Point Blank (French, DVD)

Reviews

"My review" by Jenny S. - 4 June 2018

"Point Blank" by Micky B - 23 September 2013

A no-nonsense Lee Marvin crime drama that has become a cult classic. Had it been made in the 1930s or 1940s, it would be classified as a <i>film noir</i>. And although this high-profile production was lensed in colour and Panavision, it’s basically the same kind of movie. It starts and ends on the former island prison of Alcatraz. A big man, only known as “Walker” (Lee Marvin) was apparently one of only a tiny handful of men ever to escape from The Rock, and make his way safely back to the mainland! Together with his friend Mal Reese (John Verman,) Walker is promised $93 000 for his part in helping steal a large sum of cash from a courier transporting funds for a major gambling operation. But the whole thing is a set-up, and Reece shoots Walker, leaving him for dead, before making off with Walker’s wife, Lynn (Sharon Caker.) Walker recovers, and starts to follow a long line of the men who set him up. Apart from Reece, Walker is not really out for revenge. He just wants somebody to pay him the $93 000 that he says is due to him! At the specific request of Lee Marvin: John Boorman agreed to direct the film, that included in the cast Angie Dickenson, Keenan Wynn, and Carroll O’Connor (remember him on TV as bigot Archie Bunker?) And as in the case of Hitchcock’s classic <i>The Birds,</i> you will either <i>love</i> the ambivalent ending (I certainly did!) or be <i>frustrated</i> by it!