Bob Maxwell Movies
- 1986
- PG
Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas team up one last time in Tough Guys. Harry Doyle (Lancaster) and Archie Lang (Douglas) are two old-time train robbers, who held up a train in 1956 and have been incarcerated for thirty years. After serving their time, they are released from jail and have to adjust to a new life of freedom, now as old men. Harry and Archie realize that they still have the pizzazz when, picking up their prison checks at a bank, they foil a robbery attempt. Archie, who spent his prison time pumping himself up, easily picks up a 20-year-old aerobics instructor named Skye (Darlanne Fluegel). Harry, on the other hand, has to waste away his days in a nursing home. They both have festering resentments --Archie for having to endure a humiliating job as a busboy; Harry for having to endure patronizing attitudes toward senior citizens. The two old pals finally go back to what they know best. After successfully robbing an armored car, they decide to rob the same train that they robbed thirty years ago. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Kirk Douglas, Burt Lancaster, (more)
This standard, tongue-in-cheek, gangsters and good guys saga is carried on the star power and screen presence of Clint Eastwood as Lt. Speer, a taciturn, tough, play-it-by-the-book cop, and on Burt Reynolds as Mike Murphy, Speer's old friend in the force, now turned private eye but still a captivating rogue at heart. With a sub-text of playing their well-known screen personas off each other, Eastwood and Reynolds provide more than a surface interpretation of the characters that made them famous. After Murphy's partner is murdered, he focuses on pitting one mob boss against another in an attempt to have both mobsters kill each other. In the meantime, Lt. Speer -- who has never approved of Murphy's private detective business -- does not really know if Murphy is for or against the two top gangsters. Set in the era of speakeasies and Prohibition, an added layer of "film noir" can be discerned under the complex plot, verbal repartée, and episodes of toned-down violence (a kind of parody in themselves). Although this may not be the best film either star has made, it is still interesting to see them together on screen. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide
- Starring:
- Clint Eastwood, Burt Reynolds, (more)
