POINT BLANK |
| CREDITS: Director: John Boorman. Cast: Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, Carroll O'Connor,
Keenan Wynn & John Vernon. USA 1967 (15). INTRODUCTION: There is allegedly a new print of this classic piece of 60s cinema in circulation. Unfortunately it never turned up at the Midlands Art Centre and the print that finally made it to the Electric Cinema was so battered worn and old that the projectionist eventually set fire to it. In all fairness it's not his fault the film got jammed and Boorman's visuals are so 60s that it took us all a while to realise that the 20 minute shot of Marvin's face slowly melting wasn't actually part of the film. SYNOPSIS: Double crossed and left for dead, after a heist gone awry; do they ever go to plan? Marvin returns from the Rock searching for revenge and encountering the corporation, a world of high finance and big business, populated with sleazier characters than he ever encountered in the underworld of the 50s. Unable or unwilling to pay him his cut of the heist he works his way up the corporate ladder killing them off one-by-one. REVIEW: Based on the novel "The Hunter" by Donald E. Westlake (writing as Rickard Stark), the story follows the bull-headed Walker, apparently plucked from the 50s and dumped into LA of the 60s a city more angular and menacing than Marvin himself. Walker struggles to find his place as he goes up against the corporation in his pursuit of the money he is owed. Marvin is coldly bewildered, a tricky combination to pull off, as Walker, Dickinson is superb if somewhat under-utilised as Chris, Vernon makes a stunning debut as the treacherous Reese, and fine support comes in the form of O'Connor and Wynn The film is very reminiscent of much of the 90s stuff put out by the likes of QT and the Coens, complete with heist gone awry, brutal violence and its European aesthetic. Indeed a Hollywood remake "Payback" starring Mel Gibson is in production as we speak, but it is a film that is unique to its time that there is little a remake could do to recapture that. No review of Point Blank can of course be complete without discussing the denouement, and while I'll try not to give too much away, if you haven't seen the film yet you may wish to stop reading now. (Of course you may wish to stop reading now anyway. ) Ostensibly returning to the scene of the crime, the so called "Alcatraz run", Walker at last seizes control of the plot back from the no longer mysterious Yost and vanishes. In the very last shot we see the camera pull back to reveal the twinkling lights of the Rock far in the distance across the bay, so we are not in Alcatraz for the final scene after all but rather in the aptly named Fort Point. What does all this mean? Many have taken it as proof that Walker never survived the encounter on the Rock, indeed looking back how could a man shot at point blank range possibly hope to escape from this island fortress, and that the whole film has been little more than the last gasp revenge fantasy of a dying brain. Many of Chris's lines "Why don't you just lie down and die", "you died on Alcatraz" would seem to have hinted at this possibility throughout the whole film as indeed did Marvin's cold, unemotional performance. Whether this is true or not I don't know and I don't think it really Matters. There seems to be a recurrent theme running through western philosophy that a text should only have one reading. I think that the multi-layered affect of contrasting readings evident in this film is one of its strongest points. If you want to see a classic of 60s film noir, and you can find it, maybe you should see the new print. Mutt's Rating: **** |