Viva Knievel - Der Tod springt mit

No one noticed the influence of Irwin Allen in this wretched production? The "Poseidon Alumni" of Red Buttons and Leslie Nielsen? The casting of Eric Olsen and Cameron Mitchell (two holdovers from Allen's poorly received "Swiss Family Robinson" series)? And the "Allen Tradmark" of casting over-the-hill has-beens -- in this case Gene Kelly -- in a 'throw away' role? Allen even threw in one of his old 'stand-bys', Albert Salmi (Captain Tucker, the space pirate from two episodes of "Lost In Space").

Almost the entire production crew is from the Irwin Allen camp including legendary special effects man L.B. Abbott (what for you ask -- I didn't see any 'special effects?). Even Allen's costume designer, Paul Zastupnevich, is along for the ride. Allen's wife played the Mother Superior in the famed scene where the orphan throws his crutches away at the sight of seeing Evel as he sneaks into the orphanage in the middle of the night(!).

The story behind this film is that producer Sherrill Corwin (who was the head of the Motion Picture Academy of Arts and Sciences during the '70s), was a major financial contributor to Irwin Allen's "Poseidon Adventure" and "Towering inferno." Allen needed backing because the studios baulked at the high production costs. But, by the mid-70s Irwin was 'The Man' and now it was 'pay back time' for Corwin when he wanted to hype Knievel, who by that time was a superstar among the teen-set. True, Evel Knievel WAS bankable when it came to packing arenas, selling lunch boxes, action figures and toy motorcycles. Problem was that in the acting department Evel was as wooden as a tree trunk and this movie shows it.

Not helping matters was the horrendous screenplay by Norman Katkov and Antonio Santillian (whoever he is), and the ingredients for a GRADE A Turkey were assured. It is surprising that Katkov co-penned such a bad script since he was also responsible for the famous "Blood and Orchids" mini-series of the early '80s. But then again, he was also one of the primary contributors to the screenplay for another Irwin Allen travesty: "The Return of Captain Nemo" (aka "Amazing Captain Nemo"), a mini-series produced or should I say released the following year.

"Viva Knievel" is best enjoyed by those suffering from insomnia or otherwise get their kicks from bad-movie marathons.

Oooh... Leslie Nielsen is trying to sabotage Evel's bike. Will Lauren Hutton discover the plot in time?

And can Evel convince his mechanic to give up the bottle, and be a good father to the son he has heretofore ignored?

Will Evel and Lauren give up their adversarial flirting and get together?

DOES ANYBODY CARE?!?!

I am a fan of bad, cheesy movies. And even this one had me snoozing. Although I do give it thumbs up on the marvelous transition from the final jump to the closing credits.

In VIVA KNIEVEL, the daredevil foils a drug shipment, charms a Mother Superior, reunites a long-estranged father and son, inspires crippled children to walk, woos a feminist news photographer and makes a 150-foot jump over a cage full of lions. Not all at once, however.

Robert Craig Knievel was one of his era's most singular pop culture figures, an endless self-promoter whose failures (e.g. his aborted 1974 Snake River Canyon jump) drew more media hype than almost anyone else's successes. A well-marketed, low-budget Knievel biopic starring George Hamilton did great at the box office in the early 1970s, so it was assumed the real Evel would also pack them into the theaters. But Knievel, unlike a Babe Ruth or Muhammad Ali, has no genuine on-camera magnetism and many of his line readings are horrid; trying to get Red Buttons to pay up on a debt, Evel says flatly, "You stole from me (long, long pause)... PROMOTER."

A quintessential 1970s cast (in fact, three POSEIDON ADVENTURE survivors appear here) includes a poorly-wigged Gene Kelly as Evel's alcoholic mechanic, a pre-AIRPLANE! Leslie Nielsen as the drug kingpin, Marjoe Gortner (take my word for it, kids, he was big in the 1970s) as Evel's protégé-turned-druggie and Lauren Hutton as the women's lib photographer who F-stops her way into Evel's heart.

Daredevil Evel Kneivel (just say his name out loud - ridiculous) stars as himself. The movie seems to portray Kneivel as some sort of wheelie-popping Christ figure.

You can't see it enough to fathom how truly bizarre it is. Kneivel says he's never taken a drug in his life, which is good so there was plenty enough to go around for the writer, the director and love interest Lauren Hutton.

And Kneivel's not even the weirdest guy in the movie! That honor goes to poor old Gene Kelly who plays Evel's sad excuse for a mechanic. His performance is quite possibly the worst captured on film; Kelly was playing this either as senile or retarded, though I suppose it doesn't matter which.

It's rough when the most convincing actor in the film is from Frank Gifford.

Oh, what an incredible trashy bad movie from the '70's this is, starring none other than Evel Knievel himself and Hollywood celebs from the 'old' days Gene Kelly, Red Buttons and Leslie Nielsen as a villain.

The movie has a real shaky plot that doesn't make an awful lot of sense. I don't know it has something to do with an evil Leslie Nielsen wanting Knievel death so he can smuggle drugs with Knievel's death body as a cover. Meanwhile there are also several side-plots that makes you wonder why they are even in there. It makes the movie often disjointed to watch and halve of the time you don't know what is going on, also because there is often very little actually happening in the story.

The movie was an obvious attempt to launch Evel Knievel a movie career. He was known for his daring motorcycle jumps stunts but he is perhaps even better known because of his inability to land. He crashed- and broken more bones during his stunts than a regular race-car driver would in his entire career.

Evel Knievel is in this movie presented as an all American hero. He is loved everywhere, he gets the girl and also does charity. Meanwhile he also gives important life lesson's to kids. by telling them they will eventually blow up once they start using drugs. He gets a standing ovation as well from the crowd after this inspiring speech.

The only last month deceased Evel Knievel just wasn't much good as an actor. It also didn't really helped him that he had Hollywood-cannon's Gene Kelly and Red Buttons opposite him. He turns all the more pale in comparisons to them. It's true that Kelly's and Buttons' careers already had their best time and the same goes for Leslie Nielsen, who in this movie plays one of his last 'serious'. This is basically also the only reason why those three appear in this movie. It was a bit weird to see Kelly as an 'old' man, mainly of course since I'm used to seeing him in only just '40's and '50's movies.

I can name at least a dozen movies out of the top of my head that are way worse than this one. So perhaps this movie is not entirely deserving it's title of 'one of the worst movies ever made' but nevertheless, this is a great example of bad movie making, which at the same time also makes this movie some delicious bad trash from the '70's to watch. Viva Knievel!

3/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/