10 to Midnight
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Movie Reviews of 10 to Midnight
Movie Review: My favorite Bronson film.
Summary: 4 Stars
This film is worth watching the acting here was solid not great but solid. Obviously the nurses getting slaughtered in this film were inspired by the real life Chicago massacre committed by Richard speck but it was altered so the film won't get sued.Movie Review: Bronson headlines enjoyable Cannon fodder
Summary: 3 Stars
10 TO MIDNIGHT
(USA - 1983)
Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
Theatrical soundtrack: Mono
A world-weary LA cop (Charles Bronson) plants evidence on a young man (Gene Davis) suspected of the serial homicide of several beautiful women, but the plan backfires and Davis subsequently targets Bronson's grown-up daughter (Lisa Eilbacher)...
One of a series of gritty urban thrillers inspired by the success of DEATH WISH, J. Lee Thompson's 10 TO MIDNIGHT was produced by the Cannon studios in 1983 and is fairly typical of the company's commercial output. Though he'd worked in a variety of genres since the early 1950's, Charles Bronson became synonymous with the kind of tough-but-sympathetic vigilante character he plays here, this time seeking a handsome young psychopath who strips naked before murdering his (primarily female) victims. Indeed, Gene Davis' extensive nude scenes provide the film's only significant trump card, leading to a number of curious plot developments (because he was naked when he committed his crimes, Davis knows that Bronson must have planted blood on his clothes, but he can't admit to it without... well, you get the picture), though cinematographer Adam Greenberg (GHOST, RUSH HOUR, the 'Terminator' series) turns visual cartwheels in an effort to avoid full frontal nudity (and a potential X rating).
Thompson - who gravitated towards Hollywood after forging a successful career in his native UK, where he directed a number of popular mainstream entries like YIELD TO THE NIGHT and THE GUNS OF NAVARONE - takes enormous pleasure in foregrounding the more exploitable elements of William Roberts' lively screenplay, though an unpleasant sequence near the end of the film evokes queasy memories of Richard Speck's true-life killing spree in 1966, when several nurses were slaughtered in a Chicago townhouse in a fashion similar to the killings depicted here. However, these sensationalist components are deployed in the service of a right-wing narrative in which the criminal justice system is rendered weak and ineffective by Davis' scumbag killer and his equally sleazy lawyer (a typically scene-stealing turn from Geoffrey Lewis). When Bronson confronts his nemesis during the inevitable climactic showdown, the audience is literally compelled - through dialogue and editing - to invite brutal retribution on Davis' irredeemable bad guy. It's cheap, manipulative and cynical, but it's also undeniably effective, and Bronson's closing line of dialogue is guaranteed to arouse guilty fascist impulses within even the most liberal viewers.
Davis is the spitting image of his actor brother Brad (the late and much lamented star of MIDNIGHT EXPRESS) and is quite effective in a difficult role, though his subsequent career appears to have gone nowhere, which is a shame. Co-star Andrew Stevens made a brief splash in movies like this one (including Brian DePalma's THE FURY) before becoming a producer on a wide range of Hollywood pictures (everything from 'erotic thrillers' such as NIGHT EYES to blockbusters like DRIVEN and BALLISTIC ECKS VS. SEVER, etc.), and Lisa Eilbacher enjoyed a momentary spotlight on the big screen before returning to TV (where she had begun her career in the likes of "The Texas Wheelers" and "The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries") before fading from the business altogether. Word has it that the title 10 TO MIDNIGHT (a meaningless phrase) had been announced by Cannon for another film which ultimately failed to materialize, but someone obviously liked the sound of it and simply re-used it here! The 'TV version' is a laff riot, with alternate takes featuring Davis in black briefs. On DVD, however, you get to see (almost) every inch of his fabulous, sculpted body. Drool, slobber...
Movie Review: A Trash Classic
Summary: 3 Stars
During the 1980's Cannon Films was the trash can of cinema. Very rarely did they produce any film worthy of praise. Rugged actor extraordinaire Charles Bronson was unquestionably their greatest asset in their acting stable. Brosnon's career was a painfully long time coming. Despite co-starring in Once Upon A Time in a West, The Dirty Dozen, and The Great Escape, all films that are considered down right classics, his career as a leading man didn't materialize until the first Death Wish film. After Death Wish, Bronson generally started getting type casted as one-dimensional men who make their own rules inside and outside the law. 10 to Midnight is no exception and this film stars Bronson and let's face it, people you can't remember because in the Cannon Films library very rarely do you recognize more than one or two names.
There really isn't much to analyze in 10 to Midnight because it's pretty simple. Bronson plays a detective named Leo Kessler who is tracking down a serial killer who is knifing girls butt naked. The killer, named Warren Stacy, is played by Gene Davis who does a pretty good job in this film. Davis manages to make the Stacy character as rather twisted and yet pathetic. You certaintly would not rank Waren with Lecter or Kevin Spacey's killer in Se7en but it's harsh to dismiss Stacy out-right. He fits into the cheesy atmosphere.
Speaking of cheese, there is no end to it. J. Lee Thompson directed this film and it's a far cry from his early classics like Cape Fear and The Guns of Navarone but he does a good job. He directs Stacy's persuit of his first victim with flair despite the obviously low budget. Of course Stacy's victim is too stupid to run when he finally catches up with her and there's a nice close up Stacy enjoying the sensation of stabbing the woman. One too many times in this film we say "Don't open that door !" or "Run you idiot !" but it's part of the fun. Thompson knew how to play up the corn and it works and it does stand up even after repeated viewings.
Really, I think you could pin-point where this film goes exactly and that is what makes it a fairly bad film but the ride is fun. One of the few times I can say that someone should take it for what is and it dosen't want to be anything else.
Movie Review: Don't stand too close to a naked man
Summary: 3 Stars
The completely nude serial killer is about the only thing that makes this movie stand out. Otherwise it is a pretty middle of the road, `80's action picture. The oh-so `80's music and some of the camera work almost make this feel like a parody of those movies. And the ridiculous dénouement practically screams Reagan-era conservatism.
All this may sound like I didn't like the movie, but I did. It is no classic, but it's not a bad little time-waster.
Movie Review: One of Bronson's very worst
Summary: 1 Stars
In a career filled with too many bad movies, 10 to Midnight may well be a low point even for Charles Bronson. Shamelessly cashing in on his Death Wish reputation, he's yet another jaded cop who thinks "The way the law protects these maggots out there you'd think they were an endangered species" on the trail of Gene Davis' naked psychotic misogynistic serial killer and willing to bend the law to put him behind bars. When that doesn't work out because of a sudden attack of integrity and the machinations of Geoffrey Lewis' corrupt lawyer ("We can always plead insanity later"), the loon naturally goes after Bronson's semi-estranged daughter (Lisa Eilbacher), who luckily has enough scantily-clad roommates to keep him and his `penis-substitute' knife occupied until the cavalry can arrive in time for one last pre-kill one-liner.
It's genuinely sleazy and seedy (Bronson even gets to wave a sex toy around in one interrogation scene), and not in a good way, revelling in its clumsily voyeuristic slasher movie aesthetic while getting on its high-horse for crude bumper sticker moralizing - "I remember when legal meant lawful. Now it means some kind of a loophole" and "Forget what's legal and do what's right." It's also, Bronson aside, almost uniformly badly acted and shoddily made: this isn't guilty pleasure bad, just bad bad, and dreary with it. Shoddy stuff.