THE MECHANIC (1972)

Los Angeles.  An older, professional hitman (Charles Bronson) takes a younger man (Jan-Michael Vincent) under his wing as both a protege and assistant.  After that, things start to get a little gay, but not really since the studio chickened out on the original story and instead ended up with a garbled film that doesn't seem to know what it wants to be.

The assassination portions of THE MECHANIC are entertaining enough in a dated, early 1970's action movie sort of way, but the character development is weak.  According to Wikipedia, Lewis John Carlino's original script was suppose to be "...a commentary on the use of human relationships and sexual manipulation in the lives of two hired killers. It was supposed to be a chess game between the older assassin and his young apprentice."  That actually sounds interesting, but unfortunately, that's not what ended up on screen.  At all.  I wish, that, if the studio was gonna purge the gay stuff (and therefore the main subject of the script!), they would have just made another movie altogether.  Instead, the audience is left with a confused mess about two single men who, when not murdering people together, hang out together 24/7 and stare at each other longingly.

Confused pacing that alternates between slow and fast, zero nudity, mildly entertaining kills, one nice car-pushed-off-a-cliff wreck, okay acting, boring dialogue, goofy scenes of Bronson acting sophisticated while thinking really hard, a 16-minute section where there is zero dialogue, two men at the zoo touching fingers, awesome old movie posters.

THE MECHANIC is entertaining enough for a single viewing, but I have no desire to ever watch it again...or at least soon. Knowing me, I'll watch it again.

Remake - The Mechanic
Remake, Part 2 - Mechanic: Resurrection

THE DIRTY DOZEN (1967)

Great Britain, 1944.  A US Major (Lee Marvin) is given orders to select twelve men from the local military prison, train them, then go on a suicide mission behind enemy lines to kill as many German officers as possible.  This will create disruption in the chain of command right before the D-Day invasion.  The men who survive the mission will be pardoned.

Watching THE DIRTY DOZEN today, it's dated as fuck, but still entertaining.  The story was definitely cool and the action scenes were reminiscent the covers the the men's adventure magazines of the 1950's, but I was mainly fascinated by the all-star cast!  I mean, this thing is pack from floor to ceiling with big names.  Charles Bronson, Donald Sutherland, Lee Marvin, Ernest Borgnine...pretty much every scene had somebody awesome in it.

I also found the film to be interesting from a historical perspective.  I'd love to know more about it.  For example: I'm curious how many films previous to TDD showed American soldiers so gleefully killing not only Nazi officers and soldiers, but also the women with them?  Did the subversive feel of the film have something to do with the Vietnam War?

Younger audiences would probably find the whole thing boring, but it's definitely worth a viewing for fans of (older) WWII movies and movie nerds.

Side note: IMDb lists Dick Miller as "MP at Hanging (uncredited)", but I couldn't find him.

Part 2 - The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission
Part 3 - The Dirty Dozen: The Deadly Mission
Part 4 - The Dirty Dozen: The Fatal Mission