Roel1973

A lighthearted heist movie with a lot going for it. First of all, the chemistry between Donald Sutherland and Brooke Adams is terrific. He plays criminal master mind Reese who's planning to break into a new bank, which is just being built in downtown Vancouver. While stealing the plans to the building he's accidentally photographed by Stacey (Adams). He looks her up, trying to get the negatives, and he falls in love. This puts a little bit of strain on his relationship with his partner in crime Norman, beautifully played by Paul Mazursky.

Almost everything in this film has a relaxed feel to it. Conflicts are mostly resolved rather quickly and the story just sort of breezes along, with beautiful Vancouver locations. There are a couple of suspenseful scenes, when Reese and Norman are nearly caught, but mostly this is not about the heist itself, but more about the people who perpetrate it. As a comedy it offers no outlandish gags, but there are a lot of wonderful scenes, most of them involving Norman being a nervous wreck or Adams being way too cute.

I thought it was a very pleasant surprise.

When I read the novel I had no problem picturing Burt Reynolds as the charming and laconic ex-con. And supposedly Reynolds himself thought he was perfect for the part. Unfortunately, the studio demanded he re-shoot the second half of the picture, basically trading in Elmore Leonard's scam plot for brutal action. There's always something very satisfying about watching Burt kick ass, so even if I was wondering why anyone would want to trade Leonard's smart and funny writing for a run-of-the-mill action script, I still enjoyed the finale of Stick.

Still, the Ernest Stickley from the novel called for the more lighthearted Burt from Semi-Tough, Hooper and Rough Cut. I would have loved to have heard Burt deliver some of the smart-ass lines Leonard wrote for the character in the novel. Also, some scenes just don't make a whole lot of sense now, like Stick wanting to learn about investments from Kyle or the movie pitch scene. Both of these were pivotal in the book, but just go nowhere in the film.

There's a lot of good stuff though. The scene on the balcony is awesome, the scorpions were a nice touch (not in the book!) and I liked the way the murder in the beginning was handled, with Stick's subsequent getaway through the corn field.

If you like Burt Reynolds Stick is certainly worth your time, just don't expect a faithful adaptation.

Bud Spencer wanders into a small town, gets mistaken for a doctor and winds up protecting the town folk from a gang of thugs and a corrupt sheriff.

Both Spencer and director Michele Lupo have done better, separately and together. But that is not to say that Buddy Goes West is a bad film. It has a couple of great gags and enjoyable moments (the food duel between Spencer and the sheriff is great fun) and the soundtrack by Ennio Morricone is absolutely superb (if only for the music, this late spaghetti western should be of interest for fans of the genre).

Now for the bad: I can watch Spencer do his grumpy comic persona in almost anything, to be perfectly honest, but when he's not with Terence Hill he sometimes falls back on irritating sidekicks (see also Jerry Calà in Bomber, made one year later). And in that respect, Buddy Goes West takes the cake. Morrocon actor Amidou (Sorcerer) plays a dim witted Indian who hops around like an idiot and mimics Native American speak by uttering words like 'Witchita' and 'Dakota' and plain old mumbo-jumbo. Of course it's politically incorrect, but I don't mind that. What I do mind is that Amidou is really tiresome in the role and not funny at all. I try to imagine Buddy Goes West with a less moronic sidekick. It would have been much better.