Thunderbolt and Lightfoot

Rating:
Summary: Great casting makes this movie
Review: Thunderbolt and Lightfoot is Michael Cimino?s first film as a director. This film takes its time in building its characters and story which in the hands of a lesser cast would have made it a marginal movie. But what saves it is the acting and actors involved in the project.

Clint Eastwood plays an ex Korean war veteran working as a pastor in a mid-western town whose past one day shows up to haunt him. He meets up with Jeff Bridges and they begin a journey that at first takes on the story of escaping two killers on their tail. Eventually the two killers, played by George Kennedy and Geoffrey Lewis whose past with Eastwood is explained, join up with the duo and they plan a robbery together.

All the main players here are simply excellent in their roles and there is a real comedic aspect the film. Particularly funny is when the group is forced to find work; Lewis ends up as an ice cream truck driver. Ignore the concept of a supposed ?sub-text? that others see in Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, it?s mainly wish fulfillment more than anything else. This is an above average road movie that shows what Cimino was capable of early on in his carrier before ?The Deer Hunter? made his reputation and ?Heaven?s Gate? ruined it.

Rating:
Summary: THAT'S not it!
Review: Well, aside from being a total classic, this movie is all at once, touching, funny, exciting, moving, and riveting. It is the ultimate entertaining film. It has something for everyone. Car chases, guns, girls, beer, fistfights, guys in drag, and yes, a trunkfull of rabbits... who could ever ask for more? eastwood and particularly jeff bridges are excellent, especially at the end of the film. his nomination is well deserved. see this movie if you want to be entertained, but not insulted. good stuff.

Rating:
Summary: TOOTSIE
Review: Written and directed by Michaël Cimino, THUNDERBOLT AND LIGHTFOOT is not only a Clint Eastwood vehicle. One of the reviewer here has rightly observed that the character of Jeff Bridges could have been played by an actress.

If you keep this in mind, the movie appears in a very different light. Just count the numerous jokes about the virility of the four outlaws, the dozens of cars - another powerful sexual symbol - borrowed by an always dissatisfied Jeff Bridges. And, at least, the enormous gun used by Clint to destroy the safe of the Montana Bank.

This interpretation, apart of the intellectual pleasure it can give you, would have been a little bit gratuitous if the film hadn't been a good road movie with excellent actors. If you're a movie lover, it's clear that you have to watch THUNDERBOLT AND LIGHTFOOT at least once. The same goes for Clint Eastwood or Jeff Bridges's fans.

Three different subtitles and a theatrical trailer as bonus features. Sound and images excellent.

A DVD to rent.