Aliados Contra o Crime

With the last shot leaving very much in doubt whether the crime wave that has struck the 87th precinct is truly over, my guess is that the producers were anticipating a Fuzz 2. The need for one never arose however.

A very good group of players just can't quite get this film to come together. Fuzz reminds me of a Police Academy film with two many pretensions. In fact the Boston PD may just be where those Academy graduates end up.

The main plot of the film involves a master criminal, the Deaf Man played by Yul Brynner who is blackmailing the city of Boston so he won't kill any of their top officials. He calls his threat into the precinct with detectives Burt Reynolds, Tom Skerritt, Jack Weston, and Raquel Welch are working. When they don't believe him, Brynner kills a couple of city officials to make his point.

A couple of other story lines involving a search for some punks setting homeless on fire and a rapist and somehow and through some Clousseau like luck this crowd actually solves all the cases. You have to see the film to see how they do it.

Best scenes are Raquel and Skerritt in a sleeping bag while on stakeout with Skerritt getting terribly distracted and Reynolds and Weston as nuns observing them and a possible perpetrator. That's for the main cast members, but when painters Gino Conforti and Gerald Hiken who are busy painting the precinct while all this is going steal the film whenever they're on screen. In fact in the old days some studio would have teamed these two permanently for a series of films.

Fuzz is the harbinger of Police Academy films to come.

By reading comments left by others, I can tell they never read the book "Fuzz" by Ed McBain. I think this is the WORST adaptation of a book I've ever seen. Ed McBain's stories are great! This movie was one TOTAL let down.

In response to other's comments: the final shot with the hand in the water is because the Deaf Man was supposed to survive and come back to terrorize the 87th Precinct several more times. If this movie was any good, perhaps they had a sequel in mind. Also, Eileen McHenry's (Burke, in the book), played by Welch, rape scene seemed almost gratuitous whereas in the book, the rapist was successful and this became the root of her troubles and ambitions in the future of the series of 87th Precinct books.

This movie showed NO storyline. It was merely scenes (poorly shot and directed) pieced together to form a not-easy-to-follow plot. All these scenes lacked so much detail and explanation, that the viewer was left wondering what was going on. For example, while in the park on stakeout, the blind man with the dog was really a cop (who later shot himself in the foot). This character was never introduced in the movie.

Had it not been for Reynolds and Welch (sex symbols of the time) I don't think anyone would have noticed this movie was in the theaters.

Bryner (whose fun) plays a assassin who threatens to kill all the city leaders one by one. It's up to some 'zany' characters at a crazy police station to stop him.

Attempt at bringing the irreverent, anti-establishment, comedy-drama of M*A*S*H to the police squad, is a complete disaster. The 'wacky' humor is both empty and annoying. Throwing in some strained sentiment and jarring action makes it even more baseless.

The actors seem to be just walking through their roles and the direction has no energy or vision. The pacing is disjointed without any rhythm or logic. Just about every shot is dark and shadowy. Like it was filmed on a camera with a very bad exposure.

The police station just never seems real. The precinct on BARNEY MILLER is more believable. Also having Reynolds and Weston dress as nuns just to catch the bad guy is a perfect example of forced humor.

The lowest point involves a unnecessary story thread where Welch goes after a prostitute killer. The final confrontation scene between her and the killer is a complete and pathetic rip off of the similar scene in KLUTE (complete with those chiming piano chords). This alone solidifies it as one of the biggest bombs of all time. If that's not enough you also have Dinah Shore singing "I'll be Seeing You" over the closing credits.

The whole thing is just excruciating. Does feature a young up and coming Tom Skerrit. Also has Charles Martin Smith as a punk who sets street bums on fire.

Burt Reynolds is so laid-back in this picture I thought he might fall over. He, Jack Weston and Tom Skerritt are cops at the Boston Precinct trying to stop a serial killer from blowing up more politicians, Yul Brynner is the bad guy who knows just what clueless cops these guys are, and Raquel Welch is the new badge in the building (the guys humiliate her for awhile, but she's tough and proves her merit). This is a routine cop comedy with dramatic and sometimes violent overtones, not unlike "MASH" (which it attempts to emulate in its cynicism). It was moderately popular in theaters in 1972 mainly because Burt Reynolds had just posed for Cosmo magazine and the ads and the movie one-sheet played that up. I liked Welch's scenes defending herself in the office (where she's been unceremoniously dumped at a desk) and the climactic moments are well done. The end vocal by Dinah Shore is a wonderful bit (Burt was dating her at the time). But that very last shot is perplexing: there's no explanation for it, and I'm sure it left audiences baffled. It's an artistic shot, done with humor, but considering what happens before it, it makes no logical sense. **1/2 from ****

After reading several bad reviews of this film I was almost afraid to watch it. I hate wasting my time on bad movies, but I decided based on the cast to give it a go and I'm glad I did. The movie is not a fast paced comedy by any stretch of the imagination. It is instead, like many movies from it's time, a slow moving style of film along the lines of The Big Fix. It keeps your interest because the characters are interesting. It makes you laugh at times and actually has a little suspense mixed into a story that seems disjointed at first, but ties together so well in the end it makes the whole movie work.

The plot centers partially around a bombers scheme to blackmail the city of Boston, but more so around the police precinct he chooses to contact with his threats. We see a group of officers trying to get through their daily routine as they work on several cases at once. Focusing on the bomber but still trying to deal with a myriad of other problems that present themselves as they try to solve other crimes. It presents itself as more of a "day in the life" type movie rather than a film with one main focus. It's well acted, well told and is a good movie for those times when you really want to just relax and get into a story. Sure it has a few weak spots as with most movies but it is certainly worth putting on and I'm very glad I had the chance to see it.

In short, if your looking for Starskey & Hutch 2005, this isn't it. If your looking for a slow paced intelligent movie, don't let bad reviews chase you away and give this film a shot.