Three years after their reasonably entertaining version of H. Rider Haggard's classic adventure 'She', Hammer Studios produced a sequel, 'The Vengeance of She'. Lacking the star power of the original (Ursula Andress, Peter Cushing and Bernard Cribbens are noticeable by their absence), the film is a dreary retread of events from the earlier movie, albeit with the roles reversed: this time around, it is the immortal Killikrates (John Richardson) who is pining for his long-dead love Ayeesha.

Convincing Killikrates that his soul-mate has finally been reborn in the form of a stunning European blonde named Carol (Olinka Berova), power-hungry occultist Men-Hari (Derek Godfrey) strikes a deal with the lovelorn leader: if he can successfully lure Carol to the lost African city of Kuma (using his powerful black magic), then he must be granted permission to pass through the sacred blue flame that would bring him immortality (and give him a pop at taking over the world!).

Compelled to travel to Africa by the voices in her head, the confused Carol is joined on her journey by Philip (Edward Judd), a concerned psychiatrist who is determined to ensure the beautiful young woman's safety.

On arriving at Kuma, and discovering the real reasons behind Carol's mysterious calling, Philip sets out to stop the poor girl from being brainwashed into believing she is Ayeesha, and prevent Men-hari from achieving his nefarious goal.

'The Vengeance of She' starts promisingly enough, with the sex-kittenish, mini-skirted Berova (think along the lines of Bardot, and you won't be far wrong) making quite an impression as she walks through the French countryside (accompanied by a haunting theme song), but it soon descends into a messy mish-mash of boring mystical mumbo-jumbo, lacklustre adventure, and unconvincing melodrama.

Director Cliff Owen wisely makes the most of Berova's awesome physical attributes to try and distract his audience, having her slip into clingy white robes that give viewers a tantalising glimpse of her marvellous milky puddings (please note: my workmate Phil wanted me to use that phrase in one of my comments), but even with endless gratuitous lingering shots of her semi-clad form, the film still winds up as something of a snooze-fest.


various french philosophers provide background commentary regarding the German philosopher Heidegger and Holderlein's poem "The Ister", which has something to do with the ancient Greek name for a portion of the Danube river. While the philosophers are commenting, we see images of the various portions of the river (in Romania, ex-Yugoslavia, Austria, etc), and images of the countries that it passes through. If my description sounds vague, it's because, as an average lay person, i found this movie very hard to understand, i could not follow 3 hours of philosophical expounding, in French no less. At least half the audience walked out of the film, probably feeling the same as me. I stuck it out, and enjoyed some of the imagery, and even some of the philosophy, but, the dialogue became so esoteric at points, that i found myself asking "is this for real?"!


Unwatchable. This is one of the most pretentious time wasters I've ever had the misfortune of enduring. Essentially The Ister is an overly earnest, impossibly obscure philosophical treatise that could only appeal to academics with an interest in Heidegger scholarship. What were the filmmakers trying to achieve in turning such turgid material into a movie? After more than three hours (!) of cinematic torture I am none the wiser.

I have been told that the film makers are themselves academics, and believe me, it shows. They take everything that is worst about academia and translate it into film. Quite an achievement, I suppose, but one that I hope is never repeated.

Seeing a movie in a film festival environment I always know I'm taking a chance. That's what festivals are about. But programmers also have an obligation to their audience, and they ought to protect us from rubbish like this. As it is, I feel that three hours of my life have been taken from me, and I want them back!


I can see why this movie has been critically buried by a lot of people, but come on! We've all seen way worse! The acting was horrible, the dubbing was atrocious. The story was dumb. But the creature and the story was better than the movie that surrounded it. The gore was fairly decent for low budget trash. I've seen FAR worse. I actually liked the whole tit being ripped off thing. I gave this movie a 3 because yes, it does suck, BUT you could do worse in the horror genre. TRUST ME. Go watch Alex's Apartment, Jack-O, Critters 3, The Howling 7 and then tell me how bad When The Screaming Stops Is.

My biggest complaint : why the hell did the cover box show a girl cowering from someone waving a knife? I guess to cash in on the slasher craze. I was expecting a murder mystery movie, and boy thats not what I got.


When I saw this years and years ago....there was a big gimmick.

They advertised it in my area as "When the screaming stops" and said it was the most disgusting movie ever. So, everybody that showed up got an airline style barf bag and they ran a big warning at the beginning of the movie telling people the producers were not responsible for whatever happened to those who watched the movie.

The movie was heavily hyped with lots and lots of ads on local TV stations telling everyone that this was the grossest movie ever made.

So there was a big buzz and the theaters were packed.

Then, of course the opening scene was of a tranquil lake outside some castle in Europe and people began making very mocking barf sounds...that was probably the most memorable thing of the whole movie.

There were some disgusting parts (including one part where I think the bad guy rips an organ out of a body and if I remember right eats it.

Pretty gross stuff. But it was clearly a foreign movie repackaged and expertly hyped here in the US.

Probably made some decent money but many felt ripped off.


The people here who praised this episode, are obviously leading an extremely boring life. This is one of the worst episodes I have ever seen for any TV program, anyone with an IQ over 2020 can guess the ending right away. I think the people who were surprised by the ending would have thought OJ was innocent even if they saw a video of the whole crime. The beauty of English TV is the woman Stella who is supposed to be beautiful, I would call a bit dumpy and a 6 on a 10 scale. She was no raving beauty. And the guy who is the fitness fanatic, and mind you I'm not gay, looks out of shape. I think Thriller is an excellent TV series but this episode was its worst.


During the Christmas holidays, a homeless dude returns pages of a lost thesis to a Harvard student in exchange for food and housing.

I never believed for a second that this shallow college boy would care a cockroach's butt for this pathetic derelict, but 'Harvard' gets what he deserves when the stinky bum assaults him with a lead pipe, throws part of the kid's thesis into a furnace, helps himself to other people's closets for clothes, puts his dirty socks in the oven, disrupts a class in session, murders another student's pet, and asks to be driven across the state-line to visit his son who wants nothing to do with him, causing the student to miss the deadline for turning in his thesis.

I'm supposed to feel 'sorry' for this scumbag? I was hoping he'd get hit by a train. No such luck, but at least he dies in the end. He dozes off and quietly passes (awww... *sniffle*... pffft!) while the four Harvard roommates sit around wiping away their tears because they don't have anything better to do. I would have sneaked into the bum's room while he was asleep, opened his bottle of liquor, poured the alcohol all over him, and set him on fire.

OK, I grajudated... gimmee my digree!


This is a rather aimless mystery, with an implausible murder and an utterly impossible solution, requiring the witnesses to the murder to be death dumb and blind, and the corpse of the murdered to be light as a feather. But that's not especially unusual in mysteries of the era.

The problem is that this one is, by its story, stuck on a limited number of sets, and the dialog is not enough to sustain interest over the rather brief run time. Performances are fine -- no better than one would expect -- on par with an average episode of Murder She Wrote.

It's really not worth sitting through this one to get to the solution. (Nor is it worth searching out the book -- which is just as implausible and dull) If you really like SS Van Dine, and are determined to stick it out, there is one virtue -- the components of the murder plot that don't relate to the dragon and the swimming pool are neatly done.


Not a particularly auspicious entry in the Philo Vance series. Warren Williams simply does not match the acting of William Powell who had the lead in four of these films, including the excellent Kennel Murder Case. The storyline revolves around guests at a mansion and the deaths of the fiancée Montague and perhaps others in the vicinity of the "dragon pool." Mrs. Stamm, the matron of the house warns that a water dragon that has guarded the lives and fortunes of the Stamm family inhabits the pool. Montague was not worthy of joining the family. How a dragon would have ever been in the pool is simply ignored. Shots of swimming in the pool remind one of the Creature From the Black Lagoon. Eugene Pallette is excellent as the detective who is always remarking how his knowledge of criminology leads him to suspect... Etienne Girardot is excellent as the coroner as is Helen Lowell as grandmother Stamm. Love triangle does not lend much to the plot. Much discussion of fish in tanks that does not appear to serve any purpose - although they are interesting to view, especially through the tanks suspended from the ceiling. Perhaps one of them was supposed to evolve into the dragon. Orry-Kelly costumes on Margaret Lindsay. Not recommended.


You would think the setup of a volcano blowing up at a remote, yet crowded location, leaving a handful of survivors to fend for themselves until they can be safely rescued would be a good one. Unfortunately, this movie shows just how poorly that premise can be executed.

The plot - what there is of it - centers around a resort hotel located close to a picturesque, and supposedly dormant volcano. The hotel is owned by successful businessman, Shelby Gilmore (William Holden), and his greedy son-in-law, Bob Spangler (James Franciscus). Gilmore is openly disapproving of Spangler, since he suspects that Spangler has only married his daughter, Nikki (Veronica Hammel), in order to become his business partner, and get his money. Gilmore's disapproval is justified by Spangler's affair with native Iolani (Barbara Carrera). The other natives of the island, those who don't work at the hotel, seem to spend their time either cockfighting, or drinking at a bar owned by Sam (Pat Morita) and Mona (sheila Allen, Irwin's wife, a little nepotism here?). Gilmore is interested in Kay Kirby (Jacqueline Bisset), who is in turn interested in oil driller, Hank Henderson (Paul Newman). When the ground starts rumbling during drilling, Henderson suspects their may be a problem with the supposedly dormant volcano, so he goes to talk to the scientists who work at a lab precariously perched on the lip of the volcano. While there, Henderson goes into the volcano in a gondola to inspect it, and nearly gets dropped into the lava. Somehow, he is able to see that eruption is imminent, even though the head of the lab, John Webster (John Considine), doesn't. Spangler doesn't want to cause a panic, or lose money, so he refuses to evacuate the hotel. While Henderson and Kirby are on a picnic, the volcano blows up, causing a tidal wave which wipes out half the island, including the cockfighting population. The hotel guests are in a panic when Henderson and Kirby arrive back there, as the volcano is spewing lava bombs at them. Once again, Spangler refuses to evacuate, and encourages the guests to sit tight. A small group, which includes a private eye (Ernest Borgnine) and the thief he is trying to catch (Red Buttons), and a retired high wire walker (Burgess Meredith) and his wife (Valentina Cortese), decides to follow Henderson to higher ground to get away from the lava, and we follow them for most of the rest of the movie, with a break to watch the hotel get destroyed by a surprisingly accurate lava bomb.

Clear as mud, right. The writers tried to cram so many subplots into the movie that the result is a tangled mess. It's hard to tell who is who, much less who is involved with whom. And that makes it hard to develop a sense of concern about their well being. You watch so many gratuitous characters die throughout the course of the movie that you are too numb to react to the deaths of the important ones. Simplifying things somewhat would not only have shortened a movie that seems tediously long, but it would have helped to keep the viewer focused on the important characters.

The writing also has a contrived feel to it, relying so heavily on clichés that it becomes unintentionally comical. We have not one, but two love triangles. In addition, we have a noble thief, who helps the cop out when he becomes disabled. Then there's the rickety bridge over the river of lava, which, of course, gives way before everyone gets over it. There are two deaths by falling into the lava, one by heart attack, and one by falling onto hard rock. There are two foolish children who become so frightened that they run away, and must be rescued. And there just happens to be an aerialist around when you need one. All in all, it adds up to a bit much to swallow.

The science of the movie is laughably bad. Oil is unlikely to be found near a volcano, active or dormant, and you wouldn't drill near a volcano, because the release of pressure would cause the volcano to erupt. A volcano is not a mountain with a shaft in the top that leads down to a lake of lava. If a fissure like that opened up, the volcano would simply erupt because the pressure forcing the magma up would be greater than the pressure holding it down. If the volcano caused a tidal wave, chances are it would head away from the island, rather than heading back to it. And then there's the lab at the lip of the volcano. Who in their right mind would build a lab in such a place, much less work at it? Volcano observatories are usually safely away from the lava flow, not right in the path of it. It just doesn't make sense.

The effects were horribly cheesy, and the cinematography was just awful. Who thought it would be a good idea to have an actress in a red dress fall into a red river of lava? All you see are her head, hands, and feet while she tumbles into the lava.

With the kind of star power assembled in the cast, one would think that the acting would at least be decent, but in truth, the entire cast seems embarrassed to have been involved in the project, delivering their lines with a kind of sheepishness that makes the movie seem all the more embarrassing.

All in all a bad movie, but oddly enough, it can be enjoyable if you're willing to suspend disbelief to a great degree, and lower your expectations. If you don't take it seriously, it can be an amusing little diversion.


It's hard to image a major motion picture any worse than this turkey.

Absolutely NOTHING makes any sense. Action sequences are so poorly

executed, you wonder if perhaps they hired brain-damaged high school

students to do most of the work.

Some favorites, not already mentioned:

The ranch-hand must ride on the outside of the helicopter. Dumb enough, but why

then fly DIRECTLY over the mouth of the volcano? You must be kidding.

-And when the guy predictably falls, we first see him fall backwards away from the 'copter, but them the immediate cut-away shot shows him clearly falling in a FORWARD roll. oops.

I also enjoyed seeing telephone poles fall over without anything hitting them, and as they fall over they don't looked cracked at all, just perfect horizontal bottoms that weren't really even in the ground.

Some guy's whole back catches on fire, and he rolls around for about ten

seconds. when they finally put out the flames, only a small part of the top of his jacket is scorched.

two people are flying past the smoking volcano in a helicopter. It suddenly

explodes with a loud crack and flames. Neither person reacts at all.

You could go on and on and on. Every few seconds there's another blatant goof or monumentally stupid scene.

You know, if someone made an edited DVD of this, with all the boring "personal interaction" scenes deleted, and ran a commentary along with the action, this would be possibly the most hilarious movie ever put out.


Ask a film buff for the worst disaster film of all time and you might get answers like The Swarm, Meteor, City on Fire, Beyond the Poseidon Adventure or Avalanche. But in reality the very worst of all is this incredulously awful Irwin Allen debacle. It has a wonderful cast, which in some ways makes its utter awfulness even more surprising and unacceptable. This is one of the worst films from any genre.

Paul Newman heads the cast, and has a red tinge to his cheeks throughout which may either be sunburn or embarrassment. He is the chief oil driller on a volcanic Pacific island who suspects that a catastrophic eruption is a matter of days away. However, the island relies on its tourist industry, and business bigwigs like William Holden (great actor, never more wasted than he is here) won't heed the warnings and insist on keeping people on the island. The eruption arrives, as anticipated by Newman, and the tourists are left to run for their lives from its clutches. Newman finds himself leading one group of evacuees, made up of the usual clichéd characters. The group includes some great stars, like Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Burgess Meredith and Jacqueline Bisset, but anyone with a brain can figure out with a degree of certainty which ones are going to make it and which are doomed.

The action is marred constantly by terrible special effects. The actors are critically defeated by banal dialogue and actions. The suspense element of the film fails also, because it takes way too long to get going and is thoroughly predictable once it finally kicks into gear. There really is nothing positive to say about this film at all, except that it was so bad that it virtually single-handedly ended the disaster genre once and for all. If nothing else, we should thank the cast and crew for that small mercy at least!


This is a movie where the laws of science are bent

1 ) Apparently if you're hanging off a helicopter and you slip you fall sideways through the air

2 ) If someone screams " The copter can't take off , there's too many people " the helicopter will crash AFTER several people fall off thereby not lightning the load

3 ) A volcano on the middle of an island will cause a tidal wave

4 ) If you scream very loud mirrors will break

5 ) Hotels attract fireballs being spewed from a volcano

In many ways WHEN TIME RAN OUT is a throwback to the childish and silly productions of Irwin Allen like VOYAGE TO THE BOTTOM OF THE SEA . In fact the whole production feels far more like a TVM ( Especially where the very poor FX are concerned ) instead of a big budget cinematic movie and you have to ask how on earth did the producers get so many big names to appear in it ?


As the 70s came to an end, the disaster movie limped its last with the likes of the cheesily enjoyable Meteor, the not-so-enjoyable City On Fire (no, not that one) and the truly WTF? Airport '79 before 1980's When Time Ran Out aka The Day the World Ended aka Earth's Final Fury finally sounded the death knell for both the genre and Irwin Allen's career. The 'Master of Disaster's volcano movie is no Dante's Peak. It's not even a Devil At 4 O'Clock. Instead, it's everything you would possibly expect of a film whose credits boast 'Ernest Borgnine as Tom Conti' (no, not that one) 'and James Franciscus as Bob Spangler.' Somehow  presumably very large cheques and a promise not to direct  Allen was able to tempt Towering Inferno stars Paul Newman and William Holden back to play more or less the same roles, which is handy because the film is more or less a rehash, even shamelessly recycling a couple of setpieces to infinitely diminished effect. And not just the plot - the characters are for the most part exactly the same too. Franciscus gets the Richard Chamberlain role, Veronica Hamel the Susan Blakely neglected wife part, Jacqueline Bisset the Faye Dunaway girlfriend duties, and Red Buttons the Fred Astaire role as embezzler Francis Fendly (great character names abound here), though instead of a romance with Jennifer Jones he gets saddled with Borgnine's New York cop. Still, considering the 'original' characters include high-wire act Burgess Meredith and a horrendously cloying Valentine Cortese ("My darling, you have lived through the collapse of burlesque and vaudeville twice. Now you can't be confused by a little volcano with belly ache."), Sheila (as in Mrs) Allen playing the local madam and Pat Morita as her husband whose cockfight with Alex Karras gets postponed due to flooding, you can't entirely blame slumming screenwriters Carl Foreman and Stirling Silliphant for going with the tried-and-trusted route. Unfortunately they never make any of them remotely interesting.

The plot? OK, but stop me if you've heard this before. While moneyman William Holden plans a big ad campaign for his Hawaiian hotel ("I really like your slogan: 'Come watch Mananui toss in his sleep.' Very effective." "Subtle, right?"), his dodgy partner James Franciscus tries to play down the threat of the local volcano blowing up while Paul Newman's wildcat oilman insists "This thing's a goddamned powder keg" with what little enthusiasm he can muster between romancing Jacqueline Bisset's advertising designer with tales of how he earned the money to start drilling (and not just for oil, we're informed) by teaching women needlepoint. Once Mananui gets bored with the half-hearted soap operatics and blows its top, it's women, children and top-billed stars first (this being the kind of film where the characters die in reverse order of billing, and if your character doesn't even have a name, you're toast), with a small, economically viable group of hotel guests facing tidal waves, fireballs, narrow ledges, rickety bridges and a script so riddled with clichés that the only surprise is that no-one sacrifices a maiden to appease the volcano god or that Elvis doesn't turn up to sing the Volcano-a-hula.

All of which sounds like a lot more fun that it actually is, but unfortunately it's distinctly low on spectacle or special effects, as if once the cast and hotel accommodation were paid for nothing was left for the film itself. The climax is one of the longest scenes of people crossing a bridge ever filmed (nigh on two whole reels of it) before one brief badly matted-in explosion. Even the film's best (the term is strictly relative here) scene inside the crater itself suffers from terrible back-projection. Still, it does offer one truly wonderful piece of droopingly phallic imagery as a rather unfortunately designed volcano-monitoring center falls into the crater that's almost worth the price of admission on its own.

Like The Swarm and Beyond the Poseidon Adventure, this went through heavy pre-release trimming  the US TV version ran 141 minutes  but you can't help thinking that was an act of mercy. James Goldstone, who had turned out some pretty decent efforts in the past, directs like it was a 70s TV movie while Fred Koenekamp's cinematography doesn't hide the fact that the grand finale was shot on a soundstage. Indeed, the whole thing just feels like it was made by people paying off their mortgages or alimony. If this film were a cheese, it would be processed and definitely well past its sell-by date.


Fairly decent acting from an impressive cast list was not enough to save this disaster (of a) movie from a thoroughly boring and unoriginal script.

*** potential spoilers follow - not that there's much to spoil ***

The plot is fuller of holes than a Swiss cheese. For a start I'm not sure that an active volcano and an oil field on the same small island are compatible, but as I'm not a geologist I might be inclined to let that go. But there's much more.

There's the tidal wave that trashes the village up the coast when the hotel doesn't see so much as a ripple. Correct me if I'm wrong but wouldn't a tidal wave travel outwards from an eruption and trash the island next door?

There's the long shot of a volcano spewing fire full blast into the stratosphere, cut to the research station on the edge of the crater. OK it doesn't look to be the best place to be but judging by the previous shot it should be vapourised.

There's the overloaded helicopter that crashed, despite having taken of even more heavily loaded (at least 3 people fell off). Oh yes, and it had just arrived even more heavily loaded. All it would have taken to make this less ludicrous was an additional four words in the script, (It's out of gas!) but obviously time ran out for the script-writers some time before they had finished the job.

And where did that blonde woman get that awful pink dress. The group that left the hotel to reach safety on the other side of the island were told they were travelling through rough country and to wear sensible clothes. I don't believe that was the best she could do.

And last but not least, the plot driver for the whole film was the head-in-the-sand attitude of hotel owner. He refused to leave,insisting that the lava could not reach that far, an that the hotel was the safest place to be. Quite a few others followed his lead. We never saw the lava reach the hotel. It was destroyed when the volcano blew its top again, shooting out a few tons of fiery rock which arced high in the air and, much against the odds, scored a bullseye. It seems the hotel owner was right, the odds were better on staying, even if they didn't come off.

All in all, one to miss. But why, you might ask, if it was that bad, why did you watch it for long enough to find all these faults. I wish I knew.


After "The Swarm", who ever thought that disaster movies could get any worse? Well if you witness this cinematic monstrosity, you will see existing proof that bad disaster movies were indeed churned out after "The Swarm".

This movie was encouraged to be filmed at the time because Irwin Allen still had one film left on his contract to be directed and the film studio wanted to get their money's worth while they could.

I for one could not believe that William Holden and Paul Newman would agree to star in this rubbish. I read William Holden's biography and I read that both Newman and Holden were contractually obliged to star in one more film to be directed by Irwin Allen, and unfortunately, this was it. With Holden and Newman on board, it seemed like a logical idea to jump aboard this turkey. Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Jacqueline Bissett and James Franciscus climb on for the ride. Somewhere in there, Burgess Meredith and Italian film veteran, Valentina Cortese also signed on. Unlike Olivia De Havilland who onced admitted that she made a huge mistake in turning down the role of the mayor's wife in "The Towering Inferno", I'm sure these actors were thinking exactly the opposite once filming started.

What I find most extraordinary is how these veteran actors couldn't see this bad career move they were about to get themselves into after reading the script. Olivia De Havilland admits that she only signed on to "The Swarm" after her good friend Henry Fonda joined the project. Unless the actors were all great friends with each other (which I know for a fact was not the case), then they had some serious issues to sort out.

Problems first arose on the set of this movie when William Holden discovered Paul Newman was to get top billing for the project. Holden, already a heavy drinker at the time this movie was being filmed, abruptly walked off the set many times during the filming process. Only when the film studio guaranteed that Holden would share top billing with Newman did he agree to come back and finish his scenes.

The film basically takes place on a ridiculous looking island that resembles the set of "Fantasy Island". It is basically a shot of a hotel with a papier mache volcano behind it.

Paul Newman plays an oil driller. Jacqueline Bissett is his love interest. William Holden again plays the ignorant owner of the hotel who refuses to evacuate the premises once the so-called "disaster" is foreseen. Red Buttons plays an ex-con and Ernest Borgnine again plays the hardened P.I. who has been hired to track him down and bring him back for justice. Veronica Hamel spends most of her five minutes on screen either in her night gown or in front of the vanity mirror hamming it up as the poor old wife who knows she's being taken for granted by her cheating husband. Burgess Meredith plays the 'Jack Warden' role from "The Poseidon Adventure" as the husband of the elderly vacationing couple with his wife, Valentina Cortese. Alex Carras and Pat Morita play two barflies who hang around with some Shelley Winters-wannabe at the local town bar.

When strange tremors rock the site where Newman is drilling oil, he senses something is not quite right. He decides to pay a visit to the volcanic monitoring outpost which is basically a cardboard box at the top of the papier mache volcano. To add to the insanity, there's a "gondola"-like box that can be lowered into the volcano for further testing (!!!). If you've already guessed that a man goes down in this clap-trap contraption whilst a tremor occurs and the cable snaps and he falls into the lava below, then you are dead set correct. If that seemed unconvincing, you should see the red lights the film crew strategically placed on the ground to make it look like the heat of the lava is being reflected off the casts' faces while being sprayed with water bottles to make it look like they're sweating.

One of the most hilarious scenes actually happens in the town after the volcano erupts. A flow of "lava" is oozing down the main street, engulfing everything in sight. The patrons of the bar make a hasty escape right before the red lava eats it up. It looked like a scene from "The Blob", but then I remembered that Steve McQueen wasn't in this garbage.

When the volcano erupts, it is up to Paul Newman to lead the "willing" group of resort patrons to safety on the other side of the island. Staying behind is William Holden and Veronica Hamell in one of the most awful scenes displaying terrible special effects. Huge "balls" of lava are spewing from the volcano into the resort. They're actually just huge papier mache balls covered in red and purple cellophane, but the naked eye isn't supposed to notice that. The resort explodes like something from the set of "The Thunderbirds" and you're left wondering if the bulk of the budget was spent on that one shot.

Newman leads the survivors through a jungle of potted plants and palm trees. It doesn't take long for them all to be covered in "black soot" and sweat as if they just performed a steeplechase marathon down the stairwell in "The Towering Inferno". The group of survivors is basically the "big names" of the cast. Borgnine, Buttons, Meredith, Bissett, Morita, Cortese and the Shelley-Winters lookalike from the town bar. If you thought the scene where the resort exploded was laughable, wait till you see the roped bridge suspended across a chasm filled with flowing lava. For starters, anything that was exposed to temperatures radiating off flowing molten lava would be singed and burned within seconds. But pure logic for this movie basically went out the window from about the very second the opening credits flashed on the screen.

Newman leads the group across the bridge. Pat Morita tries his best 'Stella Stevens' impression as he tumbles 'slow-motion'-style into the flowing lava below. Valentina Cortese tries her best 'Shelley Winters' impression as she tells Burgess Meredith she can't go on and dies from a heart attack. Newman leads the group to safety. They basically reached the other side of the island in 5 minutes, but who really cares.

That's basically the movie. Upon reading William Holden's biography, I discovered that none of the actors would agree to help campaign this film or attend the premiere. I can easily understand why if they even caught five minutes of the finished product.

This movie was simply awful. While it didn't have half the big names that starred in "The Swarm", it was twice as bad. Whilst "The Swarm" was laughable in parts, this movie only made you wonder why $5.00 of the film's budget was spent on special effects and the rest was paid for catering and bad make-up.

This movie was the final stake to be driven through the heart of the disaster genre. It was also Irwin Allen's final film that he directed. I was too young to see this movie when it was released theatrically, but I can just picture the audience throwing popcorn at the screen before walking out in both confusion and disgust.

Try to avoid this movie at all costs - watching it will only make you wonder where your favourite star's career went wrong.

0/10


Irwin Allen should be thanked for discovering a cure for insomnia.

The most notable feature about this movie is in the credits. Gayle Kananiokalapontigay's name takes two lines.

The movie is another Irwin Allen disaster - all the way around.

What agents got Paul Newman, William Holden, Jacqueline Bisset, Red Buttons, Ernest Borgnine, Burgess Meredith, James Franciscus, Barbera Carrera, Veronica Hamel, Edward Albert and Pat Morita into this loser?

And the writing? What writing? Carl Foreman and Stirling Silliphant should have had their names removed to save some embarrassment.

A bag of fish left in a car trunk in Sylmar would smell better than this stinker.

The story is stupid. A volcano settles scores and rights wrongs. Except it didn't destroy the master print copy. The acting is wooden, with bad, cliche lines just being spoken. And there's not one shred of excitement or danger at the climax. Just 20 minutes of watching 10 boring people cross a footbridge over a lava bed that poses no real harm.

Somehow Allen got this financed, and nobody read the script. At least I hope that's what happened. Otherwise some people would do anything, and I mean anything, for money.

When Time Ran Out, everybody fled the set.

Even if you've got five million hours left to live, don't waste one second on this piece of junk. Unless you're an insomniac. Even then, you will sleep, but your stomach's gonna churn with this garbage in it.


I was a cinema projectionist at the time of this release and it came out at the end of the 'disaster movie' era in the seventies (in the UK).

I ran this at a press screening and it was obvious from the first minute this was a disaster movie of it's own kind. What initially was mildly amusingly bad soon went to so bad it's funny but thereafter, and very quickly and for most of the film, it reached that rare distinction of 'so bad, it really is baaaaaaaaaaaaaaad'.

OK, so I've seen lots of rubbish films but what sticks in the mind with this one is the level of money and the cast involved. I had/have no expectations that some cheap budget film with no-name actors in it might be awful but this had a decent cast and money thrown at it and for that simple reason I personally regard it a THE WORST FILM I HAVE EVER SEEN.

Avoid like the plague


The Hollywood movers and shakers who decide which scripts are given the green light ought to be ashamed of themselves.

The actors who signed up for this debacle should have known better.

The behind-the-scenes crew must've kept their mouths shut while filming the Irwin Allen production, knowing that the final product was going to be garbage.

There must have been a conspiracy within the Costume Design branch of the Academy Awards for nominating this and "The Swarm" two years earlier for the bland clothing right off the store shelves from Sears or K-Mart (or whatever store that was close to the Warner Brothers' Burbank studios lot or on location in Hawaii).

And I'm not going to discuss the poor blue screen effects, the cheap miniature effects or the actor's laughable reaction shots.

While writing this review, I realized that "When Time Ran Out" and "Airplane!" were both released in 1980. I guess it speaks volumes when a silly but unintentionally funny disaster movie was a flop and a silly but intentionally funny disaster spoof was a hit.


One thing I do have to say for When Time Ran Out. There is some lovely Hawaiian scenery in it. That's a plus for any film.

But this film may have killed the disaster film genre. Might have had a lot to do with the death of the big budget soap opera as well. At least it got a lease on life on television during the eighties.

Bad guy in this film is James Franciscus who thought it would be a grand idea to build a resort hotel on a small Hawaiian island with an active volcano. Great tourist attraction. He's not happy just growing sugar cane like his dad did and becoming filthy rich. He wants to become richer and he does become filthier.

He marries Bill Holden's daughter, Veronica Hamel, to get to Holden's money. Holden is a Conrad Hilton type hotel magnate.

Meanwhile another Franciscus enterprise is an oil well which Paul Newman has brought in. All their drilling is giving the volcano an upset tummy.

Of course we've got some grand soap opera type romantic conflicts. Newman and Holden over Jacqueline Bisset, Franciscus stepping out with Barbara Carrera on Veronica Hamel with Edward Albert objecting big time. Dynasty can't hold a candle to this bunch.

Irwin Allen ripped himself off also. The characters that Burgess Meredith and Valentina Cortesa play are an Italian version of who Jack Albertson and Shelley Winters played in The Poseidon Adventure.

Newman, Holden, Red Buttons, Ernest Borgnine all veterans of Irwin Allen disaster films from before just go through the motions here.

What did they get out of it? A big paycheck and a Hawaiian vacation. That's probably reason enough to do this film as time finally ran out on the disaster film.


How did I miss this when it first came out? How have I managed to keep missing it ever since? And why has my luck finally changed?

I went to see my ageing parents and it was on, at around the halfway mark - "Hello," I thought, "even though I've never seen this before, it looks unmistakeably like Irwin Allen." You see, while I might not have seen this particular movie before, I can certainly recognise Irwin Allen's distinctive signature on celluloid.

A cast of relatively high-profile actors (and a few like Alex Karras and Barbara Carrera who somehow managed to consistently get work despite having the least appealing screen personae ever) playing characters it never proves possible to get interested in. Some astonishingly unconvincing "exterior" studio sets. A script which fails on every level from plot to dialogue. Special effects which must have cost literally tens of dollars.

Even for Irwin Allen this is a cheapskate production - you could normally rely on spectacle to compensate for the dreadful script, but not so here.

A poor effort indeed.


My Take: Despite the all-star cast, this is a formula disaster movie with too much clichés and not much thrills.

Released at the tail-end of the disaster movie craze of the 1970's (which might have already ended in 1979), Irwin Allen's WHEN TIME RAN OUT is more of an afterthought rather than a comeback as it was intended to be. Allen made a spectacle of himself with epics like THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and THE TOWERING INFERNO which popularized the lucrative genre. But with flops like CONCORDE: AIRPORT '79, it's clear the genre has overstayed its welcome. But apparently, no one told Irwin Allen, who went on to make this movie. Not only does the title say it all, WHEN TIME RAN OUT also came out the same year as the disaster movie spoof AIRPLANE!, making this film more embarrassing than it is.

WHEN TIME RAN OUT has all the usual elements of a typical 70's disaster movie: an all-star cast caught in a major calamity. But WHEN TIME RAN OUT is much more routine than usual. The film also feels more like a TV soap opera with elements taken directly from Allen's other disaster movies. The film opens with the same-old row-call: Paul Newman is an oil drill foreman who falls for advertising exec Jacqueline Bisset, who was offered an engaging ring earlier by millionaire William Holden; James Franciscus is the owner of the island's hotel who refuses to believe the upcoming threat, while not exactly being faithful to his clueless (read: foolish) wife Veronica Hamel. And there's more where that cam from: Hotel employee Barbara Carrera refuses to marry her fiancée Edward Albert, Ernest Borgnine is an old cop in pursuit of convicted crook Red Buttons (who repeats his goofy jogging routine from THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE), and so much more. I know disaster movies are part-drama, part-adventure movies, but even when the drama takes backstage to the action, the film disappoints with some really cheesy effects and not-too-exciting action scenes (the overlong bridge-scene comes to mind).

Though some hate to admit it, I'm quite fond of the 70's disaster movies, especially the one's by Allen. I liked his first two blockbusters, but I also liked his lesser efforts like THE SWARM (at least for camp value). And if there's one thing I know about Allen is that he never fails to entertain. WHEN TIME RAN OUT is quite a disaster in more than the sense of the word, with tedious subplots and some horrible special effects. But then again, no one does "disasters" like Irwin Allen.

Rating: ** out of 5.


"Rollercoaster" director James Goldstone's "When Time Ran Out," with Paul Newman, William Holden, Edward Albert, Ernst Borgnine, Veronica Hamel, Red Buttons, and Jacqueline Bisset, qualifies as just another Irwin Allen disaster movie. By this time, Allen's disaster movies had been nothing but disasters. While this one boasts a terrific cast, "When Time Ran Out" amounts to a tiresome bore. Interestingly enough, this was Irwin Allen's final theatrical feature film.

The action occurs on an island that suspiciously resembles a cross-between of Hawaii and a studio backlot set. A papier-mâché volcano smolders ominously in the background for most of the film until it erupts. Sadly, the Carl Foreman & Stirling Silliphant screenplay, based on Gordon Thomas & Max Morgan Witt's novel "The Day the World Ended," never erupts.

Oil man Hank Anderson (Paul Newman) warns tycoon Shelby Gilmore (William Holden), Kay Kirby (Jacqueline Bisset), and everybody else booked in Holden's luxury resort motel to clear out while the getting's good. Bob Spangler (James Franciscus) claims that Anderson doesn't know what he's talking about. Spangler insists that the volcano won't blow. Not surprisingly, the volcano does blow, and Gilmore along with a host of others escape to higher ground after crossing a rugged obstacle course. In one scene, they must traverse a rickety old bridge over a stream of molten lava.

If you've seen one disaster movie, you've seen them all. This muddled epic bristles with cardboard characters, predictable scripting (by two really good writers) and phony special effects. As for the title, Allen should have altered it. Time doesn't run out in "When Time Ran Out," it drags out!


Irwin Allen produced a pair of memorable disaster epics in the early '70s, "The Poseidon Adventure" and "The Towering Inferno". However, Allen hit rock bottom with his final theatrical film "When Time Ran Out...". This movie is not up there in the same league as those two blockbusters. In fact, this is an embarrassment to all involved. The great cast that's featured here (Paul Newman, William Holden, Jacqueline Bisset, Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, etc.) deserved a good movie here. Instead, they're in a movie that features inept acting, inept dialogue, and especially inept special effects. See "Dante's Peak" or "Volcano" instead.

* (out of four)


I was bored crapless the other night and turning channels on the movie channels and came across this one.

I am a big fan of Irwin Allen and this is one of the few of his films I know nothing about. I'm glad I didn't, this really was one of the bad ones.

All I got outa this one was a bunch of once-great actors trying to escape a volcano..and one by one, they die -- except for a few. I just did not care whether these folks lived or died...got off the island or not...oh, my goodness.

The special effects are really cheesy, the stories were full of plot holes. Victoria Hammel looked good pre-Hill Street Blues days...and the most exciting part was Ernest Borgnine catching on fire and blindly being led across mountain ledges by older actors who didn't seem to make it either.

What a waste.


Geriatric hysteria, helmed by a man who must've been dozing in his rocking chair. Producer Irwin Allen, at this point in his career willing to try anything--even rehashing scenes from his hit "The Poseidon Adventure"--sadly hits an all-time low. Hilariously advertised as a love story between Paul Newman and Jacqueline Bisset, this low-brow disaster movie really concerns an erupting volcano and the South Pacific island resort in its path. The scenarists can't be bothered with too much lovemaking, for their real purpose is to boil down the characters in molten lava. Deadly and depressing--not unintentionally funny or campy (no such luck); the poor actors on-screen (including a few "Poseidon" alumni) are being humiliated, and worse they don't even seem aware of it. Allen proves himself to be the '80s equivalent of Ed Wood, with this entry usurping even "The Swarm" to become his All-Time Champ of Cinema Sludge.


There are two things going for this movie and two things against this movie - Paul Newman and William Holden and Paul Newman and William Holden. They make one hesitate to walk out on this atrocious Irwin Allen tripe. However, their inexcusable presence - they didn't need the money that bad, did they? - is constantly distracting, constantly outraging you at the waste of talent. There are also the usual "all star cast" regulars, like Ernie Borgnine and Red Buttons, who only help make this a disaster film cliché, as well as a disaster film disaster. There's even a featured player whose day job has to be Shelley "Poseidon Adventure" Winters' stand-in.

Where to begin? Inane plot. "The Day the World Ended" and "Earth's Final Fury" are alternate titles, and both are fraudulent, since the story is about a volcanic island which threatens to overwhelm a Fantasy Island resort, not Planet Earth. Special effects? Yes, they are special: they are special as the cheapest special effects ever seen in a disaster film since "Plan 9 From Outer Space". Crappy sound, footage expended on stupid reaction shots . . .

Arrrrrgh! Why am I wasting time reviewing this garbage??? Don't make the same mistake by watching it. It might be suitable for a Saturday night beer and reefer silly party, but other than that, don't you dare!


The trouble with most Melanie Griffith vehicles-and for some reason I'm excruciatingly aware of the number of them I've seen- is that you're only seeing one character, ever, and not a very good or memorable one at that. Ms. Griffith should be at the very center of a firestorm of debate on what's wrong with Hollywood, and the principal lesson we can learn from movies like this one is that Hollywood is lazy. Melanie Griffith is not only not a very good actress, she is so abominably bad and mind-numbingly predictable in her infantile reactions and sex-kitten phrasings that she should never have been seen aside from her appearances in Body Double and Something Wild, in which the characters she played were simply tailored to fit her deficient persona. For anyone who still disagrees, let me put it this way. If you were to remove the mannerisms, vocalizations, and elements of style that Ms. Griffith has simply lifted from Judy Holliday and Marilyn Monroe, you would not have enough actor left to fill the shoes of a crowd-scene extra. Yet the Hollywood system somehow works to keep this Cleopatra's barge afloat, long after it should have run aground. But, since she's who she is, however unfortunate that may be for all of us, we'll go on seeing her again and again, silicon-blown lips and breasts and, oh, what's the use? This movie is really parts of two movies that never really come together, and that wouldn't really be able to stand up by themselves either. We have a typical Hollywood construct, 60's racist Alabama, intercut with a retail clerk's dream of ascendance to stardom: kill your abusive husband, steal a car, by a hat for the hatbox, (paste classical reference here) sweet-talk a cop out of holding you in jail--Banderas probably knows so little about police procedure in this country that he actually thought the hatbox in a stolen vehicle would not be checked-- win big in Las Vegas, audition for Bewitched, and become a star. Maybe we're supposed to remember here that Liz Montgomery also played Lizzie Borden in a TV movie several years after Bewitched tanked and she was renovating her image as a Now woman. Regardless, the classification of this film as "comedy-drama" should have been the tip-off that whenever Ms Griffith found herself in trouble, the baby-doll would pop out, coo sickeningly, and her character would survive for yet another stunning costume change. Now, the "serious" side of this movie flounders like the fully dressed blacks diving into the pool--we're supposed to think here of baptism, even before we see the image of the little boy floating in the crucifixion pose--and we are also supposed to swallow yet another screenwriter's slam-dunk of a terribly complex and many-sided situation, that of racial injustices of sixties Alabama. I remember sitting in an editing room, telling my working partner I'd just come back from Alabama, where my father is buried. "F--- Alabama!" she said. She was from New York, and movies like this were her entire experience of the south. So, here we are, in the middle of this dreadful hash: a dream of becoming a star, which, oddly enough, is played by an actor who has expressed in interviews this same desire, over and over again: to be a star, even tho she is incapable of acting. Then we have the Hollywood construct of a mythical, deeply stereotyped world: racist South, lustful cop, get-rich Las Vegas, and star-studded Hollywood. And to top it all off, we have A. Banderas, who, come to think of it, may actually be the closest thing to a male counterpart to Melanie Griffith you're liable to find. He's fulfilling his dream of coming to America, becoming a star in something other than Almodovar films (the worst of which was much better than this) and finally, directing. Every boy's Hollywood dream. Like Griffith, he seems to think that talent or ability should have nothing to do with it. And if this movie had been anything like the hit it was billed as in the trailers, He would have been right. But, somehow, over and over again, that self-referencing Hollywood myth simply breaks down, over and over again. What we have, then, is shoddy "stars" that no one really wants to see, like Melanie Griffith, shoddy directing, that we could live without, like Banderas,' and shoddy films, that no one really wanted to see, playing three times a day on Bravo, like this one. Do yourself a favor, the next time this one's on: Change the channel.


A man suffering from amnesia coming back from war to be confronted with a wife and child...Well we've seen this before and long ago...To be precise in 1938 ,when Curtis Bernardt -who continued his career in America afterward- directed his "carrefour" starring the excellent Charles Vanel and Jules Berry.Here the director -very academic- substituted the Middle Ages for WW1 and presto!an original screenplay! Actually ,and even the scenarists will never confess it it's "carrefour" remade as "Martin Guerre" remade as "Sommersby" .

Best part comes from Nathalie Baye,who portrays a woman who could belong to the Middle Ages as well as to our own era .Bernard-Pierre Donnadieu would have outstripped Depardieu, had the script given him the chance to shine.

Since I posted my comments,an user wrote that both "carrefour" and "Martin Guerre" came from an incident from the sixteenth century.Perhaps so ,but in my native France,nobody said a single word about that."Carrefour" was based on a John Kafka novel (not to be mistaken for THE Kafka),and as for "Martin", famous scenarist Carrière -who wrote for Luis Bunuel - and director Vigne took all the credits.Jean Tulard,the most erudite historian of the French cinema does not hint at the American novel of Janet Lewis in his "dictionnaire des films".I must add that in France "MG" is not looked upon as the great film it is in America.It's actually a return to the swashbuckler genre that was thriving in the 1955-1965 years in France,a bit more realist perhaps ,to gain the highbrows audience ,but not necessarily better.

The real writer was actually Jean de Coras ,conseiller au parlement de Toulouse,whom you can see in the film (Roger Planchon) and who reported the story.


Please do not mention Hitchcock!The Master knew that without a solid screenplay it's a waste of breath.All those "modern" French thrillers suffer from approximative vague scripts.The directors think that special effects ,disturbing music (here very Chabrolesque),and an ominous soundtrack can make the job done.Spice with uninspired flashbacks and nightmares .Add some sex.Serve tepid.

Benoit Magimel is too limited an actor to suggest two different personalities (Jeremy Irons he is definitely not).Even the final trick is not new.It was invented by Sacha Guitry half a century before.And whereas "trouble" takes finally the easy way out ,the 1953 film did not give the audience any answer.

Like this?Try these ....

"Dead ringers" David Cronenberg 1988 Irons and his twin

"Dead ringer" Paul Henreid 1965 Bette Davis and her twin (2)

"Toi Le Venin" Robert Hossein 1958 Marina Vlady and Odile Versois

"La Vie d'Un Honnête Homme "Sacha Guitry 1953 Michel Simon and his twin.

"A stolen life "Curtis Bernardt 1951 Bette Davis and her twin.

"The dark mirror" Robert Siodmak 1946 Olivia de Havilland and her twin.


Just saw this movie and must say without Duvall's performance this might rank as one of the worst Westerns ever made..I loved the snow capped mountains around Northfield and the hokey mustaches on some of the characters.. (some even looked like they were ready to fall off). The baseball game scene appeared to be just a way to lengthen the movie and had nothing to do with the actual raid. The chasing around by the Pinkerton group was almost comical and hard to watch. The only thing I did appreciate was Duvall's and Robertson's performances, but unfortunately neither warranted any type of awards because of the low budget antics of the screenplay. This very, very low budget film is not worth the time....


The opening scene is in northwest Missouri.The railroads are stealing the farmers' properties and dispossessing them.

In 1876 the Missouri legislature moves to grant a blanket amnesty to farmers as well as to Jesse and frank James(two celebrated Missouri outlaws.)

However,the railroad hires detective Allan Pinkerton(Dana Elcar)to "get" the Jameses.

Frank(John Pearce)and Jesse(Robert Duvall)find some newspaper upon which gang member Cole Younger(Cliff Robertson)has written plans to rob the First National Bank in Northfield,Minnesota.

They justify robbing the bank because the amnesty vote was blocked by a Pinkerton bribe.

The train carrying Pinkerton enters the area; detectives dressed as farmers disembark,positioning themselves to kill the James gang.The resulting ambush leaves Cole Younger seriously wounded and the Pinkerton detectives dead.

Although Jesse James comes from educated people,he rants himself into a mad-eyed,ecstatic state describing the upcoming bank robbery.

Jesse and Frank leave to pursue Jesse's "vision"; Younger and his group soon follow.

On the way the Youngers pick up Clell Miller(R.G.Armstrong.)Upon entering Northfield,a curious sight greets Younger and the gang: a trackless steam engine chugging down the middle of Main Street.

In front of the First National Bank is another oddity: a malfunctioning steam calliope on the sidewalk.Cole Younger repairs the calliope's pressure gauge.

In Northfield,Younger strikes a nefarious bargain with Mr.Wilcox(Robert R.Harris),the bank's owner,who plans to inveigle the unsuspecting townsfolk to invest their savings - then fleece them,and disappear.

Wilcox is seconded by his "yes-man,"Bunker(Elisha Cook,Jr.),but the upright bookkeeper,Heywood(Jack Manning)denounces them both.

Meanwhile,the Jameses and their part of the gang lodge with an elderly lady being evicted over an unpaid mortgage of $80.Jesse hears her rambling story about"don't sell the children"(a group of mannikins); Jesse buys the "Uncle Sam" doll for $80,takes it and confronting the landlord,shoots him dead.

At the town's baseball game,the Northfield team wins because Cole Younger blasts the ball to smithereens with his rifle.Younger(calling himself "Mr. King")and Wilcox "converse" over "King's" nearly being robber,and how he wants to protect his money in a safe bank.

Another comedic touch at the game is a lanky young man with a goofy grin who is marching around,shouldering a rifle.He's Henry Wheeler(Barry Brown),supposedly a medical student,but wearing impossibly thick-lensed glasses!

Younger tries to show Wheeler how to shoot correctly; Wheeler promptly shoots off a man's hat!Later,at a blacksmith's,Younger creates a device for Wheeler's gun allowing him to shoot straight - with unexpected catastrophic results,later.

A phony gold shipment "conveniently" arrives near the playing field,"guarded" by Younger's gang.The townsfolk,entranced,rush to put their money in the local bank.

Back in town Younger encounters a wild-eyed,incoherent individual, "Crazy" Gustavson(Royal Dano).He is insane because his son never returned from the Civil War.

Jesse James and his group ride into town,meeting up with the Youngers and their group.Before the robbery,Cole Younger shoots the town telegrapher through a plate-glass window.

Now inside the bank, Wilcox(outflanked in treachery by Younger)is soundly beaten.Bunker(injured)escapes out a back window,but the brave Haywood,who claims he can't open the bank vault's time lock is shot dead by James.(The vault,which opens briefly,traps Bill Chadwell(Craig Curtis)inside.)

Unexpectedly,"Crazy" Gustavson shows up raving,and is shot dead - but falls onto the steam calliope which,blasting like an air-raid siren alerts the townsfolk.

The enthusiastic kid,Wheeler,fires wildly with the modified gun and accidentally hits Clell Miller,killing him instantly.

Armed citizens pour into the streets,shooting.In the mêlée,Bob Younger is shot,rescued by his brother,and the surviving outlaws escape.

When the bank's time lock opens the trapped outlaw,Bill Chadwell,is promptly gunned down.

Back at the "doll lady's" house,Cole Younger,his brothers Bob and Jim (Luke askew),Charlie Pitts(Wayne Sunderlin)and the James brothers are hiding out.The Jameses want to leave; the Youngers want to stay.Bob Younger's condition is serious,requiring immediate medical attention; the elderly lady wants to bring back a trustworthy doctor.The Jameses accompany her.

A search party finds the remainder of the gang holed up in the house and enfilades it,killing Charlie Pitts.

Jesse and Frank James escape in a buckboard,heading for Missouri.Jesse is disguised in women's clothes.Presumably,they murdered the elderly lady and stole her wagon.

As Pinkerton's train arrives in Northfield,he is infuriated to see the prison wagon paraded through the town's streets,the townsfolk cheering the surviving desperadoes.(Footnote: Cole Younger received a life sentence for murder,and served 25 years in prison.)

Cliff Robertson(Cole Younger)played the part of the outlaw Cole Younger with a certain raffish bravado.

Robert Duvall(Jesse James)was eerie as the fanatical Jesse James whose cosmic "vision" led him to Northfield to rob the bank.

Dana Elcar(Allan Pinkerton)was convincingly self-righteous as the sinister detective who cut corners in the pursuit of "justice."

John Pearce(Frank James)was very good as Jesse's supportive brother,Frank.

Wayne Sutherlin(Charlie Pitts)was believable as the taciturn Charlie Pitts.

R.G.Armstrong(Clell Miller)imparted a "good ol'boy" flavor to his characterization of Clell Miller.

Royal Dano("Crazy" Gustavson)was convincingly demented as the ill-starred émigré.

Barry Brown(Henry Wheeler)was engaging as the enthusiastic but maladroit medical student,playing his part with just the right comedic touch.

"The Great Northfield,Minnesota Raid" is a Revisionist Western(a genre popular just after the Sixties),and is greatly at variance with the true facts surrounding the event.However, for 91 minutes of escapist diversion - it will fit the bill nicely.


I always cringe when someone claims a particular substandard movie is the worst ever, but I am genuinely tempted to make such a claim for "The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid". While Cliff Robertson is fine as Cole Younger the rest of the cast is pretty much hopeless (give Robert Duval some credit for expending a lot of energy as he chews the scenery to an unimaginable degree).

The real problem is the hopeless historical distortion and the early 1970's counterculture revision of history. This is especially unforgivable because the actual events were more interesting that the contrived garbage shown in the movie; these were portrayed a little more accurately in "The Long Riders", a better film.

The "actual" events were fascinating so distortion and silly embellishment are totally unnecessary. If they can't provide a reasonably accurate retelling of the story then they should change the names and call it by its right name-"fiction".

A genuine piece of crap, if there is any justice everyone associated with this mess is or soon will be roasting in hell.


This movie tells the story about Tutu and his big brother Zef and their search for a new family once their mother goes to "the rainbow." Zef, being the older brother, doesn't want to tell Tutu the truth and tries to focus them on finding a new family and avoiding the "Badness." Along the way they meet many new animal friends that help them.

While I appreciated the use of live action as opposed to animation, it was just all too dopey and ridiculous to follow. The movie was unintentionally funny due to the strange choices of voices (we thought Tutu was a girl for the first 20-30 minutes)and the corny writing. For example, Tutu is obsessed about finding the rainbow and thinks anything multi-colored is a rainbow (hot air balloon, candy, etc.). Also, every animal they meet has lost their mother so every animal they meet gets depressed because they have no mother.

Perhaps if my kids were younger they would have bought the cheesy lines and dumb scenarios these animals got themselves into...we only watched the whole movie for the humor value at a certain point.


If you must watch this movie, do so with the sound off - and perhaps an assortment of music for background noise instead. The elephants are both supposed to be boys, yet the younger brother, TuTu, is obviously performed by a woman trying to sound like a child. The effect is exceptionally annoying. As if this were not bad enough, the dialogue is insufferable. The lines are both poorly written AND poorly delivered. The story is narrated by two cheetahs who at least attempt to sound African, but all other roles are done in various accents - none of them consistent or ethnic. The overall result is campy at best. If my two year old hadn't been interested, I would have turned it off. As it was, my ten year old, eleven year old, my spouse and myself had to leave the room before the movie was part over. Toddlers and preschoolers may enjoy it. Perhaps even kindergartners. Any one over age five should either steer clear, or listen to their ipod in lieu of the movie sound.


Stunningly beautiful nature film about elephants trying to rescue their kidnapped family.

Cute to a point but the film's ability to entertain you will depend on whether or not you can stomach the voice over voices given to all of the animals. The voices have been laid over the animals natural sounds so we can hear the voices and their real sounds, its not well done. It might have worked had the script been a little more intelligent and not aimed at the lowest possible age group. Its the sort of thing that is gang busters if you're four or five, but any if you're older its an endurance test.

Thank god I wasn't watching this with a rug rat cause I could turn it off, which I did after about 45 minutes.

3 out of 10 for the great pictures.


Like most of the other comments, I came into this movie totally unprepared for what I was about to see. This movie was so bad that I was cringing with every scene, but at the same time I was compelled to see what happened next. I just can't even believe that a movie this bad actually exists. When the movie ended, everyone in the room agreed that it was hands down the worst movie any of us had ever seen. And the fact that it was produced in 1993, but set in 1983 is beyond me. But then again, nothing else in this movie makes sense either, so who knows. This movie should be shown to prison inmates in solitary confinement. They'll never do a


I watched "High Kicks" as part of the 10-movie DVD set called "Women Who Kick Butt". No doubt if that's the first film of the set you watch you'll be disappointed, but if you watch it (like me) after such atrocities as "Death Run To Istanbul" or "Flight To Danger" it seems comparatively better. The female lead takes her role very seriously and gives a convincing emotional and physical performance (she was stunt-doubled in some scenes by Michelle "Mouse" Krasnoo). The acting of the men sucks, but at least they seem to know what they're doing when it comes to martial arts. And although the film was cheaply shot on video, the camera-work is decent. Of course there are a lot of things that could be improved. The script is short on logic (how do they always manage to find the villains so easily?), the fight choreography is sometimes clumsy, and there should have been more action - the climactic fight, for example, should have been longer than 1 minute! (*1/2)


Inconceivable! What was the director thinking? Hmm, we're shooting on video, we have no stars, and we have a budget of 7 bucks for our martial arts stuntmen. I have an idea that will put us over the edge!!!! We'll feature tons of women with fake boobs doing aerobics....and we'll have no nudity at all!!!! It's cinema gold! People, there's a reason why you can only find this flick in a bundled DVD 4-pack at Best Buy for 6 bucks. And frankly, I overpaid.


I have to agree. This certainly has the look of an-early '80's shot-on-video porn film minus the nudity and sex.

Not only is this film hideously bad, I've only seen it available in cheap DVD box sets that force you to compare it to better films. The only reason I have it/watched it was that it came in a set titled SAVAGE SISTERS where it is included along with SISTER STREET FIGHTER (the reason I bought the set), TNT JACKSON, and the GET CHRISTIE LOVE! TV pilot. All those films are far better. Given how cheesy and dated they are should give you an indication of how bad HIGH KICKS is.


Here we have a really funny film that has hit cult status among a bunch of us. This is a really badly made and shot on video "action" (quote unquote) film. This is acted like a porno without the porn. Thanks to Brentwood dvd this has become available in a dvd budget boxed set. In a nutshell. Sandy opens an aerobic studio called Highkicks. A politcally correct looking street gang (every race is accounted for), harass, and then rape Sandy. Sandy hires a new guy (Sam) to help out at her place and after the attack finds out he knows martial arts (umm i guess you can call it that). You should be able to pick up the rest of the film, he teaches her and then they go after the gang. Again this film is hilarious. The really crazy clothes, definitely the 80's hair styles (even though this was done in the 90's), and acting are at the bottom of the barrel and highly worth viewing. Some funny lines are when Sam mentions to Sandy he has to go to his brothers wedding in San Francisco and that it will take him a week to get there, keep in mind he is in San Diego. Another funny one is When Sam mentions he pulled into a port (he drives a boat) and was raped by the natives. it just doesn't get any better then this. If you want a really funny fun time, rent this with a bunch of people and just mock the entire film.


After being attacked and raped by a gang of hoodlums, an aerobics instructor named Sandy turns to her new friend Sam, a karate expert, for help. After some martial arts training, she and her newfound karate cohorts decide to bring their own brand of justice to these hoodlums since the police won't do anything about them. It should also be noted with regards to the plot that never ever, not even for one single moment, does it become convincing in its portrayal of events.

I swear I could feel my brain cells literally melting away as I watched this cheese fest that is when it wasn't being utterly overwhelmed by the almost vomiting inducing level of political correctness constantly a presence in this film. Indeed, the gang is made up of members from nearly every different race (must not discriminate after all when it comes to male sleaze balls) and all the guys in the film who seem to be actually able to fight seem to also be totally ineffectual as males for the most part, wearing pink t-shirts or sweatshirts, doing aerobics and basically anything our leading lady Sandy asks them to do. It's interesting that only the effeminate men seemed to be portrayed in a positive light. Possibly as a means to appease all those male sleazes watching at home, the camera does seem to continuously leer at women as they work out to the point you honestly expect this to turn into a full blown porno film at any moment (the music even lends itself to this suggestion). However it never does. In fact, it doesn't even have any nudity.


I was so excited when I read a movie was being made of this great book. I really wanted to like this movie. Very little time was spent on Dan's actual Journey. The premonitions of seeing Socrates were missing, so Dan had no reason to be intrigued at the Service station. What happened to the teaching of the importance of humor? And why the gratuitous shower scene? Why did Dan always look angry - especially after his enlightenment - whenever he approached an apparatus? He was supposed to be at Peace (even if his message to his Coach was an 'I'll show you" - which defeats the purpose of releasing the Ego ). Too much screen time of guys with there shirts off. As an after-school TV movie - it was terrific; as a movie of this very special book - a major disappointment.


Characters are supposed to change as stories progress. The main character here changed from a selfish pompous dork into a selfish pompous reborn "guru". Nolte evidently has had a lobotomy.

This was a film about wisdom seemingly made by high schoolers who had read a comic book and become "enlightened".

A dash of Karate Kid, a little Rocky and a whole lot of Ishtar.

The best that can be said is that this was a low budget film and not a lot of money was wasted. Unless it was a tongue-in-cheek satire, it was one of the worst films ever made.

You need to run your head into a brick wall a few times before you watch this and, if you like it, you need to return to the wall and hit it much harder.


Frank Tashlin's 'The Swooner Crooner' is a cartoon I never saw on TV as a child and seeing it on DVD now it's clear why it was kept off children's TV. The concept for the cartoon is one big dirty joke! Porky Pig is a farmer who wants to increase the amount of eggs that his hens lay. He realises that the sexual arousal they experience when watching a Frank Sinatra caricature rooster perform results in them laying eggs in enormous quantities. So Porky sets about auditioning singing roosters to keep the hens in a permanent state of arousal. 'The Swooner Crooner' is a bizarre and ever-so-slightly grotesque short which I've never warmed to in the least. Most of the gags consist of various images of swooning chickens or chickens laying piles of eggs in one go. It's scarcely the stuff of split sides. Nevertheless, the cartoon was nominated for an Academy Award. No doubt the Sinatra and Bing Crosby caricatures were funnier back in the heyday of both performers. Indeed, the funniest part of 'The Swooner Crooner' in the rooster auditions in which we see a variety of caricatures of such performers as Jimmy Durante and Cab Calloway. The plot on which these caricatures are hung, however, is paper thin and the final gag is particularly strange and grotesque.


Realistically, how could a successful man who has a beautiful and sexually available wife, two children and a great home, decide to sleep with a stranger and have the audacity to come home without taking a shower? Realistically, how could this woman turn out to be the sister-in law of this man's best friend. Realistically, how could these two hook up again, and then find their respective spouses going at it less than 20 feet away? Come on!!! This movie is a great example of bad filmmaking. People in the socio-economic strata displayed in the film just don't engage in acts worthy of the "Jerry Springer Show." The film takes what could have been a viable premise and makes it into nothing but a laughable farce. Ming-Na Wen's first love scene is a complete joke. What is she supposed to be a coxswain? Give her a megaphone so she can yell 'Stoke! Stroke! Stroke! Stroke!' What a bad film.


I hated this movie. It is quite possibly one of the worst movies I've ever seen.

Part of my problem with it is the clever ending. Part of my problem with it is the typical Hollywood sympathetic portrayal of the Saintly AIDS-stricken Homosexual Wise Man. Part of my problem with it is that I just don't like Wesley Snipes much as an actor; to me, the same arrogant personality is present in every movie I've seen him in. Part of it was some extremely cheesy dialog meant to establish his wife's character: Wesley: "But, Honey, the kids...." Ming-na: "F*** the kids, I'm coming!"


Okay, so I've read all of the reviews on this movie. Let me break it down for you. I rented this movie already having a general idea what it was about. Even though I don't care for movies about infidelity, I wanted to see this particular one anyways. Ming-Na Wen is by far my absolute favorite actor, and I have always enjoyed watching Wesley Snipes' action movies.

I've read the reviews and have concluded that this movie is getting far too much credit for it's "artsy" side. Yes, I agree with another reviewer that the movie is better once you watch the director's commentary version, but that doesn't replace the fact that I watched the entire movie with my stomach in knots. And don't get it twisted, it IS about infidelity.

As the title suggests, there's a one night stand. Okay, I was expecting that. But the events that follow just drag the viewer down. Robert Downey Jr. played a decent role, but nothing extraordinary as others might have you believe. The entire movie is depressing, and the last ten minutes or so of the movie all the way up to the ending is just terrible! I'm not going to spoil anything, but let me just say that I hated it. The two scenes towards the end sealed my negative vote on this movie.

I hate to write this, too. As I said, my favorite actor is in the movie, and I really enjoy most of the roles the other main actors have played in other films. But this flick dragged me down, and I wanted to eat a bullet by the end of the movie. Keep in mind, that the director (Michael Figgis) has a thing for infidelity (Does "Internal Affairs" ring any bells?), so just go into it knowing that.

I'm sad to say it, but "One Night Stand" was a downer, despite all of the great actors and acting. Honestly, I would not recommend it. If you enjoy being cheated on and watching it happen to other people as well, then you'll probably love this movie. Knock yourself out.


Blame it on me, but the only reason I wanted to see this film for was that Nastassja Kinski plays in it. So for this alone it justifies being fixed at the screen for 90 minutes...but for the rest? I really wouldn't know.... It all starts with Wesley Snipes who travels from LA to New York to see his sick buddy Charlie who is seropositive. Wesley has a perfect familylife, two kids, a dog and a lovely wife Ming-Na. Everything goes fine till he misses his flight and bumps onto Karen (Nastassja Kinski, with blonde hair this time!). Everything is innocent (they go to an opera) till they are robbed and madame Kinski begs him to stay the night with her as she's still dead afraid. And of course it happens... You can't blame Snipes, Ming-Na....it's Nastassja, remember? The day after Wesley flies back home and his life changes...the most interesting part of the movie by the way as the dog smells something...! Look I could go on and tell you the whole movie but that wouldn't be fair. Nothing more interesting happens and if it does it is pure Hollywood-nonsense (the last 10 minutes are even completely stupid). "One night stand" certainly isn't a bad movie, it even doesn't bore one minute, but it's just a bit too empty and you can't blame the actors as Wesley Snipes plays his role perfect but actors are bound to the script, a script that is a bit too much like those telemovies that are based on true stories. Watch it but expect nothing, expect...well you know!


I couldn't tell what was supposed to be the point of "One Night Stand". So there was a bunch of stuff about interracial relationships. Many other movies have done a much better job with that stuff. How could Mike Figgis, after creating a masterpiece like "Leaving Las Vegas" create something so disjointed with this movie? It wastes Wesley Snipes, Nastassja Kinski, Kyle MacLachlan, Ming-Na, Robert Downey Jr and John Ratzenberger on complete nonsense. If this movie has any redeeming qualities, it's that it gave Thomas Haden Church an early starring role, paving the way for him to star in "Sideways".

So, in conclusion, Wesley Snipes's character says that anything's better than LA. I, for one, would rather choke on LA's smog than have to watch this movie again.


I find this film pointless. Big deal, there was an interracial relationship. This theme can hardly highlight a movie. And Robert Downey Jr. is totally wasted, having the oxygen mask on him for most of his role. Then again, they should have put oxygen masks on the rest of the cast, to stifle their lines. Come to think about, the audience in the theaters probably needed oxygen masks to keep from fainting at this poor flock.

I even found the sex scenes uninteresting.

What exactly was the theme or idea, or plot of this movie. No need to issue a spoiler here, because anyone watching this movie should be thoroughly dis-interested in the ending.


I was flipping channels one night and "The War Wagon" came on. I saw it when it came out in 1967, but not since. I had forgotten all about it, and was mesmerized by the theme song as the credits rolled. As the wagon thundered across the cowboy landscape, I began to chuckle, then laugh. After it ended, I decided that "The War Wagon" gets my vote as the worst theme song I have ever heard. It's so corny that it's hard to believe it ever got to be used. However, Hollywood westerns are notorious for some of the worst musical scores ever conceived. In fact, if you could remove the music from many westerns the movies would be vastly improved. It's always syrupy strings, Wagnerian hero-brass, and the standard thumping bass drums and trombones playing ominous minor scales whenever an Indian comes on the screen. Add a really dumb theme song like "The War Wagon" and that's how you write a horse opera.


The finale of MASH was tepid at best, stale at its worst.

There were allegations that the show had run its course several years before they finally decided to end it. It just wasn't the same for me when Radar left.

I Love Lucy ran for 7 or 8 years, Beverly Hillbillies for 9. MASH ran for 11 years.

This was the highest-rated finale because people wanted to see the train wreck. Would someone die? The big clincher was supposed to be Hawkeye going crazy. Oh, that was without a doubt the worst one here.

Alan Alda just ate it all up trying to be in denial what 'he had done' and then fall apart and then become defensive, but it was so flat, it was forgettable.

What he had done was supposedly caused a Korean mother to kill her own child. The insensitivity was that nothing was shown any further of the mother.

Yes, this was all Hawkeye's anguish wasn't it? I think we were all looking at it and going 'what about the mother?' This became something of a staple in 1980s television at this time; become overwrought over the actions of someone else, then watch how it pains me and not them.

A popular soap actor would talk about how he was torn up over the Viet Nam war for about three weeks. He didn't enlist, but he was trouble for that time period over whether he should or not, as tho this compared to vets who served two years or more over there.

Hill Street Blues would manage to make fun of people like this, with a character on the show stating pretty much the same thing (seems like it should have been Keil Martin's character), saying they were torn up for 24 days over the Viet Nam war, telling this to a vet.

It would go even further when a soap opera had a character operating a crisis hotline become overwrought when a person committed suicide over the phone. See our young star's anguish, how upset he is? Any viewer watching was going, hey, what about the kid on the phone? Funniest by far was Fame, one of the worst shows around, when Nia Peeples character left the show, she was killed off in an episode involving drunk driving.

Jesse, another character, tormented the driver about his actions, until finally Danny, who was also in the car, had to tell him "what about MY responsibility? I was in the car too?" Funny thing was, they stood in the snow, Danny and Jesse, sobbing as they hugged, but no one was hugging the poor kid who did the driving. He just stood there alone, crying to himself.

Television likes to think that these characters just go away; the suicide phone caller, the drunk driver and the Korean mother.

Hawkeye just skipped away back to America, cured by Sidney.

In the end, eveyrone's fave was the Korean band. They were the biggest stars, not Hawkeye's remorse.


Curly-haired young William Holden (as Joe Bonaparte) has trouble deciding what is best for him - is it playing the violin, boxing "The Chocolate Drop", or kissing Barbara Stanwyck (as Lorna Moon)? No points for guessing the correct answer. There is evidence of good writing skills in the script, but the quips come off as unintentionally funny - and, they are too flowery for the subject matter (which seems old hat, anyway). Clifford Odets' "Golden Boy" may have sounded better on stage. For this cast, Italian accents stick to the scenery like spaghetti. Lee J. Cobb, Joseph Calleia, and Sam Levene do not duck. One of the better lines is Holden's response to Stanwyck's initial brush-off, "See you in 1960, maybe you'll be somebody by then!" she says. Indeed.

*** Golden Boy (9/5/39) Rouben Mamoulian ~ William Holden, Barbara Stanwyck, Adolphe Menjou, Lee J. Cobb


This is a NEW and different review for this film. I had previously watched it and I was a little kinder to it. However, after seeing it again I really found the film wasn't nearly as mediocre as I remembered(it was a lot worse)--especially in the way it created caricatures instead of real and believable people. Hardly anyone in the film is very likable or believable--especially the lead, William Holden. Although he is a prodigy in boxing and with the violin, he just seems very selfish, unpredictable and stupid throughout the film. Plus, his motivation never seems clearly defined and his character just seemed hot-headed and foolish--and switching from one mood to another in mere seconds! As an example, for most of the film, he's a decent guy who likes his promoter and is infatuated with Barbara Stanwyck but then, in a matter or seconds, he casts them BOTH aside to join up with an obviously evil and slimy gangster as his NEW promoter! Huh?! This seemed only like a plot device and not something any sane or sober person would have done. Why did he do this? This is especially odd, since up until then he never acted crazy or hot-headed (just the opposite in fact).

Now the rest of the characters, with the exception of his father (played by Lee J. Cobb), were also difficult to follow or understand and it was hard to care about them at all. It was as if they were just outlines of characters and no attempt was made to define them or help you understand them at all. The exception was Cobb--who was very well designed as a character,...except that his "Italian" accent seemed extremely broad and almost comical (sort of like having Chico Marx play the dad). This was not one of Cobb's finer moments in film.

I think a couple other big problems with the movie is that there are MANY, MANY better boxing films (such as CHAMPION, THE SETUP, REQUIUM FOR A HEAVYWEIGHT, ROCKY, etc.) AND this plot is a re-working of the awfully dated JAZZ SINGER. Think about it, although the family is Italian and the dad wants him to be a concert violinist instead of a cantor, it's almost the exact same film. And that's sad, because apart from being the first "talkie", the JAZZ SINGER is a very clichéd and old fashioned film.

PS--This is a wonderful film to show your kids, as it has some lovely messages concerning marriage and the treatment of women. At one point, Lee J. Cobb yells at his son-in-law because he was slapping his wife in public--"you do that in the privacy of your own home" he explains. Then, the daughter (the victim) tells her dad to be quiet, as "he can hit me ANY TIME HE WANTS!". I'm sure that Susan B. Anthony and the other Suffragettes spin in their graves every time this film is shown!!


Some films age badly, but Golden Boy practically decomposes before your eyes. Not the print, which is crisp and beautiful as new in Columbia's recent DVD, but in plot and dialogue its beyond prehistoric. A-list production values it may have, but boy, is it bad.

Clifford Odets may have fashioned himself as a champion of the workingman, but his patronising portrayal of violinist-boxer William Holden's immigrant family makes Chico Marx look like Arthur Miller by comparison. No cliché is left unturned, be it Lee J. Cobb's Gepetto-like Ay-a-Tallyana papa, the lovable wife-beating brother-in-law (she loves it really: no, she really DOES) or Holden's Golden Boy playing Brahms' Cradle Song on the violin  you'll be rooting for him to bust his hand so he can never play the violin again. Ye gods, the man even names a black fighter  I'm not kidding  the Chocolate Drop. And the dialogue! The cast should have been paid danger money for going anywhere near it.

Barbara Stanwyck and Adolphe Menjou fare better, but Joseph Calleia's mobster is unintentionally funnier than Joe Piscopo's Danny Vermin in Johnnv Dangerously, though he does at least flick a mean cigarette. Even William Holden, in his star-,making role, is strikingly poor here. It's not just that, terrifying but true, he looks like a young Tom Hanks but his acting is clumsy, his voice weak and he occasionally looks unsure of how to act to camera: hard to believe that you're watching the first steps of a future screen great here  indeed, just about the only line to ring true is when Stanwyck tells him "I'll see you in 1966. By then, you may have become somebody." Do yourself a favour and see Body and Soul or The Set-Up instead.


This is a movie about a man who wants to be a violin player, but who becomes a boxer and injuries his hands. This film is back from the dark ages as far as how women are treated. In one scene the Father comments to his daughter's husband not to hit his wife in public, but to do it at home. Then the daughter tells her Father to butt out and that her husband can hit her anytime she likes. How sick! Oh and the movie practically put me to sleep too.


This movie was alright, i wouldn't watch it again but it was okay, some people thought it was great and some people thought it was the stupidest movie in history but i disagree with both sides of the story. It was funny in some parts and Jon Lovitz is a great comedy actor but needed some work in this movie


I would have to say the highlight of this movie was the drunk guy at the end of my row puking about halfway through. Jon Lovitz was at his annoying worst and the rest of the cast was completely unfunny. This is an hour and a half of my life that I will never have back and for that I am truly sorry.


I know it's supposed to be a spoof of "Dangerous Minds". But it goes overboard. It doesn't only spoof the film, it tries to be a film in its own right. And it's not.

Jon Lovitz plays Richard Clark, the Michelle Pfeiffer character. He is a high school teacher, who chooses to go teach in a baaad school full of baaad people, a real Gangsta's Paradise. Does this sound familiar? After winning the students' respect by flying away with the detached hood of a convertible (really!) he proceeds to inspire them for about two minutes as a teacher, and then he goes back to being a jerk.

Because Richard Clark goes beyond bumbling and into the realms of being completely and stupidly oblivious. It's supposed to be a farce, but even in the farcical frame it's unbelievable. No mean feat, really.

The love interest between Richard Clark and Victoria Chapell(Tia Carrere) was obviously written by the unsuccesful partnership between an 8-year-old girl and a wife-beating pervert. It doesn't really go anywhere, anyway, except for a toe-curling, cringable groan-a-thon of a sex scene.

The movie rolls along steadily until about half an hour is left of the film. That's when the writers seem to have run out of ways to make you groan within the framework of the film and decided to throw in a drug dealing ending that comes completely out of left field. It's supposed to be surprising and plot-twisting, but at this time no-one really cares about any of the characters anyway.

One more thing. When Richard Clark arrives at the high school the first time, the writers (reject writers from Mad Magazine, by the look and feel of it) spend a disproportionate amount of time convincing us that this school is baaad. But, as Richard Clark has taught there for some time, the school starts smartening up. Suddenly, there is less grafitti and plants in the halls. More and more, until at the end it's a beautiful, completely restored high school. How does this happen? Where did the moeny come from, and who OKed it? Not miss Doyle, that's for dahm sure. This could, arguably, be an expressionistic metaphor for the growth and development of Richard Clark. I don't believe this, though, for two reasons: a) What growth? b) This movie is nowhere near intelligent enough for that.


This film is utterly terrible on all fronts, and it is remarkable that it was made at all being as unfunny as it is.

This is clearly an attempt to be a slapstick film in the mode of Airplane. There's a difference - Airplane was original and funny, and had talented actors in it.

At least Tia Carrere was nice to look at as usual.


I gave Walk Hard a chance, I really did. I love Judd Apatow's work, as producer, writer or director. Knocked Up is one of my favorite comedies and Superbad is up there on the list. Orange County, directed by the director of Cox, was a decent film but wasn't great. But still, it had it's moments and was watchable. Normally, I can base a movies value on the names associated with it and their previous work , in fact that's the main reason I saw this movie. But sadly, it doesn't live up to anything they have been associated with prior (maybe Kicking and Screaming).

To start, I'll list the things that are good about the movie: The directing has a certain quality to it. Considering the director's previous work, I guess that makes sense.

It's not too far from a shot for shot remake of Walk The Line. Which I count as a good thing because that's what your going for in a spoof/parody.

They did a good job with the bio-pic aspect of it, which just means that they can see the humor in the constant ups and downs of a rock star's life.

Some, and I mean SOME, of the lines are good. I did chuckle and the Elvis part.

Now the bad: The first line of the movie is "I need Cox", I a movie were the main character, not just that but the movie, is named Dewey Cox, you can really only use that once. But they do it again and again.

The movie fools you into thinking it's a Jim Abrahams/David Zucker spoof (creators of cult comedies like Airplane!, Hot Shots! Top Secret! and Naked Gun) but becomes a Jason Friedberg/Aaron Seltzer spoof (creator of such Oscar worthy masterpieces as Scary Movie, Scary Movie 2, Scary Movie 3, Scary Movie 4, Date Movie, Epic Movie and the upcoming, and sure to be critical success, Meet The Spartans).

There's a monkey joke, enough said about that.

A poor representation of famous individuals, like Buddy Holly, Elvis, and the Beatles. If Buddy Holly has to tell me that he's Buddy Holly it's a bad movie. Even Jackson Browne, Lyle Lovett and Eddie Vedder are caricature of themselves. Basically the movie goes for the, "haha they are people pretending to be these people and they are doing it badly!That's funny!". As I mentioned before, Elvis was the only good one because I could see Elvis doing the "look out man!" thing, but even that gets ruined by a line that follows it that is basically "Only two kinds of people know it(referring to Karate), the Chinese and the King. And I'm the King." We get it you're Elvis Presley.

A monkey joke, it needs repeating, monkey jokes died in middle school.

The pacing of the movie interrupt scenes that could be used for character development and story to give you scenes feigning what could be considered important story points. It completely negates the scene prior. Example, Dewey Cox is in a hotel room living it up after his first taste of weed, he is on the phone with his wife. She begins to tell him that she feels a distance. Now normally, a Knocked Up type comedy would use this moment to bring down the fun for a moment. Use it to give us a real insight into the relationship of the characters, thus creating a more interesting level to any involvement later on. An Airplane type comedy would use this moment to do constant sight gags, or create a fake sense of pain increasing any sort of visual of audible humor later on. But instead it goes a complete different route when there's a knock the door. He hangs up and there is no development of his relationship with his wife or any really funny sight gags or quick quips. Instead we are treated to a story from Dewey's dad about how Dewey's music inadvertently killed his mom. Oh dear, his mom is dead due to his music. How plausible. That's not funny, that's Epic Movie. I shouldn't have expected more from a movie that has a little kid being chopped in half and still talking, with his legs just standing there. The whole thing leaves me confused as to what this movie wants me to find humorous.

I fail to see the humor in this movie, an occasional chuckle and smirk does not make this movie worthy of viewing. It could have been a lot better. Less irony and more funny. Airplane!, Naked Gun, Top Secret!, that's how this movie should have been. An Abrahams/Zucker-type movie making fun of bio-pics done by Apatow and Kasdan, that would be magic. But instead we are treated to a movie that suffers from schizophrenia, it's backed the names behind good comedies like Orange County and Knocked Up, It's titled like a Will Ferrel "Insert title: the story of insert guy's name" movie with none of the humor, it has the premise of an Abrahams/Zucker film, but is written like a Friedberg/Seltzer. The whole comes off as messy and leaving you feeling unfulfilled. Save your money and rent Apatow's back catalog and hope and pray that the train of suck that left Dewey Cox will derail and Apatow will be cool again. I think Kasdan might be lost though.


I loved Talladega Nights and was really looking forward to Walk Hard. I was extremely disappointed. This movie is slow, the jokes are stupid and the acting is terrible even for a comedy. I don't know if it was the lack of Will Ferrel or what. Despite having several cameos, and even some fairly funny people in major roles, this flick was a total flop. I don't like beating a dead horse, but I have to write ten lines about this pile of garbage. The only reason I sat through the whole thing was a vain hope that it was just a slow starter and laughs were around the corner. Its not even low-brow slapstick funny, Health Inspector was a better movie than this.


This movie was absolutely awful. The movie falls into inanity almost immediately, and just went downhill from there. This movie is crude, and lacks any plot. The acting is flat enough to make daytime TV look as high quality as stage acting. The movie relies on tired, dumb clichés and stupid dialogue to attempt to mock biopic movies. The effort fails, and absolutely miserably. This movie is totally unredeemable, and lacks social value. The site gags are not even able to make the movie amusing. This movie truly does rank among the five worst movies I have ever seen. I recommend either not watching, or if you must, finding some place to run and hide. Do not watch this movie if you value your brain cells. It is not humorous, and it is not satiric. It is not even slapstick.


As a fan of Will Ferrell-style comedy (and I've loved Reilly in other movies), as well as a fan of the Johnny Cash and Ray Charles biopics, I thought mixing the two couldn't go wrong. I was horribly disappointed. Almost every joke was completely predictable  you could see the punchline coming from a mile away, and when it arrived, it wasn't very funny. About the only thing good in this movie was Tim Meadows, who had me howling every time he was on screen (he's the only reason I gave it two stars instead of one). If my daughter hadn't been in the next theater watching a movie with her aunt, I would have walked out and gone home.