Directed by:
Peter BogdanovichCinematography:
László KovácsCast:
Boris Karloff, Tim O'Kelly, Arthur Peterson, Monte Landis, Nancy Hsueh, Peter Bogdanovich, Sandy Baron, Frank Marshall, Mike Farrell, James Brown (more)VOD (1)
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Old Hollywood collides with New Hollywood, and screen horror with real-life horror, in the startling debut feature from Peter Bogdanovich. Produced by Roger Corman, this chillingly prescient vision of American-made carnage casts Boris Karloff as a version of himself: an aging horror-movie icon whose fate intersects with that of a seemingly ordinary young man (Tim O’Kelly) on a psychotic shooting spree around Los Angeles. Charged with provocative ideas about the relationship between mass media and mass violence, Targets is a model of maximally effective filmmaking on a minimal budget and a potent first statement from one of the defining voices of the American New Wave. (Criterion)
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An excellent film that shows that anyone can be a killer, if only because they want to try it out. Or they'll just shoot once. You also get the acting legend Karloff in a film about how being an actor is not easy, but being a spectator can also be very dangerous in some cases. An interesting script that is driven forward by interesting actors.
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After a long while, I have to say that I finally got to watch a truly interesting American movie from the 1960s and 1970s. And personally, I need to add that I was probably most intrigued by its brutality that could easily rival even the movie brutality in modern thrillers. Or even easily outdo some. And at the same time, I admit that I haven’t had the opportunity to find out how big of an actor Boris Karloff was in his time, but I feel that he couldn’t have gotten a better movie homage than the movie Targets. And especially after I found out from the trivia how the movie was actually made. And it turned out to be of such quality. Mr. Karloff commands great respect and the final 10 minutes were so strong that I couldn’t even function a couple dozen minutes after I finished it.
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