Rating: 4.5/5
Cult Movie Challenge 2016 | 14/52 | John Carpenter
— This can't happen! In the middle of a city, during the day... — Then let's pinch each other and wake up
Throughout a Saturday in Los Angeles, a series of events converge into a powder keg of violence.
Cholos accrue automatic weapons and take to the streets.
Lt. Bishop is assigned to watch over a closing precinct for its last night open.
A bus with three death row inmates has to make a stop when one of them gets sick. They stop at Bishop’s precinct.
A distraught man runs into the building. He cannot speak, but we know that he shot and killed a Cholo. And they want vengeance.
The phone line goes out. Then the power. Then all hell breaks loose.
This script has several moving parts, and it maneuvers through it expertly. At the core, it’s a Western, but with a limited budget, everything is modernized. The result is a tense and magnetic pot-boiler where everything convenes into a nightmare.
The action is mostly unadorned. Bullets fly, and people die. It feels more like a horror movie than an action flick. When gang members climb through the windows, the Night of Living Dead influence leaps out.
As I associate Riki-Oh: The Story of Ricky with Stewart Wellington from The Flop House podcast, I associate this movie with Elliott Kalan from the same podcast. This is one of his favorites, and I understand why.
Laurie Zimmer is such a fucking badass. They get a scene where the street light cuts across her face like a noir and she delivers a cold speech.
The dialogue gets cheesy in a couple of places, and the pacing before the climax isn’t great. But this movie nails a lot and is one of the best action movies I’ve seen.