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DEATH MACHINES (1976)
The machine on the cover - now THAT'S a death machine Three pairs of martial-arts warriors square off - Asian against Asian, white against white, black against black. The Asian dudes are using fancy-looking Asian martial arts weapons. The white guys appear to be unarmed. The black guys are fighting with SPEARS, shit you not. One Asian dude lets down his guard, and gets slashed. One black dude lets down his guard, and gets stabbed. Then one white dude whips out a knife! His opponent then whips out a gun and BAM! Such moments of humor whose intention are impossible to guess at (See also the Italian restaurant proprietor who says "I don't-a care what a-nybody says-a, you don't-a get spaghetti this-a good nowhere back east!") are what makes a movie like Death Machines such a hoot, as the three surviving warriors are employed by the Chinese Dragon Lady (Mari Honju, who appears to have at least one big fan at marihonju.com) to wipe out their competition so that all assassinations in town have to go through her. All their victims are given advance warning in the form of a little Buddha statue left where they can find it ("Hey! Who put this in my spaghetti?") At first it seems nice of them to stop these assassinations in progress (with martial arts, and bazookas), but they make a much bigger mess when they do things themselves - driving trucks into restaurants, slaughtering a dojo of like thirty students so they can get to the teacher. They all wear bulletproof vests (apparently made of stretchy cotton) and even a gunshot to the head only mildly slows down the white guy, who escapes from police custody to help his brethren catch and kill the only surviving witness to the dojo massacre, who lost his hand in the melee. This witness is romanced by a pretty nurse played by an unknown actress who he takes on a date at a seedy strip bar. A seedy strip bar where he's tending bar, because after losing his hand, he dropped out of college and is all like "I dunno...I need time to think" when asked what he wants to do with his life now. And then he gets his ass absolutely handed to him in a barroom brawl. While this would qualify as a disaster of a date for just about anybody, for some reason she sleeps with him, and the next morning, she looks hilariously disappointed with herself. (she's last seen getting kicked out of his car as he speeds off to chase the three assassins) Death Machines is never boring, and its plot never stops moving - its ostensible lead doesn't even get any lines until half an hour in, and he isn't even really involved in the climax. There's nothing original or thrilling about the story but it never settled into a groove, and I like that. (c) Brian J. Wright 2007 BACK TO THE D's BACK TO THE MAIN PAGE |