533. Get Carter (1971)

Running Time: 112 minutes
Directed By: Mike Hodges
Written By: Mike Hodges, from the novel Jack's Return Home by Ted Lewis
Main Cast: Michael Caine, Ian Hendry, John Osborne, Bryan Mosley, George Sewell
Click here to view the trailer

JACK CARTER IS A LITTLE UPSET

If you're a movie-hound like me, then you know the feeling. You watch a movie, starring one of your many favorite actors and all of a sudden you develop a temporary man-crush (or regular crush, if the particular actor is of the opposite sex) on said actor. Well it happened to me with Michael Caine, so I had to move a few things around in order to watch his final film in THE BOOK.

Jack Carter (Caine) is a gangster who lives his criminal life in Newcastle, England. However, when his brother dies, Carter decides it's time to return home, mostly because he smells suspicion regarding his brother Frank's death. As the opening credits roll Jack rides a train from Newcastle to London, leaving behind his beautiful, blonde girlfriend Anna (Britt Ekland). When Jack arrives, he takes care of Frank first, a simple service, before Frank is wheeled, pine box and all, into the crematorium. Then, as far as Jack is concerned, it's time to get down to business and find out who killed his brother. Jack revisits all of his old cronies from his younger days, when he was a junior criminal and meets up with his niece (or was it his daughter) Doreen. Jack doesn't play games, he gets his answers from the craftiest of thugs, puffing on cigarettes, downing liquor and wooing ladies in the process.

I have mixed feelings on "Get Carter", but ultimately I think I liked it. I certainly got what I went to it for and that's a good dose of Michael Caine and what a performance he dishes out as Jack Carter. He's a character that you can have fun watching and he makes the whole movie unpredictable. Hodges was in top form here, giving us a bevy of different shots and using editing techniques that only served to draw us deeper into the criminal underworld of Jack Carter. There's dozens and dozens of shots that separate "Carter" from your typical action/gangster film and give it a real stylish quality in the process.

However, I had gripes too. The main thing that was that the film was just too complicated and at times even resembled a good, old-fashioned "clusterfuck". There were about five too many characters to keep track of, as Jack trotted around London, getting lead after lead and chasing down a different "bad guy" every twelve hours. You had Brumby, Eric, Kinnear, Sid, McCarty, Albert, Thorpe and Gerald. Ok, so maybe they weren't all main characters, but they're all guys who Jack chases down over the course of this movie as he gets closer and closer to avenging his brother. By the time the end rolled around, I didn't know Brumby from Kinnear or Sid from Thorpe, as I scrambled to keep track of everyone. So maybe I'm exaggerating, but there were TOO MANY characters! Also, the whole plot kind of hung on a shoestring, with everything revolving around Frank's daughter appearing in a porno flick.

SPOILER ALERT!

Also, what was with the ending? Why did they kill Jack Carter? Was it to show us that "Get Carter" wasn't like your typical "regular joe turned superhero" movies and that Carter COULD BE stopped? Doesn't seem right, since the film was made in the days before the "regular joe turned superhero" was really popular. Or was it simply threw in as a last minute shocker to the audience? I don't know, either way it didn't quite make sense to me. Sure it shocked me, but as it really necessary?

RATING: 7/10 Yeah, I gripe, but ultimately "Get Carter" was a standout movie, that didn't blend in with the crowd, but rather, shined...thanks mostly to Caine. In other news, "Godard Week" should be wrapped up by the end of the weekend.

MOVIES WATCHED: 389
MOVIES LEFT TO WATCH: 612

January 7, 2012 5:08pm