cult film freak: MIKE HODGES DIRECTS A KILLER MICHAEL CAINE IN 'GET CARTER'

Written by James M. Tate / 1/06/2021 / No comments / action , british neo noir , exploitation , gangster , michael caine , mike hodges , neo noir , seventies , thriller

MIKE HODGES DIRECTS A KILLER MICHAEL CAINE IN 'GET CARTER'

1/06/2021 | No comment

Michael Caine in GET CARTER Year: 1971 Rating: ****

The plot of Mike Hodges' GET CARTER is simple enough: London-based gangster Michael Caine as Jack Carter returns to the squalor of Newcastle to find out how his brother died, which was supposedly a drunk driving accident that Jack thinks was murder...

Easy so far, sure, but how he figures out the truth is more complicated than memorizing Shakespeare in Klingon... And in the opening scene he's reading Raymond Chandler, a nod to the kind of Film Noir that GET CARTER embraces by the myriad of last names spouted in a dizzying barrage that needs close paying attention to...

But instead of a discovering the truth mystery/thriller it's a nihilistic avenge the truth exploitation that's said to have started the Second British New Wave, providing the usually charming anti-hero Caine his all-time coldest performance. The women involved he either cares nothing about or is about to kill as violently as the men. The sporadic action is filmed with a 1970's zooming-precision between the voyeuristic documentary style buildup set against the grungy "crap house" Newcastle landscape — a soulless purgatory where our proverbial shark swims through a maze of piranha (who can only kill him if he slows down), making the excessive violence not only common, but commonplace. "Remember," Jack's both told and warned before the opening credits. "They're killers... just like you!"

Michael Caine is Jack Carter in GET CARTER with Rosemarie Dunham

Michael Caine is Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine is Jack Carter in GET CARTER with Petra Markham

Petra Markham as Doreen Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Stanley Kubrick regular Godfrey Quigley in GET CARTER

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER w/ Ian Hendry

Grungy locale of Newcastle from GET CARTER

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER w/ Geraldine Moffat

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine and Geraldine Moffat in Get Carter with a LET IT BLEED album

Michael Caine as Jack Carter in GET CARTER

Michael Caine in GET CARTER

George Sewell and Tony Beckley in GET CARTER

Michael Caine pays another visit in GET CARTER

Michael Caine and Alun Armstrong in GET CARTER

Michael Caine in GET CARTER

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Tags : action , british neo noir , exploitation , gangster , michael caine , mike hodges , neo noir , seventies , thriller

James M. Tate

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