★ 8 / 10
Undervalued thriller. A lone gunman has his sights
John Chard
Undervalued thriller. A lone gunman has his sights set on a sell-out crowd at a championship football game. Captain Peter Holly leads the desperate fight to…
Undervalued thriller.
A lone gunman has his sights set on a sell-out crowd at a championship football game. Captain Peter Holly leads the desperate fight to try and stop the maniac from picking people off at will. Perched high on top of the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, the gunman has his pick of the targets, the Mayor -the President - or merely the innocent? Either way he has to be stopped before all hell breaks loose.
Much like "Rollercoaster" a year later, Two-Minute Warning is wrongly lumped in with the disaster movie genre that flooded the 1970s, and just like Rollercoaster, Two-Minute Warning is an excellently taut thriller. The build up is paced to precision, all characters are introduced to us to give us something to associate with should things go very wrong. As this is happening we get little POV snippets of our killer, accompanied by Charles Fox's harshly impacting music, the killer is never seen but we feel the dread, the impending sense of murder is a constant presence.
Once we are at the game and the authorities are aware that a sniper is on the roof, the film shifts up a gear and lays on the suspense thick and heavy. Captain Holly (Charlton Heston in authoritative scene commanding form) is joined by the SWAT team, led by the cool and serious Sgt. Chris Button (John Cassavetes), whilst stadium security manager Sam McKeever (Martin Balsam) prays that disaster can be averted. Then the final third of the picture is a ripper of heart pounding stuff, a final third that rewards the viewers patience for having invested in the film and the key characters. Filling out the cast is Gena Rowlands, Jack Klugman (brilliant interplay with Mitch Ryan's priest), Beau Bridges, Walter Pidgeon and David Jansen.
Two-Minute Warning is a quality thriller that is sadly undervalued on the big IMDb site, go on, give it a go and you might just be pleasantly surprised. 7.5/10
Footnote: I should point out that my thoughts are on the original unedited cut of this film, I have never seen the watered down TV cut and have no plans to ever do so.
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★ 6 / 10
A faceless gunman shoots innocent bystanders in a tower overlooking a Los Angeles football stadium
ma-cortes
Thrilling and entertaining disaster movie but full clichés and stereotypes with enjoyable performances from Charlton Heston and John Cassavetes . This…
Thrilling and entertaining disaster movie but full clichés and stereotypes with enjoyable performances from Charlton Heston and John Cassavetes . This catastrophe movie blends action , intrigue , disaster spectacle, suspense and emotional byplay . ¨Two-minute warning¨ was a successful film that grossed at box office . A psychotic sniper wielding a rifle with telescopic sight plans a massacre during a major championship game . The two protagonists , the police Captain Peter Holly (Charlton Heston) and SWAT commander Sergeant Button (John Cassavetes), learn of the plot and spend most of their time devising various ways for avoid to psychopath sniper carries out his aims : a massive killing spree in Los Angeles football stadium filled to capacity . As our heroes get stuck in the stadium before it blows up and when slaughter takes place they go into action ; as they pay tribute to policemen . There takes place a struggle between two forces , the cops and the sinister assassin and ultimately erupts when the crowd turns almost effortlessly and devours itself in a climax of panic . Exciting film that contains noisy action , unsettling scenes , thrills , emotion and turns out to be pretty entertaining . This formula suspense movie belongs to catastrophe genre of the 70s , being the undisputed king , ¨The towering inferno¨ along with ¨Earthquake¨ , ¨Roller coaster¨ and many others ; this formula disaster movie was widely developed by Irwin Allen , previously winner of numerous Oscars for ¨Poseidon¨ until the failures as ¨Beyond Poseidon¨, ¨Swarm¨ and ¨When the time ran out¨ . ¨Two-minute warning¨ results to be an intriguing and suspenseful film , there was a later version released that had footage not shown in theaters , in the original theatrical version, the sniper's motives were not known. In the later television version, it was revealed that the attack was done to cover an art robbery next door . Filmed at the height of the disaster genre from the 7os , this entry in the spectacular series profits of a strong acting by starring trio Charlton Heston , John Cassavetes and Martin Balsam . Succeeds in combining various talented actors , an all star cast came together that tie for film's top casting honors ; furthermore a top-notch secondary casting such as Gina Rowlands, Beau Bridges , Jack Klugman , Marilyn Hasset , Pamela Bellwood , Mitch Ryan , Brock Peters, David Janssen and Walter Pidgeon as a pickpocket who formerly co-starred in 'Harry in Your Pocket' , a film about pickpocket s. This edgy , paranoid film was deemed too violent to show intact on broadcast television, so they re-wrote the story and added a heist element , the re-written material minimized both the main storyline and the subplots . Colorful and gripping photography in Panavision by Gerard Hirschfeld , including persistent high-angle shots , subjective camera-work and use of long lenses . Intriguing and atmospheric score by Charles Fox . This big-budgeted disaster movie was professionally though coldly directed by Larry Peerce , an usual TV movies director . Rating : Good and entertaining , it's a fairly watchable disaster movie.
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6.2/10
5K
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