john-852

The plot about smuggling gold and double crossing thieves is old hat, and Dynamite Jim is one of those laid back, sarcastic quipsters. In the middle, playing off all sides, is Rosalba Neri's character Margaret. She gets to wear a couple of nice dresses and look pretty great, and while the role is hardly taxing, it's all good fun for Neri watchers. She's out for herself and wants the gold anyway she can get it. It's a decent role and she manages to stay alive past the 30 minutes mark. Fernando Sancho is second billed but has few scenes. Some of the fight scenes ( as well as Jim's one liners ) have comic sound effects added The is minimal violence and no blood during shootouts. The full screen video I saw looked like 16 mm and had muffled audio, and was brutally cropped and panned and scanned. Not ideal in the A/V dept.but could have been worse, and 2.35 widescreen remastered DVD would be a far nicer way to evaluate this one. Rosalba's star would far brighter the same year in JOHNNY YUMA, but this is also well worth a look for fans of the Euro goddess Neri

OK, I did not watch the first two episodes but I watched the third one tonight. It was not funny. It is absurd and the situations were so far from anything near reality that I was groaning before the first commercial. Two lines were amusing. The pawn shop lady saying she'd step on Earl's sweaty teabag and Jamie Presley falling on her knees and saying she'd opened up her rug burns. The rest was flat out stupid and absurd, and humor is supposed to come from the characters and the situations. The characters are comic stereotypes and the situations would be ridiculous in a cartoon. There was not one single action a character took or a situation they were in that had anything to do with humor. I had heard good things about this so I watched, and now I know it is as bad as anything on television today. Good grief, there is no way this show will last.

I really like this movie but am distressed that the US video SHATTERED runs 86 minutes while the film should run 99 min. The video box claims 100 min, so something is clearly off with the Media release. I have no idea what is missing from the US version but there are scenes that cut off abruptly and the ending also seems tampered with. Peter Finch gives a mighty performance as a man who is hanging by a thread. His involvement with a young pregnant girl seals his fate as he gets sucked in over his head and then makes a very poor decision about how to dispose of unwanted refuse. If anyone has seen a version other than the US video release I would love to hear some details.