STREETS OF FIRE. Directed by Walter Hill; written by Walter Hill and Larry Gross; produced by Lawrence Cordon and Joel Silver for Universal. Starring Michael Pare, Amy Madigan, Diane Lane and Rick Moranis. Rated PG (some violence).
More reviews by —
TITLE:
RATING:
There hasn't been a good, old-fashioned western movie made in several years. At least until now.
I know some of you will think I'm crazy. The movie does have a good rock music score, set design like Blade Runner and hip young stars. But substitute the streets of Tombstone for the urban-blighted settings of Streets of Fire, and you'll have as pure a western as Hollywood has produced.
Now I said pure, not great. It tries to do too much with too little, and there's only one memorable character. But it's an interesting, if considerably offbeat, movie.
A gang of rowdy bikers kidnap Ellen (Lane). Her manager/boyfriend (Moranis) hires Tom (Pare) to rescue her, not knowing he and Ellen were once lovers. Tom is a fellow of few words and indeterminate livelihood, but with the kind of courage and expertise required for such a dangerous undertaking.
McCoy (Madigan) is his sidekick and she does more than just help him rescue Ellen. She also rescues a good bit of the movie. Her character is more three-dimensional and sympathetic than any of the others. Tough and cool, she can also project some vulnerability. And she gets most of the script's good lines.
The most curious thing about this curious movie, however, is its lack of graphic sex and violence. This is what really reminds me of older movies. Ellen is kidnapped by a supposedly vicious motorcycle gang, but head biker Raven (Willem Dafoe) doesn't force his attentions on her. And Tom and Ellen's one love scene is a model of discretion.
Several people are injured (some may be killed) in the rescue. But Tom doesn't ever fire his high-powered rifle at any people—just vehicles. (I suppose the resulting gas tank explosions are what give the movie its name.)
The final showdown between Raven and Tom is somewhat brutal, but it's not even to the death, for goodness sakes. If it sounds like I'm criticizing this restraint, I'm not. But it is a little unexpected.
Ellen's rescue comes early in the movie. But if anything Streets of Fire gets more interesting after the fireworks of that sequence. Our group of heroes still must get back to safe territory, past police as well as bikers. And then there's the question of revenge. Raven isn't about to let this humiliation go unanswered.
Streets of Fire has a lot going on besides the basic story, however. In fact, there's probably too much going on. First of all, there's the subtitle: "a rock and roll fable." And then a sub-sub-title: "another time, another place." So we have a kind of musical, a science fiction/fantasy, and a western, all trying to co-exist in the same movie. An interesting experiment, but not entirely successful.
Pare is part of the problem. He looks fine most of the time, but seems self-conscious about his dialogue. Here, however, the dialogue may be more at fault. The same kind of corny, cliche-ridden conversations I remember from "B" westerns abound in Streets of Fire. Maybe my tolerance for this kind of dialogue is lower than it used to be. But it is hard to take.
Except for Madigan, Pare gets no help from the other characters. Lane is pretty, but other than that it's hard to see a reason for all the fuss about her. Moranis' character grows on you after a while, but he's much better suited to straight comedy (he's a MacKenzie from the Great White North). Dafoe has the advantage (for a villain) of being really ugly. And he is effective in his few scenes. There should have been more of him.
June 27, 1984