The Warriors

Rating:
Summary: Warriors 4ever
Review: I first heard about this movie on I love the 70's. I wanted to see it so badley mainly because out where I live, there was a local band that I loved so much who were called Warriors. I was really influenced by them to see it. The bad thing at the time was I coudn't find it for rent anywhere. So finally on 4-16-04 I took the chance and bought it assuming I was gonna like it and I was right. It wasn't what I was quite expecting but it still rocked. After seeing it I thought that that band I love named themselves after the movie. Sad to say they did not but it's all good. I'm really looking forward for the Warriors video game for PS2 to be out soon and to see the remake of the Warriors set to be released sometime in 2006 (directed by Tony Scott). I'm not much of a reader but I really want to get the Warriors novel (by Sol Yurick). To all those teens and young adults, you wanna see a classic gang flick, see the Warriors and be watching for the video game for PS2 to be out soon along with the remake of the film set to be out in 2006.

Rating:
Summary: Hello, All you big boppers out there!
Review: As a New York kid, some movies just bring back how it all once was. This movie is one of them as well as Taxi Driver, Saturday Night Fever and The Goodbye Girl.

While it's true that NY wasn't as decrepit as this movie portrays, it was very close. I remember blocks upon blocks in Bklyn, Queens, Manhattan, and especially the Bronx as burnt out shells. Landlords burned their buildings rather than take a loss in income. Also, it was considered a viable option to have your car towed to a desolate part of NYC and blown up. Hey, it was either that and collect comp insurance or let the repo man get it. Also the trains really were scary. The train near me was the IRT (numbered trains from 1 to 5). You did not ride these trains unless it was during rush hour or you were with a large group of friends. The trains were covered in grafiti, filthy and the lights did not work. You could ride to and from NYC and be sitting in the dark 75% of the time. Also the stations were the habitat of the homeless and gang kids. 42nd Street was also a notorious red-light district but that never seemed to be an issue with us New Yorkers. We laughed about it.

Anyway, this film is a landmark film on street kids, gang culture and 70's NY. It's campy, true, but back then almost every New Yorker dressed like a refugee of Studio 54 and the Mudd Club. The gangs represent a drugged out, punk rock version of lower class hell (By the way, Punk Rock was a New York invention, London stole it from us). The Baseball Furies, in particular, scared the living daylights out of me. You can imagine the mess I was in when Halloween came around and everyone was a Baseball Fury. I loved the fact that the gangs were a mix mashup of all kinds of kids. All of whom had one allegiance, to perpetuating neighborhood turf wars, everything else (gender and race) came afterwards.

This film launched the careers of James Remarr, Michael Beck, Mercedes Ruehl, David Patrick Kelly and Deborah Van Valkenburgh. Valkenburgh's performance in particular is affecting. She was one of the glamorous tv stars and in this film she was covered in dirt. One of the best scenes is when she comes face to face with rich prom kids on the train. She tries to tidy herself up but Beck's Swan stops her. It captures NY class warfare at it's most brutal.

The soundtrack is, of course, fantastic.

I shudder over the remake news. This film is, was and always will be about New York. Now they will take it and turn it into some moralistic, stylistic, car ad to sell us junk. How depressing.


Rating:
Summary: Fists will get you home, looks will give you fame
Review: The warriors, an epic tale of a group of boys with the souls of poets, but the lifes of soldiers, in shiny uniforms they battle their way back to warrior's turf after being blammed for the murder of the Riffs' boss; they are chased all over the city, by cops, other gangs, babes and sexy lips talking to a microphone, a must see for urban action movies.

Rating:
Summary: "They shot Cyyyyrussss...."
Review: "The Warriors" is a fantasy film. If you try to judge it in relation to the real world, you're wasting your time. It takes place in an alternate universe. In this world, street gangs don't traffic in drugs, they only fight against each other and never target innocent civilians, and they wear colorful costumes like in "A Clockwork Orange". They also fight with knives and chains rather than AK-47s. You know early on the David Patrick Kelly is the villian, because he uses a handgun, a clear violation of the gangbangers' civilaric code.

If you accept this alternate reality, "The Warriors" is a great adventure movie. In my opinion it the best film that Walter Hill ever made. I love the various street gangs which include:

The Thermal ACs, who are skinheads, but not racist, since they also have black members.

The Furies, who dress up like baseball players with clown makeup.

The Riffs, who seem to pattern themselves after Jim Kelly from "Enter The Dragon".

An unnamed gang who dress in the style of 70s roller disco (not really scary; rollerskates are definately something you don't want to be wearing during a rumble).

The Orphans, a gang of losers who want respect but are too chicken to earn it.

The Lizzies, and gang of man-hating lesbians who pretend to be loose in order to lead male gang-members to their doom (think Homer's "The Odyssey").

The Rogues, who are led by a sadistic psychopath (who also has the best lines in the entire movie, including the classic, "warriors, come out to play...!"

I love this movie, having seen it in my youth numerous times at the midnight movies, and I would highly recommend it to anyone who loves non-stop action and laughs. Five stars.