I was subjected to this hideous mess of a film when my sister accidentally grabbed it off the video shelf instead of the Michael Mann film of the same name. Pray you never make the same mistake. The direction is ham-handed, the script ridiculous, the characters and their motivations laughable, the acting disastrous, and two thirds of the way through the film, just when you think your suffering might be over, it seems to become a different movie! Burt Reynolds' tough guy is a cardboard cutout of the tired "dangerous man with a troubled past and a heart of gold" character we've all seen 100 times too many. Peter MacNicol as the nebbish who idolizes him is not just unsympathetic, but actually so irritating I laughed out loud when he was machine-gunned by the bad guys. Neill Barry is absurd as the childish gangster who seems to think shrieking and whining make him a more intimidating figure. Pretentious, self conscious, and filled with cartoonish intensity, this film is excruciating from start to finish. Good for Mystery Science Theater style mockery only.
