Too much of everything

Best movie of this year hands down!

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

A fun heist film with enough lowlifes & plot twists to make your head spin. Retired thief Lee Van Cleef is convinced to pull one more job by the son of a dead crony only to find himself on the lam with wacky Karen Black as his nursemaid. It's not without thrills and features a few exciting car chases, but the plot has far too many holes in it (scenes actually appear to be missing), they really hurt. Antonio Margheriti's direction is somewhat bland though he makes good use of the NYC locale. Van Cleef heads a decidedly quirky cast. In addition to Black, Edward Albert, Roy Brocksmith, Robert Alda and the always terrific Lionel Stander are in it too. The intrusive music score is by Paolo Vasile. Black & Brocksmith would also appear in Margheriti's KILLER FISH the following year.

This movie is great if you're having a bad movie night with friends and like to MST3K it up. From the goofy disco music throughout (it's not even cool disco music) to the bad acting, this movie is almost a waste of time - except if you have friends around to make fun of it! The plot has lots of double crosses and I think it could be remade very well.The copy we have came with 100 trivia questions on it that were unintentionally funny. For example, a giant CORRECT! or NO! pops up on the screen. Or, after showing a clip, the question afterward is "What is the number on the police car?" The quality of the copy was very poor and the sound quality is absolutely terrible.

This Italian produced, NYC lensed heist picture is actually quite entertaining with a few nice twists. Retired safe cracker Chris Gretchko (Lee Van Cleef) is lured to a job by the son (Edward Albert) of an ex-buddy. He flies to NYC and finds out he will be lifting $1 million in diamonds for a shady German group. It all goes smoothly until he learns that the group has plans to kill the second he has the safe open. Directed by Antonio Margheriti (as Anthony Dawson), this flick benefits from a clever script, great performances and evocative locations in New York. Van Cleef is his usual gruff self and he plays most scenes off Albert or hippie chick/life saver Karen Black. Lionel Stander appears as Gretchko's old-time fence. Supporting roles include Peter Carsten as the German mob boss, Ron Van Clief as some karate chopping muscle and soon to be character actor Roy Brocksmith (the bald, fat guy from TOTAL RECALL) as the guy who gets ripped off.

A retired safecracker (Lee Van Cleef) is lured out of retirement by the son of one of his buddies who is in trouble. The job - steal a load of diamonds from a warehouse safe. Things go terribly wrong. Van Cleef is wounded and everyone else is dead. Now, Van Cleef must elude the man who set-up the job, the man who owns the warehouse, and the police. It seems that Van Cleef's only ally is a crazy woman (Karen Black) who is the only other resident in an abandoned apartment building.Over the years I've noticed that when the material he's faced with isn't first rate, Lee Van Cleef can overact with the best of them. And that's what he does here. There are many scenes where Van Cleef makes some of the most ridiculous faces for no purposes other than overemphasizing his point. It get very distracting. But in The Squeeze, he's outdone by Karen Black. She chews scenery like her life depended upon it. I just had to laugh a couple of times (inappropriate times) because it was all too funny. I suppose that most of the blame for the acting weaknesses could be traced directly to the script. The characters are given some really lame lines.The story itself is quite nice. There's one double-cross after the next. The ending really caught me off guard. Just when I thought I had things figured out, I was hit with another loop. The plot is the primary reason I've rated this movie as I have. If you're a fan of heist films, much of The Squeeze will appeal to you.I would be remiss if, even in this short review, I didn't mention the soundtrack. The music is pure (bad) 70s disco. The main theme song is especially annoying and presents everything that was wrong with music from this period. Even worse, it's stuck in my head - Oh the Pain!