No. 259 : The Specialist (1975)

 

The Specialist at the IMDb

Do you know that you can get free movies on YouTube? Good ones too, like ‘Galaxy Quest’ and both Anchorman films, but you can also find stuff like ‘The Specialist’. No, not the sexy Sharon Stone / Sly Stallone one, a 1975 flick of the same name.

The film has Adam West as its star, so you know it will be good and to be fair it is a bit of low stakes fun. The plot is a bit complicated but basically one lawyer tries to get another disbarred after one of his clients is stolen from him. You’d think the client would have the choice, but the matter goes to trial.

There is a brief preamble in some offices which suspiciously all have their curtains drawn during the LA day – I’m guessing the filming schedule was tight! The wronged lawyer, Pike Smith, won’t go down without a fight and decides to engage in some jury rigging. He enlists a local hood and his son to engage ‘The specialist’ – basically a big whore who will seduce the opposing counsel.

The Specialist, Londa, played with abandon by Ahna Capri, is soon on the job after getting out of the bed in the buff immediately agrees to a spot of nude modelling for Pike’s artist son. Got to meet the T&A quotient somehow, I guess!

The trial is convened and Londa asks to see the lake which is the subject of the contentious lawsuit. West gives an impassioned speech to a confused judge and jury (and audience) who were led to believe that the trial was about client stealing. Londa gives West a wipe down after the trial and despite him initially saying he can’t speak to her, due to the law and stuff, he agrees to go on a trip to the lake with her.

Within five minutes West is having some loving in the water, whilst the local police, fixer and, strangely, the judge look on. A mistrial is ordered and West faces disbarment. Luckily enough for him, his shrew wife doesn’t knee him in the balls but sets about unravelling the conspiracy.

 

Londa flees back home and manages another nude scene, this time with her boyfriend/pimp before the plot unravels. A blackmail plan goes awry when the boyfriend is strangled by a door and soon both lawyers are up for disbarment. Who will keep their law licence? It really comes down to that!

This was a strange film that looked like a 1970s TV movie but with added nudity. Adam West didn’t really convince as the straying lawyer and his sexy credentials weren’t stamped when he got his shirt off - it was of course Pure West.

I did like the free-spirited performance by Ahna Capri who you may remember as the love interest in ‘Enter the Dragon’. The main issue I have is with the plot. There were endless dull legal scenes with low stakes and worse acting. The judge looked like they found him in a pub ten minutes before filming.

 

The big disbarment hearing, that looked like it was filmed in someone’s living room, was really tension free despite a surprise outcome. With a minute left on the runtime and with an unsatisfying ending fast approaching, the director went for the ‘what the hell’ option and a freezeframe. It wasn’t earned or believable, but I didn’t care; so no harm done.

 

All in all, this was a pretty mindless romp involving scheming lawyers and a sexy ‘specialist’ who would probably be riddled with VD - the way she carries on and would need a specialist of her own pretty soon – one well versed in the clap!

THE Tag Line : Taking Down the Briefs!  56%

No.46 : The Accused (1988)

The Accused at the IMDb

I’m not a big fan of court room films, ‘Witness for the Prosecution’ notwithstanding. Like many sports films and any old ‘triumph against adversity’ gubbins the end is a foregone conclusion. There has been a slight renaissance with some sports movies like ‘Coach Carter’ and the ‘Bad News Bears’ remake where the big twist was that they lost but they also ‘win’ - but court room films don’t have that option. Either the bad guy gets banged up or he walks - no middle ground. Unless he walks and gets shot on the way out the court or he gets off on appeal off camera.

Yeah I know you’ve got the ‘Mockingbird’ defence and while that was a great film and the good guy lost at least it taught us innocent kids a bit about the realities of life.

Anyway ‘The Accused’ is a decent enough court room drama that is helped by only the last few minutes taking place in a court room. You still get the emotive speeches and pleas to the jury but at least you get a little bit of investigation along the way. Jodie Foster plays a trailer trash waitress, Sarah, who gets gang raped by three men on a pinball table while some jeering louts and a sensitive video game player look on.

After a pretty blow by blow account of the hospital forensic tests the three rapists get fingered and are put on trial. Fearing that her main witness was drunk and a bit slutty the DA, played by the woman out of ‘Top Gun’, plea bargains the rape charge down to reckless endangerment, much to the disgust of her client. Feeling a bit guilty herself Top Gun woman goes after the jeering mob in a hope of atoning for doing her job.

After a lucky break on the Pac-Man machine she traces the sensitive video games player who agrees to testify despite the pressure of his rapist friends. The trial is set and the lawyers have their show stopper speeches ready. Will the fragile waitress get the justice she craves or will the baying mob of louts walk free? It’s the first one!

I quite enjoyed ‘The Accused’ despite its obvious agenda and total lack of strong believable male characters. There’s no doubt that the case as presented was horrendous and brutal but the men were all such stereotype red necks and frat boys that it made the whole thing seem unbelievable. I’m pretty sure in the real case, on which the film was based, the drunken mob didn’t come up with catchy chants.

Foster was great as Sarah and really pulled off the tough and sexy yet fragile and vulnerable waitress. She rightly got an Oscar for her performance which must have been harrowing given the violent and humiliating subject matter. Top Gun woman was less good as the hard as nails, but has now learned a valuable lesson, DA.

I like the way the film showed various viewpoints of the unseen events before we saw the actual crime in the last half hour. I don’t know if this was a late addition as lots of the court room testimony later referred to was missing. It certainly made the film more real and had a lot more impact than another 30 minutes of court room drama.

The best scene for me was Sarah shopping for tapes when she encounters the most loathsome man you’ll ever see. Think of a male version of the landlady out of ‘Kingpin’ - certainly one worth losing your no claims bonus over.

This is the kind of film you can’t really enjoy. The grim subject matter and the foregoing conclusion rob it of any real thrill or drama and the scenes at the end where they’re all having a good laugh at the outcome don’t sit right. A worthy film definitely, but a watchable one? The jury’s out.

THE Tag Line : Accused of Being Grim & Predictable 62 %