Just a thought. If you are trapped under a car with the gas leaking and asking the man standing there for help, it is probably best that you don't confess to killing his father and call him the N-word. Just a friendly suggestion. Especially if that man is Slaughter. Jim Brown as Slaughter - ex Green Beret - gets to do a lot of his trademark in this film - running. Which may seem tame until you remember that he was one of the greatest running-backs ever and that people loved to see him run. His famous run in The Dirty Dozen is imprinted on our minds like a tattoo and here he runs to avoid two cars trying to kill him in a narrow alley. Guess who wins that race? Mr. Brown, we didn't hire you to act; we hired you to run. Though he had been appearing in some fine films since 1967 - The Dirty Dozen, Ice Station Zebra, 100 Rifles - his acting hadn't improved much. But for a low budget action film, it is good enough. On top of that there is Stella Stevens showing mounds of cleavage when she isn't showing everything and Rip Torn as a smirking, snarling bad guy with really bad hair. It makes for a solid Drive-In movie.
The film opens with an older black couple getting into their car and your movie antenna immediately go up - something bad is going to happen otherwise why show this - and sure enough ka-boom. Some unlucky son-of-a-bitch just killed Slaughter's parents. Big mistake. He kills a few just as an appetizer but then the cops - Cameron Mitchell - point him towards Mexico where the real bad guys are. He plays it cool though - only a kill here and there - no one seems to really notice that there is a dead man in the hotel pool and another in the air conditioning vents. He seduces Torn's girlfriend Stella by Starlight who happily takes orders to keep close to Slaughter. No, I didn't mean that close! The movie comes to a dead halt when Slaughter and Stella get it on - twice - and are all lovey-dovey - but then it is Stella Stevens who isn't shy.
It has one of those dumb action endings in which some 30 bad guys can't hit either Slaughter or his partner (Don Gordon) but they just aim and a bad guy falls down. But they make up for it with a fine car chase that is very well filmed and edited. Directed by Jack Starrett who would next direct Cleopatra Jones. Title song from Billy Preston. AIP produces.
Slaughter's Big Rip Off (1973) - 6.5
Director: Gordon Douglas
How can you tell that you are about to dip into a low rent movie - when Ed McMahon is the main villain and he isn't shouting "Here's Johnny". It is definitely a step back for director Gordon Douglas who had been making all types of films since the 1930s - even a classic Laurel and Hardy movie, a Bob Hope movie, one of the Falcon films, Dick Tracy vs Cueball, the great B film Them! but then in the late 1960's got a stream of good A pictures - Tony Rome, Lady in Cement, The Detective all with Sinatra and then right before this one They Call Me Mr. Tibbs. Not that this is a bad film - it is good fun but trashy is scrawled across it in bright neon with lots of naked women, sleazy guys with moustaches, cocaine up everyone's nose, dirty cops, pimps with hats higher than Moody's rating for Switzerland, a string of seductive girls for hire, a cold blooded hitman played by Don Stroud and Slaughter who keeps talking about himself in the third person as in "Hey baby, this is Slaughter, the coolest cat in the world". And he may well be.
Slaughter is back from killing half the population in Mexico in Slaughter (1972) but sadly Stella Stevens was left behind dead or alive - we are not sure. But he hurt a lot of feelings with those killings and the gang is out for revenge. A little clumsily as Slaughter is out in the countryside at a luncheon with friends - whites at their own tables and blacks at their table - which struck me as odd - when a small plane machine guns many of them down. The Big Boss (McMahon) isn't happy with that less than subtle method and calls in a pro from Miami - Stroud - and tells him to clean up things by first killing the inept killer. I loved this scene. At a party with a bunch of people around the pool. Without a word they all somehow know that a kill is about to take place and politely take their leave as the soon to be victim floats peacefully in the pool.
Well, Slaughter is pissed off and wants his revenge. As he tells his annoying girlfriend Gloria Hendry I have to kill them before they kill me. And not surprisingly a lot of killing follows. Filmed without any particular style - what you see is what you get. Slaughter isn't one for witty or clever repertoire before he kills someone. You see them, you shoot them. Or knife them. Or club them to death. Or blow them up. Or beat them to death with your fists. He brings variety to his kills. It rarely slows down except when Hendry shows up and whines and has a few terrific scenes.
