KNIGHTRIDERS star Ed Harris will attend our post screening Q&A after the August 31 screening at the NoHo! Stunt coordinator Gary Davis and actress-stuntwoman Jennifer Elizabeth will also attend.
George A. Romero’s KNIGHTRIDERS may well be the only cycle flick ever to be played out in suits of armor. A hardcase motorcycle gang led by Ed Harris has found itself a neat money-making gimmick. Dressed as the knights of the round table, the cyclists pick up a few bucks at local “renaissance” fairs, selling handicrafts made by the more talented members of the gang. Harris’ great rival is Tom Savini, who has his own band of “black knights.” Keep an eye out for a chucklesome unbilled bit by novelist Stephen King.
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Mitchum was a contract player at RKO when he starred in Out of the Past, directed by Jacques Tourneur with a script by Geoffrey Homes (Daniel Mainwaring), adapting his novel, “Build My Gallows High.” Mitchum plays an ex-private eye entangled in a web of double-dealings by former criminal associates (gangster Kirk Douglas and old flame Jane Greer). Mitchum, described in the New York Times review of the day as “magnificently cheeky and self-assured,” entrenched his cynical, antihero image in this film.
Cape Fear came at the end of the classical black-and-white film noir period (1942-62), and stars Mitchum in his most memorable villainous role, Max Cady. In this adaptation by James R. Webb of James D. MacDonald’s novel, “The Executioners,” an ex-con plots insidious revenge on the lawyer (Gregory Peck) whose testimony sent him to prison. Director J. Lee Thompson was an admirer of Alfred Hitchcock, and paid homage to the Master of Suspense with camera angles and the use of his frequent collaborator, composer Bernard Herrmann, who provided a superbly menacing score. Mitchum was so convincing in the role that co-star Polly Bergen (as Peck’s wife) said she was genuinely frightened in an improvised scene with him. Leonard Maltin calls Mitchum’s performance “believably creepy,” and the American Film Institute cited his portrayal of Cady as one of the top 30 “All-Time Screen Villains.” Martin Balsam, Lori Martin, Telly Savalas, and Barrie Chase co-star.
