I saw this after listening to an enthusiastic recommendation from a Quentin Tarantino interview, knowing how iffy his taste can be. It was one of his 70s attempts to do something a little different - this was written and directed by Frank Gilroy.
It's a bright idea that could have worked as a gangster movie: Charles Bronson is an outlaw who spends an afternoon with Jill Ireland, who then cashes in on the notoriety to such a degree than Bronson finds himself frozen out of his own history.
I'd classify this has a half success. I really love that Bronson tries here, and clearly made this film to give Jill Ireland a decent role. Ireland tries but simply isn't up to it. I mean imagine, I don't know,Faye Dunaway or Katherine Hepburn or Vanessa Redgrave or... anyone who was a better actor, really. I don't mean to be mean, truly. It's great they had a swing.
Bronson is far more animated than he was in so many of his seventies films. He didn't feel quite right but it was a good try.
The film feels as though it leans towards Preston Sturges territory but lacks something. Maybe stronger support roles - parts like Ireland's maid and Bronson's former gang members feel as though they should have been bigger. It's a satire of society's glamorisation of crime... I feel society needed to be personified.
It's a pleasing tune they wrote for this film and this actually would form the basis of a decent musical.
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