ben hibburd The Gladiator is the third film i've seen from New York auteur Abel Ferrara. Although this film happens to be set in California it retains all the same visual stylistic choices from his New York films. The Gladiator is yet another film that i find Incredibly divisive, and has done little too sway my opinion of him from either being a hack or a genius.The film stars Ken Wahl as Rick Benton, a revenge fuelled vigilante. After the death of his brother to a crazed motorist that is in the midst of a murderous rampage. Benton takes to patrolling the roads of San Francisco in his modified pick up truck, using the call sign Gladiator. He does so to ensure the roads are kept safe from inept drivers, whilst simultaneously hunting for his brothers killer.The Gladiator is essentially Death Wish on wheels, and nothing much else. The script is your typical vigilante drama, as the stoic Benton goes through every cliché known to man. That is until his inevitable showdown with his brothers killer. Usually this would bother me in most films of this ilk though Iv'e come to accept this macho style of film-making from Ferrara. Whilst the film is thin on characterisation, it's never regarded as the focus of the film.There's something though about Ferrara's film-making that i can't quite put my finger on. It's no secret that his films don't look very good, and most of them have a televisual feel to them alongside, at times unintelligible audio. However they completely suck me into his world. All of his films have this underlying, stoic, brooding atmosphere, that i find intoxicating. Ferrara is able to bring his films to life in ways that few directors can. His night-shots, despite the poor, indie quality of the cameras, look beautiful, much like the work of Michael Mann or Katheryn Bigelow.Nearly all his films are divisive and rough around the edges. This film is more straight forward, then most of his others films such-as: Bad Lieutenant, The Driller Killer etc. Whilst i respect and even at times admire his low budget, guerrilla style of film-making, it's not enough to save this film from it's poor, under-cooked screenplay, and bland characters.

bennozoid1 I love Abel Ferrara, but I'm guessing he was slightly high when he accepted this gig and had some bills to pay?? No that's cruel. Although the film stock and general production values of this are shoddy and televisual, Ferrara's gritty aesthetic just about peers through the sanitised veneer of this one. His mechanic best buddy is a nice character, and there are a few unintentional laughs to be had. Overall though, if this was your first insight into abel ferrara, then it would be a bad one to pick...Choose Ms.45, King of New York, Bad Lieutenant or Fear City instead....I believe Tarantino's segment of the forthcoming film GRINDHOUSE is about a killer, hit-and-run car.....I'm sure he's seen this one then! I also had the (mis)fortune of watching BLACK MOON RISING on the same day!? Also about cars/car chases/the fetishisation of driving souped up cars in the US. Is this the direction that Tarantino is travelling???.....

Woodyanders When one thinks of the singularly raw, gritty and hard-hitting cinema of Abel Ferrara (who's rough'n'tumble films include "Driller Killer," "Ms.45," and "Bad Lieutenant"), several scattered idiot box credits aren't the first thing to spring to mind. But back in the mid-80's the often fiercely indie and underground Ferrara briefly went mainstream and somehow wormed his way onto the boob tube, where he directed the "Crime Story" pilot, a few episodes of "Miami Vice," and this fairly generic, yet miraculously rough-edged and compelling made-for-TV feature. Ken Wahl of "Wiseguy" TV show fame gives a somewhat stolid, but overall acceptable and engaging performance as an amiably zhlubby blue collar ordinary shmoe ace automobile mechanic whose younger brother gets killed by a drunk driver in a sinister black muscle car. Haunted by his bro's untimely death and angry as all hell, Wahl builds himself a lethal souped-up tow truck, hits the dark, hazy, perilous Los Angeles nocturnal streets looking for that spooky muscle car, and winds up becoming a self-appointed vigilante who takes out all those leering, unruly, bellicose, recklessly inebriated killers on wheels who pose a general threat to decent, law-abiding folks on the road with them. Naturally the cops want to nail Wahl real quick and the media turns him into a folk hero.Okay, so the plot is little more than a vehicular "Death Wish" variant crossed with "Duel" and the picture does suffer somewhat from unavoidable mild'n'middlebrow TV movie sanitizing (the sporadic sappy pop-slop tunes mewling away on the soundtrack are especially irritating), but Ferrara's strong, sturdy and stylish direction certainly compensates for these minor flaws. As usual with Ferrara, he takes a provocative questioning stance with the obsessive, tormented protagonist, vigilantism is properly addressed as the knotty, nothing remotely simple or easy about it issue that it really is, James Lemmo's slick, polished, glittering neon-hued cinematography vividly depicts a luridly gleaming nighttime atmosphere, and the palpable evocation of the scary, forbidding and dangerous urban hellhole jungle setting positively seethes with a frightfully omnipresent menace. Moreover, there are fine supporting turns by Nancy Allen as a sweet radio talk show host, the always reliable Robert Culp as a hard-nosed detective, and Stan Shaw as Wahl's nice dude best buddy, David Frank supplies an effectively spare, shivery, jazz-flavored score, and the final showdown between Wahl and the muscle car delivers the pulse-pounding, heart-stopping, metal-mangling auto-to-auto stand-off goods. Sure, it's not exactly one of Ferrara's best-ever offerings, but this generally solid and satisfying item sure ain't no lemon, either.

Johnny the Boy I bought this for less than five quid, so I didn't expect much. The villan has a black 69 Dodge Charger and there's a 70's Torino in there as well - it's a bit like watching one of the Dukes of Hazzard episodes - there's one with the General and a Starsky Torino in a Junkyard. The Gladiator has the Duke traits - the story isn't great but you get a bit of car action involving 60/70's US cars. It works for me, I even spotted a black 76 firebird in a junkyard !