Kansas City Bomber

Loana-NO PHOTO AVAILABLE! This is what you are greeted with on IMDb when you click on the character name of Raquel Welch from ONE MILLION B.C….Considering her iconic fur-bikini clad image was the best-selling poster EVER until Farah Fawcett came along a decade later, I find this fact to be just beyond the limits of my Suspension of Disbelief! I imagine that someone, somewhere, feels that Jo Raquel Tejada deserves a break….And believe me, I could not possibly be in more agreement with that decision! With its miserable 5.4 IMDb rating, and MEASLY 711 votes, (To be crystal….That's considerably LESS than the 1,000 votes needed to be taken seriously here!) I state, most emphatically, that BOMBER is the most underrated film of the thousands on which I have voted on this website! Believe me, I have NEVER made the previous comment before!

Here is a film which parallels the intense focus of its lead character, K.C. Carr, on the somewhat seamy world of professional team roller-skating. For those of you under 40, this sport (or is that exhibition?) enjoyed a considerable cult following in the 50's, 60's and 70's. BOMBER does not pretend to offer us romance or glamor or alternate back-stories…Just a gritty and intense focus on K.C. Carr and her obsession to excel in team-skating. Perhaps, this is a bit of a metaphor for her desperation to be taken seriously as an actress? How do I recall so clearly a film released well over 40 years ago? That's a fair question!

Well, when HANNIE CAULDER was released in 1971, I thought the film was rather under-appreciated by both the critics and the public alike and, even much more obvious, was the undeserved nature of the almost universal panning of Ms. Welch's performance in the title role! There was a growing vocal tide of resentment in the media against Raquel Welch. When BOMBER was released, the media was awash in Raquel Welch jokes…Johnny Carson quipped: "Hey, how about that new Raquel Welch movie…Kansas City BOMBER…Talk about accurate Box-Office Predictions!!!" Ahhhhh…Ms. Welch has been haunted, for most of her career, by the ghost of Loana (Photo Seared into our Collective Cultural Memory!) So, I paid to see BOMBER on three occasions in 1972, applying my most critical eye! All I could see was a very skilled actress whose interpretation permeated every cell of her being. I suppose I was one of a very select group who saw it that way! BOMBER does have a lot more going for it than just the title role…Helena Kallianiotes turns in an excellent performance in a Golden Globe nominated supporting role.

BOMBER displays even handed direction that immerses us in the very realistic, rather seedy world of professional team skating. The technical excellence of the filming and editing of the on track scenes also cannot be overlooked. Although you might not rate it 9*, as I did, if you can manage to see BOMBER with an open mind, I am sure you will find it both entertaining and worthwhile!

ENJOY!/DISFRUTELA! Any comments, questions or observations, in English o en Español, are most welcome!

Let me get this out of the way, not only was I a huge roller derby fan, Raquel Welch was my first pubescent crush. I was only six at the time this film was released and I every Saturday afternoon I would sit glued to the set watching my favorite team, the Los Angeles Thunderbirds do battle every week with their rivals. Now when I heard that there was a movie about the roller derby coming out, I was extremely excited. Also, when I saw Raquel Welch on the cover of Life Magazine, I really got excited. However, I had to wait a few years to see this movie on television and when I did, I couldn't see what I made a fuss about. Sure, Ms. Welch was hot in this film and the skating sequences were excellent, but as far as the story goes, you can have it. The story was nothing but pure soap opera. The only thing I really enjoyed about this film was Norman Alden's performance as the aging roller derby star who acted as sort of a big brother to K.C.. Other than that and the skating sequences, this movie fell flat. However, if you want to see what made roller derby big in the 1970's, this film is for you.

OK, so before Raquel became a "serious" actress, she did a number of fluffy, inconsequential films which displayed far more of her physical attributes than any heavy-duty acting chops. This film (while keeping la Raquel covered, for the most part) pretty much falls into "fluffy": good-hearted but lonely divorceé Diane "KC" Carr tries to make it in the Roller Games circuit, clashing with female cohorts and dodging male advances. Being a huge fan of Roller Games during the early 70s, I was thrilled that this film featured a number of RollerGame stars who were big at the time. Toss in a love affair between KC and a manipulative team owner, stir in strained relationships between KC & her mother and KC and one of her two young children (one played by a young Jodie Foster), add a bitter rivalry with fading Roller Games queen Jackie (excellent Golden Globe nominated performance by Helena Kallianiotes) and there hangs the drama. Kevin McCarthy oozes as the pawn-shifting team owner, and pulls off the love-interest quite believably in spite of the fact he is 26 years her senior! Overall, a good effort (with La Raquel executive producing) and a check-your-brains-at-the-door kind of movie, but one I still love to curl up in front of... even while folding laundry.

As of March 15, 2005, I just learned that the movie is finally scheduled for DVD release May 31, 2005. For those of you who have bought previous DVD versions, you're probably already aware that they're cheesy bootleg copies, mostly taped from TV then transferred to DVD-R; says the seller, "I bought this at a convention, so that's why the picture isn't so great."

It took some courage to make a sports movie like this, one that's cynical about everything, including the sport it's highlighting. Sports movies today (ever since "Rocky") are usually uplifting and positive and as such feel kind of fake and silly. But this movie is nothing like that. It takes you right down into the gutter of life. And at times it can be kind of depressing to watch. In fact, one of the main characters is a clinically depressed alcoholic very effectively played by Helena Kallianiotes, who was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for this role. But as the movie goes along you feel like you're watching something real, even though the sport itself is supposed to be "fake".

And Raquel Welch gives a very real performance. Her character is gritty, sad, lonely, and vulnerable, and Raquel captures all of that very effectively. She tries to work her way through all the cynicism, even her own.

If you prefer dark and gritty sports movies then you might enjoy this. And, of course, Raquel Welch is in it and that's always a big plus.

Raquel Welch broke her wrist doing some of her own stunts, in this movie where action is all-important, and plot non-existent. In 1972, by her own admission, Raquel Welch was a sex goddess who hasn't turned serious actress -- and "Kansas City Bomber" changed nothing. Raquel said in an interview at the time, that when she was growing up in La Jolla, CA, she would sometimes strap on a pair of skates and clank all the way from her porch to her garage and back. When she was 7, she put the skates away and didn't skate again until a year ago when she began readying herself for "Kansas City Bomber." Raquel reported to a banked oval track built for her on a Hollywood lot, where she skated 5 hours a day for 3 months. Her tutor was famous skater Paul Rupert who skated along beside her, coaching her and teaching her the basics of 5 strides on the banked track, how to take falls (fall backwards -- if you fall forwards you could break a wrist), and everything else she needed to know.

There is almost no time for any love interest in this movie, what with the all the Roller Games and bruising grudge matches. Whatever its dramatic shortcomings, and there are many, "Kansas City Bomber" does offer Raquel looking good even in pads, some authentically seedy roller skating locales, and real heroes and villains of the banked track. Sharp-eyed fans will recognize real-life Roller Games players from the L.A. Thunderbirds: tall John Hall, and big blocker Danny "Carrot Top" Reilly; the games announcer even mentions the names of top jammer Ralphie Valladares, and Ronnie "Psycho" Rains (with a beard), and "Little" Richard Brown -- who is still skating (now in Roller Jam) almost 30 years later! The game they play is some hybrid of Roller Derby and Roller Games that does not exist in real life. It lends a surreal atmosphere which is appropriate. Raquel's nemesis on the banked track is Helena Kallianiotes, a Belly Dancer in "Head" (1968). Try suspension of disbelief, and you will enjoy this movie forever ("and forever is a long, long time!")