THROUGH THE FIRE

The good news is they qualified for a ton of frequent dier miles.

We were led to the Clint Eastwood drama The Gauntlet by its promo poster from Frank Frazetta, the generally agreed upon wizard of sword and sorcery art. We’ve featured him a little, such as here, here, and here. We didn’t know anything about the movie’s plot at all. We quickly found it, queued it up, and sat back to check out an Eastwood movie we hadn’t seen—a rarity.

He plays a gruff, rebellious cop sent to escort trial witness Sondra Locke from Las Vegas to Phoenix by plane. When mobsters try to kill her via various unlikely means, his transportation options—which quickly range through an ambulance, a rental car, and a motorcycle—are finally reduced to a bus that he packs with plate steel to make it bulletproof.

The Gauntlet was Eastwood’s eighth directorial effort, and was voted one of the year’s worst films by the Phoenix Film Critics Society. We don’t think it’s that bad, but it certainly isn’t very good. It hits some stupidly broad notes, such as when an empty liquor bottle falls out of Eastwood’s car to let us know he likes to drink, and a bunch of bikers are driven to attempt rape after being called “fairies.”

In addition, the mobsters’ attempts to knock off Locke are a bit ridiculous, and the traitor in the plot is obvious by minute eight. Still, the movie is Clint in full grunt-and-grimace mode and that’s worth something. During filming each take he was probably: “Okay, cut! Let’s do another, and I’ll crinkle my eyes more this time.” As the saying goes, you do you. Mainly we wanted to share the above piece by Frazetta. It’s a reminder to us that we should feature him more.

Peru, Las Vegas, Phoenix, The Gauntlet, Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Pat Hingle, Mara Corday, Frank Frazetta, poster art, cinema, movie review

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HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

January 17

1950—The Great Brinks Robbery Occurs

In the U.S., eleven thieves steal more than $2 million from an armored car company’s offices in Boston, Massachusetts. The skillful execution of the crime, with only a bare minimum of clues left at the scene, results in the robbery being billed as “the crime of the century.” Despite this, all the members of the gang are later arrested.

January 17

1977—Gary Gilmore Is Executed

Convicted murderer Gary Gilmore is executed by a firing squad in Utah, ending a ten-year moratorium on Capital punishment in the United States. Gilmore’s story is later turned into a 1979 novel entitled The Executioner’s Song by Norman Mailer, and the book wins the Pulitzer Prize for literature.

January 16

1942—Carole Lombard Dies in Plane Crash

American actress Carole Lombard, who was the highest paid star in Hollywood during the late 1930s, dies in the crash of TWA Flight 3, on which she was flying from Las Vegas to Los Angeles after headlining a war bond rally in support of America’s military efforts. She was thirty-three years old.

January 15

1919—Luxemburg and Liebknecht Are Killed

Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht, two of the most prominent socialists in Germany, are tortured and murdered by the Freikorps. Freikorps was a term applied to various paramilitary organizations that sprang up around Germany as soldiers returned in defeat from World War I. Members of these groups would later become prominent members of the SS.

January 14

1967—Summer of Love Begins

The Human Be-In takes place in San Francisco’s Golden Gate Park with between 20,000 to 30,000 people in attendance, their purpose being to promote their ideals of personal empowerment, cultural and political decentralization, communal living, ecological preservation, and higher consciousness. The event is considered the beginning of the famed counterculture Summer of Love.

DON GIOVANNI

Giovanni Benvenuti was one of Italy's most prolific paperback cover artists. His unique style is on display in multiple collections within our website.

WALKING AFTER MIDNIGHT