Stadt in Angst

This was one of the b-thrillers of the '70s released when there was the craze of the ''Dirty Harry'' movies (until the mid-1980s), and it has an unusual plot.

A sniper (Victor) hops around in a town where he kills people and demands that he wants money so he can stop his killing spree! So a tough law enforcer tries to stop the killer with every possible solution.

This thriller is very tame in comparison to flicks like ''Mitchell''; there is no blood, no sex scenes, and not much bad words. The problem is the script full of holes; Victor is a sniper (and former swimmer) that has a bone to pick with the USA because of his Vietnam war experience. His motives are explained in the end credits song, and to complete the weird stuff, he dresses as a native American and kills his victims with a jagged crossbow! So the city folks hire macho detective McCormick, and then the movie unfolds in a slow pace, with cheesy action sequences and subplots about the characters. But the ending it's a bit surprising, and the hero ends his killing spree with clean hands and with the money. It seemed to me that they compensated the plot holes with some nice shots of the Phoenix mountains in Arizona!

The actors are the true high-lights of the movie: Oliver Reed steals the scene with his bombastic appearence, but his only flaw is that his drunkness has the first focus on the movie instead of the plot, and in certain scenes talks like growling. By the way, Oliver Reed even here gives a great performance, and it's also funny to look at in some scenes. It's supported by few famous actors of those years: John Ireland, James Mitchum as a tracker, and Stuart Whitman as an arrogant milionaire are very good in their roles.

If you want to look some '70s thrillers of the Dirty Harry type, pick this one. It's a decent time-passer for an hour and a half.

Paul Koslo appears to be a crossbow killing phantom, since he often shows up out of nowhere, with no obvious means of getting there other than wings. His meaningless rants about the wind, only deepens a total mystery regarding his motivation for extorting the rich. Either an awful lot of this film wound up on the cutting room floor, or this is one of the most underdeveloped scripts ever. Stuart Whitman and Oliver Reed are charged with ending Koslo's mayhem, but to no avail as they seem to be constantly chasing smoke that simply disappears. Throw in the fastest seduction on film between Reed and Deborah Raffin, car chases for the sake of car chases, and you pretty much get the idea. The movie is watchable, because the desert scenery magnificent, but believability is nowhere to be found. MERK

A group of shady businessmen in a wealthy Arizona town find themselves extorted by a man who wants $1 million dollars. Ringleader William Whitaker (Stuart Whitman) decides the best course of action is to hire mercenary Nick McCormick (Oliver Reed) to eliminate the killer. Wow! This was a nice surprise from director Richard Compton (the Macon County movies). It has two great chase scenes, fantastic location work in the desert, and a cast to die for. Seriously, as the opening credits unfold you get like 6 greats in a row - Oliver Reed, Deborah Raffin, Stuart Whitman, John Irleand, Jim Mitchum, and Paul Koslo. Okay, 5 greats and Jim Mitchum. The Code Red blu-ray is definitely the way to see the film. It is presented in the 2.35 aspect ratio and includes a pre-credit sequence that Roger Corman's New World shot for it. Also, there is a longer TV cut which has extra scenes and a voice over by Reed. There is also an incredible 44-minute interview with Koslo. He spends the first 15 minutes talking about his role in this film and then the rest of it is talking about his career. He has great anecdotes about working with Charles Bronson, Charlton Heston, John Wayne, Paul Newman, Shelly Winters, and many more.

I am a great fan of novelist James Hadley Chase, a prolific writer of crime stories, between the late thirties and mid eighties, stories about psychopaths of all kinds, gumshoes, rogue cops, femme fatales, where greed, greed was the key word, where characters were lead only by gold lust, and certainly not love nor tenderness. That said, this very movie RANSOM, is not supposed to have been inspired by a Jim H Chase's novel. But for me, I am not that positive. Chase gave us WANT TO STAY ALIVE, back in 1971, which took place in a Florida town called Paradise City - in this film, the town where the action takes place is called Paradise - where an Indian born hoodlum decides to ransom rich people; if not the killing will begin. It is a violent but tense story, page turner topic, which is not exactly the same as this one, let's admit. The Olly Reed's character doesn't exist in the novel. This film is also very good, as good as the novel, believe me.

An American Indian named Victor (Paul Koslo, "The Stone Killer") is running around an Arizona town picking off people with his trusty crossbow. What he wants is for all the local fat cats to pay him a million to make him stop the killings. The richest jerk in the area, William Whitaker (Stuart Whitman, "The Comancheros"), hires a mercenary, Nick McCormick (Oliver Reed, "The Devils") to work on behalf of him and his peers. Since these particular fat cats are by and large a corrupt bunch, they would rather not use the regular legal channels. John Ireland ("I Saw What You Did") is the rather useless sheriff, Jim Mitchum ("Trackdown") a local hired for his tracking skills, and Deborah Raffin ("Death Wish 3") the reporter who takes a shine to gruff stranger-in-town Reed.

Directed by the late cult filmmaker Richard Compton ("Macon County Line"), "The Ransom" (also known as "Maniac!" and "Assault on Paradise") is decent entertainment, as far as it goes. There's nothing particularly interesting or different about it, it just tells a passable, routine story in capable fashion. It does have some good set pieces, whether they be vehicular chases or a stalking / suspense sequence set at Whitakers' estate. It is rather amusing, and ridiculous, how Victor is almost always way ahead of everybody else. He seems to have little trouble infiltrating defences and acquiring excellent vantage points. Nicely photographed (by Charles Correll) in scope, and scored (by Don Ellis), it moves along pretty well, but never gives us much info about, or insight into, the characters. Most of them are ciphers. And very little is done with many of the plot details.

Still, it's a treat to see Reed do just about anything, and here he gets to be moderately badass and try out an American accent. Raffins' reporter is a largely useless character, but Whitman is fun as the cranky moneybags who becomes increasingly frustrated over Victors' success and McCormicks' insistence on doing things his way.

Overall, a reasonable way to kill an hour and a half, with a fairly high body count but not much in the way of gore.

Six out of 10.