Eye Candy #511 - "10 to Midnight"

10 to Midnight:   One of the more explicit of the Bronson 1980’s thrillers, it’s very much in the same vein as the “Death Wish” films and their ilk - man on the edge plays by his own rules and often shoots people in the pursuit of good/revenge/justice, etc.  It’s also directed by the venerable Bronson regular, J. Lee Thompson, who started his career directing movies like “The Guns of Navarone” and ended his career directing Charlie in picture after unmemorable picture.  Here Charlie is a grizzled veteran cop Leo Kessler tracking down a slick murderer (Gene Davis) patterned after Ted Bundy, who kills girls while in the nude.  So as you can imagine, there is some nudity in the picture.  Soon Kessler’s own daughter falls into the crosshairs of the murderer, and it’s up to Kessler and his by-the-book partner (played by Andrew Stevens) to get him before he gets her.  Wilford Brimley is here in support in a small role.  The title of the movie has NOTHING to do with the plot of the film (it was arbitrarily chosen by the producers).  Silly, credulity-stretching, with Davis more an irritating villain than a menacing one (he’s got such an odd speech pattern, he sounds like he fell out of community theater; he also has the worst Spanish accent of all time), this film is better than the average Bronson movie (it’s not hard to be better than “Assassination”), but it’s nowhere near good.  Woodchuck sez, “Skip it.”