AMERICAN BOY

title: AMERICAN BOY: A PROFILE OF STEVEN PRINCE
year: 1978
cast: Steven Prince, George Memmoli, Martin Scorsese, Mardik Martin
rating: ***1/2

Steven Prince, who played the gun-dealing babblemouth "Easy Andy" in the Martin Scorsese classic TAXI DRIVER, has his hour to shine. This, a documentary involving Prince, Scorsese, and actor George Memmoli (the really fat dude in MEAN STREETS and the guy who reluctantly allowed Stallone to ice-skate in ROCKY) sitting around a living room, is really a gloriously-glorified home movie, inserting images of the subject as a child between his bantering - with a more grating voice than Horseshack from WELCOME BACK KOTTER - about drugs, bagels, family members, working for Neil Diamond, and a lice-seeking gorilla. Few of the diatribes are interesting and some seem a bit forced. But it's during the last fifteen minutes, as he shares about killing a man in Arizona by shooting his six times, where things pick-up. The standout tale of madness involves Prince saving an overdosing girl's life by injecting her in the chest with an adrenaline shot while reading instructions on how to do so. Sound familiar? Neil Young's obscure track "Time Fades Away" envelopes the piece nicely.
at
Labels: , , ,

No comments:

Post a Comment

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)

Featured Post

NICKELODEON (1976)

There's a scene in Peter Bogdanovich's tribute to early film-making when Ryan O'Neal, a goofy lawyer turned goofy director, has...

  • THE DEATH COLLECTOR/FAMILY ENFORCER (1976)
    The extremely low-budget of THE DEATH COLLECTOR should not be a detriment since  it effectively provides an eerie realism to what's a po...
  • RAIDERS OF THE LOST ARK (NOVELIZATION)
    If a novelization flows, it doesn't matter how many times you've seen the movie, since, on the printed page, RAIDERS OF THE LOST A...
  • EASY MONEY (1983)
    Hands down the best scene of EASY MONEY has Rodney Dangerfield insulting a fat kid and his family... where he seems like characters from sup...
  • TO BE OR NOT TO (1982)
    Starts out decently enough, and surprisingly different for Mel Brooks to direct a remake: something that isn't a parody of a serious ...
  • HARBOR COMMAND (TV SERIES 1957-1958)
    Although on the big screen the film noir/crime b-movies were on their way out (or morphing into something else), television held onto this ...
  • THE HAPPYTIME MURDERS (2018)
    It's not just that son of Jim Henson Brian Henson crapped on his father's MUPPET SHOW legacy by making a crude comedy where crude pu...
  • THE WALKING DEAD: DARYL DIXON (2023)
    Well if anything happens, and THE WALKING DEAD: DARYL DIXON doesn't become a big hit, then they could easily make a prequel taking place...
  • SHADOWS AND FOG (WOODY ALLEN)
    While SHADOWS AND FOG is a pretty good movie, and uses the titular elements that channel old British mystery novels, German Expressionism an...
  • OLIVER'S STORY (1978)
    Poor Ryan O'Neal couldn't catch a break. Even two films now considered classics didn't make money in the 1970's upon relea...
  • LIVE CREAM (ALBUM)
    LIVE CREAM is the best live Cream album, covering songs from the first LP Fresh Cream and Jack Bruce, Eric Clapton and Ginger Baker (bass/l...