Riding with Death

Like most folks, I suspect, I saw Riding with Death on MST3K. There's no question that it's a totally hackneyed, badly acted, horribly edited movie. But there's something about their attempt to splice together two separate episodes into a movie that moves me. They're incredibly clumsy in their attempt; mainly it consists of totally obvious voiceovers while the camera shows a shot of a truck or a landscape. Gene Roddenberry, whatever his flaws, was able to do this brilliantly in "The Menagerie." But watching the attempt in Riding with Death can be fun, and all the 70's stuff (e.g., fadeaway jerk handshake) is a blast. So I give it a 2, perhaps my first-ever non-1 for a Msted movie.

If you enjoy watching a discombobulated, incoherent dumpster fire of a movie, then Riding With Death is for you. Please, for the love of God, do not watch this without the MST3K commentary. I tried once without it and it was brutal. You have been warned!

well let's just say that one line from "Riding with Death" completely summarizes the type of movie it is and that is a big, fat turkey.

This one was deliciously roasted on MST by Mike and the oh so funny robots, with many references to how dopey the hero, Ben Murphy really is.

The flimsy plot jumps from an explosive being transported in a truck to another explosive substance being used in a race car to kill off some people for no apparent reason. The reason for the jumping of the plot most likely stems from the fact that the movie is no more than 2 episodes of a short lived 70's T.V. series, slammed together and released in theatres. Oh well flimsy plot aside, the rest of the movie is just plain horrific, most of the bad stuff is in the form of awful acting, which raises the question as to how this got made into a T.V. show to begin with.

Well, the MST version was a lot of fun, though this is still an incredibly bad movie. 9 for the MST version, none for the actual film.

Typical cheese of the 70's. Good for laughs. Overly smug Ben Murphy plays a secret agent named Sam Casey who works for "Intersect", which is housed in a redressed parking garage.(Apparently Intersect couldn't afford a better office building). He was apparently involved in an accident earlier in his career that caused him to turn invisible, but he was cured. However, he was left with the ability to turn back invisible whenever he wanted, by using a handy wristwatch outfitted for him by Intersect. This we learn via vague flashbacks which leave us with more questions than answers. witness Murphy's narration of the flashback: "...all I could say was, 'What the hell happened?'"

The movie itself is not really a movie at all. It is actually two different episodes of the very short lived TV series "Gemini Man", which ran in or around 1976. It was probably spliced together because they were the only two episodes which also co-starred (I use the term 'starred' lightly) hillbilly music personality Jim Stafford.

The two episodes were obviously unrelated other than that, and the poor editing doesn't help to cover up this fact. Watch & listen for the edits where they try to tie these two together, you'll have a hearty laugh.

I actually wasted some time researching facts about the original TV series and found out that the second part (episode) of this movie never actually aired on TV. The show had already been canceled five or six weeks previous to its scheduled airdate. I guess the producer just couldn't bear to waste all that great footage of Jim Stafford yelping like a hyena in heat.

One word of advice: Do yourself a favor and locate the episode of the classic TV show "Mystery Science Theater 3000" which features this movie. Then you can *really* enjoy Riding With Death. Its one of their funniest episodes ever. (With material like RWD, how could it not be hilarious?)

Two episodes of a really bad 70's T.V. show crammed together. It's worth watching for laughs. Observe all the bell bottoms, cheap dialogue, and unquestionably the worst actor I ever saw (the guy who plays Dr. Hale). Expensive and hard to find, so stick to the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version, which appears on the Sci-Fi channel. "Riding With Death" occasionally runs.