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kittysheba1
Reviews
Evel Knievel (1971)
This is a wonderful irresponsible bombastic backwards movie.
I saw this movie in the dollar bin of the grocery store and I couldn't help smiling. I had no idea if it would be worth a sitting, but I discovered to my joy that this film captures the energy and twisted, booze-fueled optimism of 1971 only too well. There is a senior thesis and a kitsch musical trapped in this time capsule. It is both a on-the-spot knowing parody of 70's machismo and a hapless apology for it, a living testimony to a living person.
George Hamilton in 1971 didn't seem to know how to act, he swaggered humorlessly and proclaimed, and chewed gum like Burt Reynolds. John Milius and a 90 year old Englishman scripted this, so Evel's lines are filled with references and heightened language that are quite outside the range of a dropout sociopath. And yet this movie isn't dead. It has an intentness, a brio, a sort of-- pertness. It deserves to have eyeballs given to it, over a few sittings, over a few lunch hours, using the DVD feature of your workstation in your cubicle. Go to your supermarket today!