy of his parole officer to set him free.
This cast certainly works hard to answer this question.Hoffman, Busey, Stanton, Russell, and Walsh all give great performances to a tight, well-written script.There is no fluff here, just a straight shooting story.The soundtrack is excellent as well.If you're reading this around the beginning of February, 2018, you can watch it for free on the TCM app on your portable device..
Dustin Hoffman (believable ex-con) has a meeting with sleaze-ball Parole Officer (M Emit Walsh) leading to inevitable return to life of crime with fellow mal-adjusted friends played well by Harry Dean Stanton and Gary Busey.
Based on ex-convict Eddie Bunker's novel, No Beast So Fierce, pic pitches Dustin Hoffman as ex-con Max Dembo, who after being released from prison has every intention to go straight.
Emmet Walsh and Gary Busey, and Theresa Russell gives quality turn as the naive woman in Max's life - no token here, she's in the grip of a homme career criminal and not merely here to look pretty and doe eyed.As a character study it positively bristles with brains and foolish brawn, and Grosbard directs with unfussy skill whilst showing a very good eye for a dramatic action scene.
Others in the cast include Theresa Russell, Harry Dean Stanton and Gary Busey, brilliant as a young would-be gangster not making much of a job of trying to stay on the straight and narrow.
Straight Time is a film directed by Ulu Grosbard in 1978 and starring Dustin Hoffman, Theresa Russell, Gary Busey, Harry Dean Stanton, M.
The film belongs to Dustin Hoffman who plays Max Dembo, the man trying to do the right thing but who was pulled back in the crime world because of many reasons, one being the over-zealous sadistic parole officer Earl Frank (incomparable M.
When he is released again, after vindicating himself in perhaps the film's best scene, and returns to a life of crime with a vengeance.What I like about Straight Time is that it is based on a novel by Eddie Bunker, who spent his formative in and out of jail for bank robbery, drug dealing, extortion, armed robbery and forgery, and played Mr. Blue in Reservoir Dogs.
Dustin Hoffman gives one of his most powerful and underrated performances as max Denbo, a career criminal who has been in and out of the prison system for most his life who is again out on parole as the story begins and as much as max wants to straighten his life out, all he finds along the way is roadblocks and bigotry, bigotry towards ex-cons trying to start their lives over that eventual leads him back to a life of crime.
Hoffman is riveting in this film and gets strong support from Theresa Russell as a sympathetic employment agency worker, Harry Dean Stanton and Gary Busey as friends from Max's past who he reconnects with and M.
This movie is probably the best I have ever seen at making this point.Teresa Russell is great as the girl who is too good for Max and who might have offered him a reason to go straight.
Watching it again, I could see how the film could be considered off-putting due to a protagonist it is hard to root for, but I gained an even greater appreciation for the fine work a great cast put into it.Giving one of his finest performances, Dustin Hoffman excels as an ex-con who, despite his best efforts, can not adjust to life as a parolee.
STRAIGHT TIME (action-drama, 1978) Max (Dustin Hoffman) is finally released after 6 years in prison for theft .
Beginning with "The Graduate", I have seen many Dustin Hoffman movies in which he excels as an actor playing a very wide range of roles, but there is something about this part as ex-convict Max Dembo that stands out in my mind.
The film opens with Dustin Hoffman playing a greasy haired lowlife just released from prison, having to check in with his sleazy parole office, the great M.
Hoffman tries to go straight for a bit, but he doesn't try all that that hard before he slips back into a life of crime, pulling jobs with his equally scuzzy friend Harry Dean Stanton.
Besides the above mentioned Hoffman, Russell, Walsh, and Stanton, you also have strong a strong performance by Gary Busey as Hoffman's junkie friend and most surprising of all is a young Kathy Bates playing Busey's wife, who's trying to raise a family and also trying to keep her husband on the straight and narrow, away from the criminal influence she knows Hoffman brings.
A Neo-Noir from the Pen of the perennially penned-up Eddie Bunker who has since become rehabilitated from Drug and Crime and slowly made a Name as a teller of unfettered Truth from a Convict's point of View.Dustin Hoffman in an Uncanny Acting Turn is wholly believable as the short- tempered Small Time Criminal who gives a half-hearted attempt to do "Straight Time" despite His tendencies to be completely Anti-Establishment and lashes out any chance He gets to beat down anyone who gets in the way of His anger.A fully Great Cast of Character Actors like Harry Dean Stanton, E.
Emmett Walsh, and Gary Busey, with Theresa Russell in an Early and understated Performance as Hoffman's wannabe Girlfriend and the Direction from No-Frills Ulu Grosbard make this a Must See.It's a Come Together of Gritty 1970's Realism, a Tell it Like it Is Script, and fine Acting.
Max Dembo (Dustin Hoffman) is released on parole and initially gets a minor reprimand from his parole officer Earl Frank (M Emmet Walsh)for breaching some of the terms of his parole.
Dustin Hoffman gives one of his finest, scrappiest and least sappy performances as Max Dembo, a cagey, scuzzy, ferociously self-reliant sociopathic ex-con who gets sprung from the joint and makes a game, albeit futile attempt at going legit, only to wind up resorting to his old criminal ways after his browbeating, grossly unfair and overzealous parole officer (a superbly slimy M.
The supporting cast makes the grade with flying colors: the gorgeous Theresa Russell as a guileless, but headstrong welfare worker who gets more than she bargained for when she hooks up with Max; Gary Busey as a deplorably craven, heroin-addicted wheelman with a backbone of jello, a then unknown Kathy Bates as Busey's loving wife, and, best of all, the ever-awesome Harry Dean Stanton as an uncomfortably mellowed-out erstwhile jailbird who gladly chucks away his hideously banal suburbanite existence in order to embark on an exciting robbing spree with Max. Further strengthened by David Shire's sprightly blues score, Owen Roizman's agile, but scruffy cinematography, a suitably harsh and unglamorous depiction of brutish low-life crooks and the grimy, seedy, and dangerous down'n'dirty milieu they inhibit, a lively, adrenaline-pumping jewelry store heist sequence, and a rigorously grim, downbeat, unsentimental tone that stays bleakly true to itself to the literal bitter end, this extremely powerful knock-out undeservedly tanked at the box office, but has rightfully amassed a sizable cult following which correctly proclaims it as one of the single most remarkable and shamefully underrated sleepers from the 70's..
After many juvenile detentions and six years in prison, the small time thief and burglar Max Dembo (Dustin Hoffman) is released on parole.
Max and his best friend Jerry Schue (Harry Dean Stanton) successfully rob a bank; but after a jewelry heist in Beverly Hills, where Max loses Jerry and Willy, he leaves California and Jenny and heads alone elsewhere."Straight Time" is a small gangster film that shows how impossible is to a smalltime thief to regenerate and begin a straight life in insensitive the American correctional system with abusive parole officers and no assistance to the ex-cons.
His additional contributions as a screenwriter, technical adviser and bit-part player must also have been critical to achieving the level of authenticity that makes "Straight Time" so compelling to watch from start to finish.After serving a six-year sentence at San Quentin for armed robbery, Max Dembo (Dustin Hoffman) has to report to his parole officer Earl Frank (M Emmet Walsh).
Harry Dean Stanton and Gary Busey are terrific as Max's associates, M Emmet Walsh is marvellous as the sadistic parole officer and in one of her earliest roles, Theresa Russell expresses the full range of (mostly negative) emotions that the naïve Jenny goes through with all the skill of someone considerably more experienced.
Emmet Walsh as the sleazy parole officer; Theresa Russell as the naive Jenny who seems surprised that she is attracted to Dembo; Gary Busey as Willy, the drug-addicted friend of Dembo; Kathy Bates as the fiercely protective wife of Willy; and Harry Dean Stanton as Dembo's partner in crime, Jerry.
Emmet Walsh).Dembo manages to snag a straight job with help from Theresa Russell(who becomes a love interest).The movie manages to capture the frustration of being an ex-con.Based on No Beast So Fierce a book by ex-con Edward Bunker- we see the un-ending cycle of jail time and bad schemes.Gary Busey,Kathy Bates and Harry Dean Stanton all do well in their roles in Dembo's universe.The DVD has a commentary track by Dustin Hoffman and the director and a vintage featurette.Good mix of action and location shooting.Worth a rental for fans of gritty realistic drama.
Somehow STRAIGHT TIME is one of the least known movies of the '70s despite the fact that it features a brilliant performance by Dustin Hoffman.
This movie had a 7.4 rating on IMDb, and it had Dustin Hoffman, Theresa Russell, Gary Busey, Jake Busey, Harry Dean Stanton, and Kathy Bates.