Running Scared a Peter Hyams film

RUNNING SCARED


Peter Hyams directed this buddy cop movie with zest.Gregory Hines and Billy Crystal are the cops who are after a drug lord and will stop at nothing to catch him there's also the mad police captain and two other cops who try'n stay one step ahead of them. I know this sounds like you've heard it before but there are some great action scenes and some hilarous moments this movie ranks as another one of the best cop buddy movie ever right up there with Freebie and the Bean, lethal weapon and stakeout.

Peter Hyams has always been able to make something unorignal highly original Outland is High Noon in space and Narrow Margin is a remake of the 1952 classic with the same name. Give it a try you might get a nice surprise.

I thought Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines had pretty good chemistry, and I liked this movie at the time it came out. I've seen it only once or twice since then. Not one of my all-time favorite movies or anything, but it's something I can enjoy when watching.

I've always liked Running Scared, mainly because of Crystal and Hines. Their chemistry is up there with Arkin and Cann's in Freebie & the Bean, though I think that earlier movie is better overall. Running Scared uses the Chicago locales well, Dan Hedaya is always a treat, Jimmy Smits makes an imposing bad guy, and Joe Pantoliano steals just about every scene he's in.

But compared to Midnight Run, a truly great movie of the same type from the same period, Running Scared is an also-ran in my book. I enjoy it, I've owned the LD for years and pop it in from time to time (I can watch Crystal do his "Oh no, he missed the Bible question" over and over), but it's not one I watch religiously. I'd grade it a C+, or even a B- in a particularly generous mood.



In general, I don't care for Peter Hyams' work and consider him a bit of a Hollywood hack. Both Hyams and Taylor Hackford (Against All Odds, White Nights, Proof of Life), whenever I see their names attached to a project, my interest and expectations automatically diminish. Roger Donaldson and John Badham are another couple I'd slot into that company, though their best stuff (what there is) is a bit better than Hyams and Hackford's.

Running Scared is the best, most complete film Hyams made in my book, and it's far from perfect or revelatory. Outland is OK could have been better, The Star Chamber and Capricorn One are good ideas poorly executed & hopelessly dated, and the Narrow Margin re-make (besides being unnecessary) isn't a complete failure - thanks chiefly to Hackman & James B. Sikking. But I always get the feeling that a more talented and visionary director could have done much more with the exact same material. Hyams isn't incompetent, his movies simply aren't special. The end result is usually watchable, but very average fare and rarely memorable. Hyams is also responsible for Sudden Death and Timecop with Wham-Bam-Van Damme, End of Days with Schwarzenegger, Hanover Street the dud wartime romance with Harrison Ford, The Relic, The Presidio, 2010: The Year We Make Contact and the horrible Stay Tuned (has to be his worst). With the exception of Stay Tuned, all of those movies are crushingly average, at their best.

Hyams often handles his own cinematography (all of his movies from 2010 through last year's silly The Musketeer), and I think he's much more talented in that department than as a director or screenwriter. In the old Studio system, a director like Hyams would have been relegated to mostly B-movies for his entire career, and he would have been successful enough to keep getting assignments (on time, on budget, everything is in focus), but never be first on anybody's list. I doubt these words have even been uttered: "Oh, we just HAVE to get Peter Hyams for this one!". There's nothing wrong with being a B-movie guy, but I never find his movies are more than that.

__________________
"Film is a disease. When it infects your bloodstream it takes over as the number one hormone. It bosses the enzymes, directs the pineal gland, plays Iago to your psyche. As with heroin, the antidote to Film is more Film." - Frank Capra

Out of the Directors you named did any of them make movies that surpassed your expectations of how you thought they were going to be. basically what i'm asking is did any of them make a movie that you consider to be great or really good well above average.

John Badham , Roger Donaldson , Taylor Hackford & Peter Hyams

Of those four directors, no, I don't think any one has made a truly great film. As I said, most of their work is watchable, and some are even entertaining, but I wouldn't call any of those directors artists, they're workmen. Nothing 'wrong' with that, but that's just the way I see their movies.

Let's see, director by director...

Taylor Hackford
Against All Odds is probably his best movie, and it pales in comparison to the original, Jacques Tourneur's Noir classic Out of the Past with Mitchum and Douglas. An Officer & a Gentleman was certainly popular in its day and made Richard Gere a movie star, but while it's competent and has some good performances, I don't think it's any masterpiece. Delores Claibourne is interestingly stylized visually, but compare it to Rob Reiner's similar Misery, also based on a Stephen King novel also starring Kathy Bates, and tell me which is the better film. The Devil's Advocate was slick, but hollow and really dumb, with a ridiculous cop-out ending. I watched most of Proof of Life on TV the other night, and it was pretty standard stuff. White Nights is nice to look visually, but really ordinary and dull otherwise. The Idolmaker and Everybody's All-American were pretty average too.

John Badham
WarGames and Blue Thunder are his best two flicks, but while they're good movies and hold up well despite their age, I wouldn't call either a great flick. Saturday Night Fever rightly made Travolta a star and is a decent urban coming-of-age story, but is it a great movie? I don't think so. Who's Life Is It Anyway? is a solid drama with a strong semi-autobiographical performance by Dreyfuss, but not a masterpiece. American Flyers is an OK little drama, but not in the class of a Breaking Away (not by a longshot). He can make good mainstream entertainments, like Stakeout, The Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings, The Hard Way and Short Circuit, but he's just as likely to make horrible entertainments like Another Stakeout and Bird on a Wire. Even when they're good, they're not great. The Americanized la femme Nikita re-make he did, Point of No Return, was just embarassing compared to the original. Nick of Time had a decent gimmick and a strong cast, but it went nowhere. Drop Zone is junk. The Dracula he did with Frank Langella was extremely disappointing. He's been relegated to mostly made-for-TV stuff in recent years, which is probably where he belongs.

Roger Donaldson
No Way Out is a good thriller, I actually like the re-make of The Getaway, and The Bounty is an interesting take on that material, but none of those is a great movie in my book. Marie has a strong performance by Sissy Spacek, but not much else. Cocktail is a complete piece of trash. Cadillac Man is mildly watchable, but so very disappointing given that cast and that situation. It could have been a dark comedy version of Dog Day Afternoon. It isn't. White Sands is OK as a B-movie genre piece, but doesn't transcend the material. Dante's Peak is a dog. Species made money and has a following, but it's pretty average dumbed-down Sci-Fi, despite the excellent cast. Thirteen Days was ambitious and Donaldson's first attempt at a real, serious, adult, grown-up movie in quite a long time, but I thought it was flat and Costner was COMPLETELY miscast. When the '74 made-for-TV version of this story, "The Missles of October", is more riveting and well-made than what you can do in 2000 with the new effects and a good budget, what does that tell you about the filmmaker?

Peter Hyams
I already went through his filmography in the other post. Running Scared is probably his best film, and it's no Beverly Hills Cop, you know?


All four have made films worth seeing, and all four seem to have a fairly strong visual sense as far as composition and the overall look of a movie (or at least they communicate well with and know how to choose their D.P.s). But none has ever hit a home run...as far as I can see anyway. I own a bunch of those titles: Blue Thunder, Running Scared, Outland, Narrow Margin, White Sands, No Way Out, The Getaway, The Hard Way, Against All Odds and WarGames. I enjoy them for what they are and have seen each one of those flicks multiple times. But I don't think there's a masterpiece in the bunch, even in genre terms.


Feel free to disagree, of course. That's just my take on those four directors. Your mileage may vary.

I would have to agree with you on the way you think about these director I just think that Taylor Hackford is a bit more artist than the others visualy and story telling wise.

I'm a sucker for a lot of Hyams stuff and the others so I guess I love the hollywood B Movies of today

John Badham's
who's life is it anyway I thought it rised above his usually stuff with Photography by Mario Tosi the guy who did The Stunt Man I own Wargames on DVD and thought it was very nicely done and I enjoyed The Hardway purely for it's entertainment value and Michael J. Fox but yes i'd have to say he hasn't made a truly great movie from his filmography.

Roger Donaldson
I have seen most of his stuff from America actually marie & Thriteen Days or the only one's I haven't seen yet of his from America and I think that White Sands is my fav of his list of movie made there.

But i'm wondering now, how some of his other stuff's like from his home land Australia Sleeping Dogs (1977), Nutcase (1980), Smash Palace (1981) are compared to the movies he makes today have you seen any of them Holden.

For me there's a director named Geoff Murphy from New Zealand and he made Goodbye Pork Pie (1981) & Quiet Earth, The (1985) which I think are very intresting and very good films but almost all the stuff if not all the stuff he has made in America pales in comparisen to those two films further more I think the only two good films he's done here are Freejack (1992) & Young Guns II (1990) and there nothin super. So i'm thinking that Donaldson work from Australia might be a step up.

No, I haven't seen any of Roger Donaldson's pre-American work. It may well be interesting and dynamic and good, I don't know. But judging from what all four of these directors has done in the mainstream system, they're all competent, but none has broken away toward anything really amazing.