Showing posts with label Jack Starrett. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Jack Starrett. Show all posts

Tuesday, April 13, 2021

Jack Starrett: Director

 

(Text here is from original Kinja post.)  

I watched Slaughter (1972) with Jim Brown before I knew who he was as a director. I remember thinking whoever shot this thing was a crazy person. Fisheye lens from ground level in the middle of a fight scene and other weird camera moves. Then I learned that was just a Jack Starrett movie. He shot Cleopatra Jones (1973) next with a real budget from Warner Bros. and it showed.

Then I was able to see the two biker flicks: Run,Angel, Run! (1969), with an informative Joe Bob Briggs commentary, and The Losers (1970), a truly insane movie shot in the Philippines. I also was able to find the nearly forgotten cult film, The Dion Brothers (1974)[aka The Gravy Train], with Stacy Keach and written by Terrence Malick. It is on Youtube at the moment. I have the nice Shout Factory DVD of Race with the Devil (1975) with Peter Fonda and Warren Oates.

And, finally, I came across two of his TV movie director credits in the late 70s while doing my TV posts. Mr. Horn in 1979 with David Carradine, and Big Bob Johnson and His Fantastic Speed Circus in 1978 with Charles Napier. A failed pilot.

Mr. Starrett died from kidney failure in 1989 at age 52. He was also known as an actor. Gabby Johnson in Blazing Saddles. The sadistic cop, Galt, in First Blood.

https://cscottrollins.blogspot.com/2013/03/jack-starrett-aka-claude-ennis-starrett.html

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Starrett




Sunday, March 7, 2021

The Dion Brothers (1974)




Directed by Jack Starrett. aka The Gravy Train. Stacy Keach. Frederic Forrest. Terrence Malick writing. A cult crime item that was little seen for a long time but there is one up on Youtube at the moment. I have still only watched it full screen.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Gravy_Train

Jack Starrett replaced original director Terrence Malick. 

The title was changed from "The Gravy Train" to "The Dion Brothers" after audiences at sneak previews and other early screenings indicated that they thought the original name sounded like a movie about dog food (Gravy Train being the name of a well-known American pet food).