Shotgun

For a time, I thought I was the only person in the world to see this sorry excuse for a movie, catching it during late-night TV. Sometimes this movie is so bad, it's hilarious. But mostly it is INCREDIBLY AWFUL. And I don't mean just everyday AWFUL - I'm talking about ****AWFUL****! The actor who plays the character who gets the creative nickname "Shotgun" is perhaps the WORST ACTOR IN THE WORLD! Really! I'm not kidding.

Maybe you should see this movie anyway, because anything you'll see afterwards will look even better!

P.S. - This production company (formerly City Lights, now PM Entertainment) did improve over time, and now PM generally makes decent and slick B movies that deliver the goods. The general rule, however, is to avoid ALL their movies made before 1993!

My review was written in March 1989 after watching the movie on Raedon video cassette.

"Shotgun" is a lean, mean action pic for video, bringing some good acting and okay technical work to the overworked cops-on-the-vice-beat genre.

Stuart Chapin toplines as Detective Ian Jones, an L. A. cop who gets mighty steamed when his sister, a prostitute, is offed by a sadistic sex maniac. Thrown off the force, he becomes a skip tracer nicknamed Shotgun because of his weapon and his ruthless but efficient methods.

With ex-partner on the force Riff Hutton, Chapin ultimately gets the killer and puts a massive drug ring out of commission. Vigilante payoff scene is something of an anticlimax, but filmmaker Addison Randall keeps things moving otherwise.

Chapin is effective as the antihero, with Hutton (previously teamed with Andy Garcia as test examiner in "Stand and Deliver") scoring as his loyal sidekick.l Poster art and video packaging benefit from spotlighting a beautiful blonde who does not appear in the film proper.

Just like the majority of the reviewers, I caught this little gem late late night (3 a.m) on my local ABC station some years ago. I'am glad that I'm not the only one in the world that has enjoyed this masterpiece. It has all your classic PM Entertainment elements: Hollywood backdrop, angry detectives, car crashes/explosions, unsuspecting hookers, loud screeching guitar solos, machine guns that sound like pistols, but no Lawrence-Hilton Jacobs (j/k). This is probably my favorite movie out of my PM Entertainment video library, the reason, its that damn good!!

Stuart Chapin plays a total badass from beginning to end, his theme song just kicks, "Shotgun...Shotgun Jones". Rif Hutton (the KFC guy :) just tears it up as Chapin's partner, Max Billings, later to be promoted to Det. Sgt. Max Billings. My favorite supporting cast member is probably Broadway Joey, his charm and goofy front tooth will melt your heart away, what more do you want from a adult bookstore clerk?

Favorite scene is probably the night club scene, with the DJ spinning some tight background beats, the scene builds up to an awesome performance by Chapin (I think somebody should of told that guy in the black sweater that people will notice you wearing the same black sweater two nights in a row, keep an eye out for this guy, very crucial in the movie). Favorite line is probably this one, Det. Sgt. Max "KFC" Billings: "You know the streets are starting to call you Shotgun Jones." Shotgun Jones: "Well its better than what they used to call me."

OMG what a classic line!!

I think I should stop before I give away all the juicy stuff, if you like "Shotgun" I highly recommend other PM Entertainment videos such as, "Angels of the City", "Deadly Breed", "Quiet Fire", and the Det. Jon "Welcome Back Kotter" Chance Trilogy, "L.A. Heat", "L.A. Vice", and "Chance". Oh, my second favorite PM movie is "The Art of Dying" with my man Wings Hauser, check it out, another gem from the people of PM.

I loved all these PM Entertainment movies that I went on eBay and bought as many as I could. My friends think I'm a loser for proudly displaying these movies on my TV shelf. But who cares, friends come and go, but I will always have my PM movies with me!! :D

Two cops…two different cops…one white, one black…one officious and one who doesn't play by the rules. Playing by the rules can get you killed.

You may have encountered the above scenario a few times before. Shotgun is without doubt a cliché-fest and I love it for it. It's central character is called Ian 'Shotgun' Jones and he is on the hunt for a sadistic misogynistic maniac in a gimp suit. Stuart Chapin plays the title character perfectly with zero irony and humour; this makes him all the funnier of course. This is the joy of Shotgun in general, in that everything is played deadly seriously while at the same time being quite magnificently ridiculous. Take the scenes near the end where Jones and his buddy more or less build a tank out of scrap metal – pure hokum but oh so much fun. This extends to the music too. The soundtrack consists of many guitar solos and a theme song about the title hero. It's pure 80's cheese. Add to this a shot of a man being thrown into a pile of cardboard boxes from three separate angles, a badge handing-in scene, an angry chief, an arrogant lawyer villain, lots of prostitutes, people dancing in suits, a man being set on fire and then run over by a car, etc etc…you get the general idea.

As you might have guessed already, Shotgun is essentially a Lethal Weapon rip-off. It follows the basic template quite closely but obviously with hugely lower production values. Oddly enough, this doesn't effect the enjoyment level of the film very much at all, as it's not especially expensive to make an action thriller if you do it without any star names. And I might actually prefer Stuart Chapin and Rif Hutton to Mel Gibson and Danny Glover. I mean did Gibson and Glover ever appear in a drunk scene quite like the one here? In this one, Chapin and Hutton meet for a few beers at the latter's house and all I can say is it looks like they have had their drinks spiked as their acting suggests that they are tripping on acid as opposed to being ripped on alcohol. This is one of the funniest attempts at drunk acting I have ever seen. Another classic moment to look out for is in the corridor of the police station where the film-makers have decided to try and make the small number of extras they hired seem like a much larger group of people – watch characters walk off screen only to return a few seconds later in the opposite direction wearing shades etc. Great stuff.

Shotgun is a terrifically entertaining bad movie. It has an agreeable smattering of action, sleaze and unintended hilarity. Definitely a hidden gem of a movie for bad movie buffs. A very entertaining flick overall.

There are bad films and there are 'so-bad-they're-good' films. 'Shotgun' falls – weirdly – somewhere between the two. Part of me wants to say that it was truly the worst film I've ever seen. But then I am I charge of the remote control. I could have turned it off any time I wanted, yet I didn't – I stuck with it until the end. I guess that means I took some strange form of enjoyment out of it? I guess if I had to describe 'Shotgun' I'd call it a 'Lethal Weapon' clone, only filmed on the budget of £1.59. It's about two (mismatched) cops (one black, one white) on the trail of a brutal serial killer (as opposed to the kind and gentle serial killers, of course!).

Now, normally this is the point in the review where I say something like 'So… if you're a fan of 'buddy-cop' movies then you'll probably get something out of it.' I know it's not the most original premise, but it can't be THAT bad, can it? The answer to that question is 'Yes.' The problem with this film isn't its lack of originality, it's the budget. You could almost mistake this film as some sort of 'student' effort. Seriously, I made a few short films at college and some of them look more professionally-done than this! Almost every scene is a set. Yes, I know most Hollywood films are made on sound stages for ease of production. However, here, you can almost see the boom mic hanging down – it's that obvious. Then there are the actors. Or should I say 'actors?' They can't act. Again, I get the impression that if you grabbed the nearest guy at the pub and stuck him in front of a camera, he'd pull of a more convincing 'cop in crisis' performance that the lead actor (plus he'd probably look less like a hobo-Beegee). And don't get me started on the action. There's the odd squib full of blood that just about looks passable, but when it comes to anything involving cars they just film the 'chase' at normal speed then fast forward the footage, giving off some sort of 'Benny Hill' vibe to the scene.

Overall, it's really hard to recommend this film to anyone. I only continued to sit through it just to see how bad it actually got. By the time the credits rolled, the major emotion this film invoked in me was pity. I actually felt sorry for the cast and crew who made this mess. They must have known that the budget and talent wasn't really there in order to make something that would compete with the proper Hollywood blockbusters. They could have played this to their strengths and turned it into a parody (it worked for 'Loaded Weapon!'). Unfortunately, they seemed to act (and I use the word 'act' loosely) like the truly believed this was some sort of gritty epic action movie that would stand the test of time. Sadly, it's an awful movie. If you're looking for an action movie, there are better. If you're looking for a buddy-cop movie, there are better. If you're looking for a serial killer movie, there are better. The only reason you'd want to watch this is if you're a huge fan of bad movies and just want to say that you've watched what possibly could be one of the worst films ever made, just so you can win an argument in the pub at a later date.