Point Blank (1967)

After being double-crossed and left for dead, a mysterious man named Walker single-mindedly tries to retrieve the money that was stolen from him.

Director:

John Boorman

Writers:

Alexander Jacobs (screenplay), David Newhouse (screenplay)

Stars:

Lee Marvin, Angie Dickinson, Keenan Wynn

1 win.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Lee Marvin	...	Walker
Angie Dickinson	...	Chris
Keenan Wynn	...	Yost
Carroll O'Connor	...	Brewster
Lloyd Bochner	...	Frederick Carter
Michael Strong	...	Stegman
John Vernon	...	Mal Reese
Sharon Acker	...	Lynne
James Sikking	...	Hired Gun
Sandra Warner	...	Waitress
Roberta Haynes	...	Mrs. Carter
Kathleen Freeman	...	First Citizen
Victor Creatore	...	Carter's Man
Lawrence Hauben	...	Car Salesman
Susan Holloway	...	Girl Customer

Storyline

Mal Reese is in a real bind - owing a good deal of money to his organized crime bosses - and gets his friend Walker to join him in a heist. It goes off without a hitch but when Reese realizes the take isn't as large as he had hoped, he kills Walker - or so he thinks. Some time later, Walker decides the time has come get his share of the money and starts with his ex-wife Lynne who took up with Reese after the shooting. That leads him on a trail - to his wife's sister Chris, to Reese himself, then onto Big Stegmam, then Frederick Carter and on and up the line of gangsters all in an effort to get money from people who simply won't acknowledge that he's owed anything.

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Plot Keywords:

money | gangster | criminal | revenge | organized crime | 

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Taglines:

He thrived on two kinds of people...his victims and his women!

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

10 February 1968 (Japan)

Also Known As:

A quemarropa

Filming Locations:

Fort Point, Presidio, Golden Gate National Recreation Area, San Francisco, California, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$3,000,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), Winkler Films

Technical Specs

Runtime:

92 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Metrocolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This is the first instance of a film adaptation of a Richard Stark novel about Parker, in which the character is re-named ("Walker"). Parker's creator, Donald E. Westlake, mandated that "Parker" could not be used unless the filmmakers planned a series. This situation happened also with the Mel Gibson film "Payback" where Parker became "Porter." Notably, in an early Stark novel a crime figure can't remember Parker's name, referring to him as "Porter, Walker, Archer, something like that."

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Goofs

When Walker shoots up the bed, the holes shown are way larger than would come from a handgun, except maybe, if they were contact shots, which they were not. None are at the angle from which he is shooting, and there's already a hole in the bed where he takes his last shot before he does.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Walker: Cell. Prison Cell. How did I get here?

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Connections

Featured in Lionpower from MGM (1967)

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Soundtracks

Mighty Good Times
by Stu Gardner
sung by The Stu Gardner Trio

User Reviews

Raw, Lyrical, and Bullets

Point Blank kind of came and went in theaters but I can't imagine anyone who saw it in 1967 left forgetting John Boorman's tough and beautiful film. A simple story told in a very stylish and, at times, surreal manner. Though the storyline is a variation on "revenge" themes, it is Boorman's images that open it up and find pay-dirt. Images of Lee Marvin emptying his pistol in slow motion, the sound of footsteps over a string of pictures that curdle the mind, and the seemingly limitless use of rawness perfectly realized in the action and performance by Marvin and,interestingly, Angie Dickinson. There is a wonderful conflict between the primal Marvin and the Corporate Crime world which he cannot understand. Marvin knows survival of the fittest- not the richest. It's hypnotic and aggressive. Boorman balances perfectly on the line between the two.