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The prelude (a backyard execution lamented by dogs and horses) states the laconic approach, plus a kinship with Siegel and Karlson. The victim's brother (Robert Duvall) is fresh out of the slammer and nearly killed in a motel, his squeeze (Karen Black) begs him to run away but no go, "I got business." The mob by any other name, the title, its sundry fronts are hit by the avenger who figures he's owed monetary compensation. "Sounds like you've got a war," it pays to have the burly shit-kicker (Joe Don Baker) on your side. John Flynn likes his noir spare and vicious, his view of Donald E. Westlake's tunnel-vision collector scrapes off Boorman's Point Blank flash for a remarkable string of underworld haiku. "Your time's used up," snaps the widowed sister-in-law (Jane Greer), the perfect hard-boiled mourner for a netherworld where bars are run by Marie Windsor and Elisha Cook Jr. (Timothy Carey, Roy Roberts and Emile Meyer are among the weathered genre mugs on the margins.) The capo (Robert Ryan) steps out of his limo but turns on the radio to the annoyance of his moll (Joanna Cassidy), "keep the game on, I want to know when somebody scores," his meeting with the protagonist at an auction for thoroughbreds is illustrative of the splendidly abrupt style. Flynn is exceptionally attuned to moments like the bruiser turning down a humid blonde on a porch, the extra beat a henchman takes contemplating reaching for his gun, the taciturn banter of gangland comrades driving at night while the girlfriend is curled up awake in the backseat. "Maybe we're getting too old for this line of work, hmm?" Guffaw follows shootout at the close, and Mann follows with Thief. With Richard Jaeckel, Sheree North, Bill McKinney, Tom Reese, Felice Orlandi, Henry Jones, Anita O'Day, and Archie Moore.
--- Fernando F. Croce |