[THE CHALK-OUTLINE]
10 To Midnight (1983): Breakdown by Rantbo
Liberal justice system protects woman killer. Bronson hate woman killer—BRONSON SMASH WOMAN KILLER!
[THE EXECUTION]
Charles Bronson plays hard-boiled conservative cop, Leo Kessler, hot on the trail of a woman-hating psychopathic serial killer. And bears shit in the woods. To say that this is a by-the-book, right-wing 80s cop drama starring Charles Bronson would be redundant. I’m not sure why at this point in his career they even bothered giving his characters different names, as he is simply Charles Bronson—Vanquisher of Evil Men. Not that this is by any means a bad thing, as who doesn’t love Chuck?
So, while Bronson is simply himself, slightly exaggerated, all is not lost to the pits of mediocrity as 10 TO MIDNIGHT makes itself memorable with it’s villain. His name is Warren, he looks like a perverted Jim Carrey and he kills women out of his sexually repressed rage. Sounds like your average everyday slasher, right? Well, how about this? His stalker uniform consists of a pair of latex gloves and a hard-on. That’s all. If I were a sexy young 80s slut, I’d certainly be dead bolting my apartment door. On top of that Warren has a humiliation fetish, a large blown-up wall-size picture of himself in a karate gi hanging in his apartment and according to Bronson, “His knife has gotta be his penis.” And that means he has a spare, as this still-frame clearly illustrates…
Eat your heart out Krueger. And that’s pretty much the film. Bronson knows that Warren is the killer after talking to him for 30 seconds and spends the rest of the picture complaining to his superiors that no more slutty women need die, if they just let him kill the son-of-a-bitch. And, of course, it takes a whole economy sized trunk-full of trashy female corpses and the attacking of Bronson’s daughter for him to finally get his (death) wish and enact justice the way God intended. Fast, bloody and without question.
10 TO MIDNIGHT is one of the few 80s Bronson films that is actually pretty good. I’ve seen a lot of the output he did that decade and most had the foul stench of ass accompanying them. None of which, I really blame him for. He was just being Bronson. But that is neither here nor there. As far as thriller-killer movies go, MIDNIGHT is a winner. The actor playing Warren, Gene Davis, is a delightfully evil little shit and completely believable as a creep. And it’s always nice to see Bronson playing a hard-ass killer of killers in a movie with an actual plot. I recommend it for fans of vigilante justice and Bronson’s cold glaring mustache.
[HOW BAD-ASS IS THE MAIN CHARACTER?]
Charles Bronson is Lt. Leo Kessler is Charles Bronson
“…I’m not a nice person—I’m a mean, selfish, sonovabitch.”
Kessler is like a very talkative Dirty Harry. Almost every other line of dialogue out of his mouth is a bumpersticker slogan on how liberal pussy judges and by-the-book officers are allowing crime to happen. What with their Miranda Rights and laws against plugging bad guys the moment intuition tells you they are scum. Charles Bronson knows, the only way to truly stop crime is to break the law in the name of justice…
“The way the law protects those maggots out there, you’d think they were an endangered species!”
“I remember when ‘legal’ meant ‘lawful’—now it means some kind of loophole.”
“Forget what’s legal—do what’s right!”
While Bronson is once again an asexual, he takes it one step further by insinuating that any act done with or while thinking about a woman not intended specifically for procreation or vengeance of their murder is amoral and worthy of death by lead injection. He even makes the case that masturbation is proof of murderous tendencies. Seriously. So, in short, Bronson-excuse me, Kessler is a walking conservative’s wet-dream and a perfect 80s Action hero.
[THE BODY COUNT: 07 AND 01 UNCONFIRMED]
Bronson only kills one bane of society, sorry to spoil, but it’s a pretty satisfying end. As for the rest, they all belong to poor, insane, little Warren and his butterfly penis. In total, he offs 5 women (and another potential with poisoned hard-liquor) and some unlucky guy that happened to be thrusting into one of the chosen ladies. Not many kills, but they were all quite brutal and for this type of film, that’s all you can ask for.
[MOST SATISFYING DEATH]
Party-Guy’s Boner
Upon hearing the squeals of a female in possible peril, Bronson’s partner rushes to her aid and barges in on a date-rape in progress. The girl’s breasts are bared toward the fourth wall as Detective Buzzkill apologizes for the party-foul and backs out the door encouraging the continued demoralization of the poor drunk skank and her defilement on top of a washer-dryer combo. And I must say, the will is strong with this frat-douche as the moment the door is shut, he literally pushes the confused co-ed back into missionary before the scene cuts away.
The sequence plays for laughs in a film it has no business being in, letting us know that no matter how pro-vigilantism the filmmakers appear to be, their true intent is obviously the mistreatment of women for cheap thrills and snuck-in teenage hard-ons. More—no, MUCH more on that later.
[DUDESWEAT AND MACHISMO]
As mentioned before, Bronson is completely asexual, even when married. So no luck finding anything limp-wristed with his half of the film. But, thankfully, Warren the Naked Lady-Killer not only displays his blow-dried and well groomed physique in front of a mirror while alone, he also graces us with his shiny hairless ass and bulging genitals for what must be an accumulated 30 minutes of on-screen glory.
And I for one am surprised his dick didn’t get whiplash from all the bare-assed shenanigans he pulled off while slaughtering helpless women in the buff.
[EXPLOITATION AND MISOGYNY]
“You give me blow-job—I give it to you in the ass. How about it, baby?”
This film should have been called, 10 TILL THE NEXT TITTY AND VIOLATED FEMALE SCENE.
As some of the shots indicate, these ladies don’t last long after unleashing the dogs of war. Much like an 80s slasher film (which this film pretty much is), sex=death for bimbos. Add to this the fact that these women have the unfortunate position of being in a Charles Bronson picture, it was only a matter of small time increments until the sanctity of their earthly bodies was violated by a filthy pervert.
Speaking of ladies in Bronson’s life, there is no mention of what happened to his wife, only that he had one so far as I can remember, so I’m left to assume that she too was raped and murdered in the backstory. However, he does have an in-tact, undefiled (so-far) daughter that catches the eye of the deranged lunatic. And why not? She, like every other lady in the picture, is a good looking well-endowed symbol of modern femininity. The women in this film are classic archetypes for chauvinistic male fantasies. You have the big-breasted secretaries, the big-breasted hookers and most important of all, the ultimate feminine profession—the big-breasted nurses. And, of course, they are all punished by the end of a razor-sharp phallus for daring to think they could invade the manly realm of the workforce.
[EPIC MOMENT AND BEST ONE-LINER]
I have to go with the end chase sequence. It’s not too often you get to see a naked man running after a nurse on a two-lane black-top at full speed, cock flapping in the wind with Charles Bronson in pursuit. It’s novel to say the least. And it only gets better after Bronson catches up to the psychopathic streaker…
[THE MORAL OF THE STORY]
Every time you jerk-off, you risk becoming a serial killer. But, like Warren says…
[THE CHECKLIST: 09 outta 25]
[X] Athlete(s) Turned “Actor” [Lisa Eilbacher was/is a bodybuilder]
[ ] Clinging To The Outside Of A Moving Vehicle
[ ] Crotch Attack
[X] Dialogue Telling Us How Bad-Ass The Main Character(s) Is/Are
[ ] Ending Featuring An Ambulance, A Blanket or A Towel
[ ] Factory/Warehouse
[ ] Giant Explosion(s)
[ ] Heavy Artillery
[X] Improvised Weapon(s)
[X] Macho Mode(s) Of Transportation
[ ] Main Character Sports Facial Accessory(s)
[ ] Manly Embrace(s)
[ ] Notorious Stunt-Man Sighting
[ ] Passage(s) Of Time Via Montage
[X] Politically Fueled Plot Point(s)
[X] Senseless Destruction Of Property
[ ] Shoot Out(s) and/or Sword Fight(s)
[ ] Slow-Motion Finishing Move(s)/Death(s)
[X] Stupid Authoritative Figure(s)
[X] Substance Usage and/or Abuse
[ ] Tis The Season
[ ] Torture Sequence(s)
[ ] Unnecessary Sequel
[ ] Vehicle Chase(s)
[X] Vigilante Justice
10 To Midnight (1983) © MCMLXXXIII (1983) Y & M Productions, Inc. and MGM/UA Home Entertainment