Spoonatects Am i the only one who thinks........Average?

Intcatinfo A Masterpiece!

Bluebell Alcock Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

bombersflyup Targets is a pointless but engaging thriller, that is a mixed mess.So the film started off in another film and I had no idea what film I was watching or what it was about, so that was pretty cool. Every review raves about Karloff, I'm suppose to care who that is am I? I know he was in "Frankenstein". Anyway, he was fine, though the bit at the end where he walks up to the killer and slaps him is laughable. So Bobby says to his wife "You don't think I can do anything do you" and that is all we learn about why he goes off killing people. Byron says "Nobody cares about a painted monster anymore" and points to his newspaper about a shooting, when there is real horror out there. There are two separate stories and then the two come together in a silly conclusion. One with depth that is uneventful and the other eventful without any depth, you put the two together and you get? I don't know, an unwritten character that takes up half the screen-time. It's not a great film nor is it a bad film, it was fine.

rooprect In the DVD introduction to this film, writer/director/actor Peter Bogdanovich explains how it happened. B-movie mogul Roger Corman came to Peter in late 1967 with a proposal: take 40 minutes of footage from Corman's film "The Terror", film 20 minutes of Boris Karloff (who owed Corman 2 days of work), film 40 minutes of other stuff with other actors to tie it all together, and complete a feature film all for a budget of $125,000.You'd think this would be a recipe for a colossal turd of a movie, but on the contrary, it pushed everyone's creativity to the max and resulted in a remarkable work of cinema.Peter & his wife grabbed their typewriters and wrote a modern horror story contrasted against a classic Victorian horror. Assisted by Peter's friend & successful writer/director Samuel Fuller (not credited), they churned out a profound & poetic script loosely based on the news story of Charles Fuller, a former marine sniper who went on a mass shooting rampage the year before. A bit was also inspired by the Highway 101 sniper shootings in which a 16-year-old boy killed 3 motorists in 1965. That's the "modern horror" part. The Victorian horror comes with the character Byron Orlock (played by Karloff) who is a classic horror icon at the end of his career, realizing that his brand of horror is outdated.If you can see where this is going, you're in for a great experience. Yes, it's a story of change, out with the old & in with the new, but in a chilling way I've never seen before. The idea that fear has evolved into something far different. Ghost stories & creepy characters no longer cut it. The new brand of terror is faceless, anonymous, soulless and random. Enter the phenomenon of the mass killer."Targets" was ahead of its time, and Peter even mentions how its release was delayed because studio execs were afraid of how its message would be received, especially with the assassinations of Martin Luther King Jr and Bobby Kennedy just months prior to release.It is extremely relevant today, and even if it weren't so artistically done & expertly acted, I would recommend this film for its message alone. The directing, cinematography & acting is icing on the cake, and oh what icing it is! If you're like me, you probably know Boris Karloff as the lumbering creature in "Frankenstein" (1931)... a big, stiff lunk in electricians boots who drags himself around as if he's murderously constipated. Here in "Targets" he is eloquent, charming, tragic, comic and instantly worthy of our attention. My favorite scene is in a hotel room when he tells a ghost story. Director Bogdanovich is very respectful with his camera work in that scene: it opens wide and fixes itself on Karloff with its (and our) undivided attention as it slowly narrows on Karloff's face. No cuts, no jumps, no distractions, just pure Karloff.The movie is full of thoughtful camera work like that. As you watch the film you get the idea that every camera angle, movement, pan & zoom, and every shadow and inch of background action was very carefully planned to the millimeter. I confess I've never seen a Bodanovich film, but I know he's a very respected director. Now I see why. On a tiny budget that, today, wouldn't cover the catering for a big studio film, he cranked out a magnificent film.I would put "Targets" squarely in the class of Hitchcock, as compelling as my favorites "Rope", "Rear Window", "Vertigo" and so on. But as I mentioned earlier, it's the blending of Victorian horror (Hitchcock, Vincent Price, etc) with modern horror (Fox News, etc) that makes this an unforgettable show.Just an epilogue to the story of how the film was made... Although prints caught the attention of major studios, it wasn't officially released until it caught the eye of a film professor who invited Paramount execs to a screening in his classroom. Paramount bought the film for $150,000 (netting Corman a whopping $25,000 profit... hope he didn't blow it all in 1 night!). The film was eventually released, and it received rave reviews from critics but never did well with the public at large. Way ahead of its time. Lucky for us it survived onto DVD 40 years later when perhaps the world will understand it better. Don't hesitate for one minute to see this film if you have the chance!

Jackson Booth-Millard From debuting director Peter Bogdanovich (The Last Picture Show, What's Up, Doc?, Paper Moon, Mask), I saw the title for this film in the book 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die, I rightly assumed it was something do with an assassin, but I had no idea about the plot, and I was very excited by the cast, especially the lead actor and the director himself. The story is based on that of ex-marine Charles Whitman from Texas in 1966, he murdered his own mother and wife, and armed himself with many rifles and handguns, and went on a shooting spree killing fourteen innocent people and wounding thirty two others, so this film is a fictionalised reinvention of that idea. Basically ageing horror movie star Byron Orlok (Boris Karloff) has become bored with acting and feels that monsters he is playing are going out of fashion, so despite getting a new script that was written specifically for him he wants to retire, but friend Sammy Michaels (Peter Bogdanovich) is insisting he keep going. Bobby Thompson (Tim O'Kelly) is a quiet insurance agent and Vietnam War veteran who one day snaps, murdering his wife, his wife and a delivery boy from the grocery store, and armed with several rifles and handguns, that he has been collecting from a gun store, he goes to the top of a Los Angeles oil refinery area and starts randomly shooting cars passing by the passengers inside and getting out on the nearby freeway, many killed and others wounded from his actions. Orlok may be tiring of the limelight and wanting to move on from his career, but he allows himself to attend and make a final promotional appearance during the performance of his classic film The Terror playing at a drive-in theatre in Reseda, he and his colleagues do not realise that the amateur assassin is setting up his weaponry to kill people when they are least expecting. The film starts playing and people are settling with no concerns, and then soon enough people have bullet holes cracking their windshields, people inside the cars are being shot and either killed or wounded, and slowly more people realise that a gunman is aiming at them from above, and this was not long after the star of the show arrived. The end of the film sees Thompson getting ready to leave the scene, when he realises the police are gathering outside, and Orlok is brave enough to limp over to the young murderer and slap his to allow the police to catch him, he feels better for doing something good, and all Thompson wants to know before being taken away is how many victims are dead. Also starring Nancy Hsueh as Jenny, James Brown as Robert Thompson Sr., Sandy Baron as Kip Larkin, Arthur Peterson as Ed Loughlin, Mary Jackson as Charlotte Thompson, Tanya Morgan as Ilene Thompson and Monte Landis as Marshall Smith. This was one of the last films that Karloff appeared in, as he was in ill health, the following year he tragically died, so was only hired to film for a short period, but he proves himself a great choice as the old actor who wants to get away from it all, and O'Kelly is absolutely the right person to play the young uncoordinated assassin whose actions are never explained, which makes him all the more creepy. There is not much of a plot or story as such, but it is fascinating to watch, because the two stories combining and eventually coming together makes good sense, it is full of interesting moments when Karloff is on screen, and the unhinged random shooting sequences are most watchable, it is in small parts disturbing as well, a fantastic crime thriller. Very good!

tribble-841-35156 This is essentially a "B" movie with aspirations, and I think there are three elements that have kept it being remembered, even if it is far from classic status.The first is the heartfelt performance by Boris Karloff, who plays essentially himself, lamenting that his brand of horror is now seen as silly and comic, and that he is no longer relevant.The second is the atmosphere or feel of the film, which for anyone who can remember the daily life of the late sixties this is captures almost perfectly, rooting you in the time and place.Lastly is the film portrays its story in a cold, almost documentary style, and for the time period it takes place in is surprisingly violent. This detachment lets viewers feel they are seeing a news event rather than a movie.Taken solely for that, and without any political context, and it's not a half bad movie. It was originally released with a short text prologue about gun control, but in actuality the movie doesn't itself make a statement one way or another.And therein is the issue I have with this movie. The shooter just seems to lose it and goes on his spree, with no real motive established. If it was a message about the coldness and randomness of modern violence, it should have been spelled out more clearly. Instead we're left with a man who embarks on his spree because he decides to, and in the end his only concern is he hardly missed.Karloff is ultimately the confrontation to the shooter at the film's climax, but I was never sure what we're supposed to take from it, since we didn't know the the why of the killer and Karloff was a horror movie actor.The closest interpretation I could think of was Karloff represented an old school idea where violence was only make believe on film, while the killer was the modern day senseless spree murderer.A much better examination could have been made of the societal aspects behind the killer, but then this was only a "B" movie.