Prime Cut (1972)
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Oscar winners Lee Marvin and Gene Hackman teamed up in 1972 for a violent mob thriller bathed in blood. While it has a few great scenes, PRIME CUT is decidedly underdone.
Hackman, hot off filming "The French Connection" is Mary Ann, a Kansas City mobster with a hair trigger who likes to put his adversaries through the meat grinder at his KC slaughterhouse, Mary Ann's Meats.
His name is never explained, but I can only imagine it's part of why he's so pissed off.
After a rival Chicago mobster sent to collect monies owed from Mary Ann is sent back to his boss Jake (Eddie Egan) as fresh hot dogs, Jake hires free lancer Nick Devlin (Marvin) to put Mary Ann back in his place.
Violence ensues.
Egan is a fascinating actor. He was the real life NYC cop that inspired Popeye Doyle, Hackman's character in "The French Connection". He carries real weight as Jake. Marvin's performance is a reminder of just how great he was in action roles.
Even in films like this, working off a half baked screenplay that barely supports 90 minutes of running time, Marvin is fantastic. They don't make tough guys on film like this anymore, and they are missed!
Marvin's Nick gathers his boys (his loyal driver and two younger goons) and heads to KC.
It's immediately apparent when he gets there that he and Mary Ann have some serious history, including with Mary Ann's wife Clarabelle, played by 70's screen vixen Angel Tompkins. Her Playboy Playmate appearance in 1972 rocketed her to fame after many TV guest star spots in the late 60's. She also starred in one of my personal favorite TV series of the early seventies, 'Search". She's stunning and does just fine in her big scene with Marvin.
Any time that Marvin and Hackman are on screen together, its riveting. Nick and Mary Ann have hated each other deeply for a very long time. Hackman is so damn good at playing a man with a hair trigger that I couldn't wait for Marvin to set him off. Marvin's quiet bravado seethes just below the surface and my money is ALWAYS on Marvin.
Hackman accepted the role after sitting unemployed for six months since the end of filming on Friedkin's "French Connection". His next film after this would be a huge hit, "The Poseidon Adventure".
Director Michael Ritchie (Fletch, Semi Tough) seems as fascinated with showing us small town farm life and county fairs as he does the action, leading to a strange pace that suffers plenty of lulls between the action.
You can't accuse him of shying away from violence and nudity, revealing stables full of beautiful naked young women that Mary Ann is auctioning off like prized cattle.
One of the girls, Poppy, whispers "please help me" to Nick and he immediately takes her with him. Poppy is played by Sissy Spacek in her first acting role. She's excellent, boldly frank in her nudity and displays all the acting talent in her first role that would earn her an Oscar playing Loretta Lynn eight years later.
Marvin and Director Ritchie famously had huge fights during production as Ritchie wanted to film love scenes between Marvin and Spacek, which Marvin refused to do, due to their age difference.
Gregory Walcott (The Eiger Sanction, Joe Kidd) is slimy as hell playing the aptly named thug Weenie. His penchant for grinding up folks in the slaughterhouse and
dripping blood & sweat all over his victims makes him one of the most repulsive screen bad guys of the era.
There are a couple of great action sequences in the film, the best being Marvin and Spacek running endlessly across wheat fields with a mob of gunmen and a huge threshing machine chasing them. It conjures up Cary Grant's dual with that airplane in Hitchcock's "North by Northwest".
A second cat and mouse face-off in a field of sunflowers also delivers the goods.
But for a film that's only 88 minutes long, it's got more filler than those bloody hot dogs. Even Marvin and Hackman's heroics can't save it from being more than an average early seventies thriller with a few great scenes.
When even the great Lalo Schifrin's music score sounds like he phoned it in, you've got issues. This is the man that wrote the action music for "Bullitt" and "Mission Impossible". Just like the rest of the film, his score here comes up far short.
PRIME CUT feels more like celluloid ground chuck. I'll stamp it with a C.
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