I like turkey. Every Thanksgiving (or any time that it’s
served with my family), I get chosen to carve up the bird. It’s not that I’m especially adept at it, I believe. I think it’s more that I’m willing to do it
than anything else. The carving itself is
actually quite simple, once you understand how to take the breast off the bone,
and know where to crack off the wings and drumsticks. It can get a little messy, however. I should probably invest in a pair of
turkey-handling gloves (I assume that this is something that exists), but
normally I just use a little tin foil to hold anything steady (any tips or
tricks you may have would be appreciated).
At any rate, while I enjoy turkey, I don’t like gravy. Like, on anything. I guess this is the same proclivity that
makes me dislike condiments (with the exception of possibly ketchup [or catsup,
depending on where you’re from]) on hot dogs, hamburgers, and so forth. There’s just something about gravy that turns
me off, but what can you do, right? What
the hell has this got to do with Giulio
Giuseppe Negri’s (credited on screen) and Yilmaz Atadeniz’s (credited as co-director on IMdB) Four for All (aka Dort Hergele aka Fighting
Killer)? Well, the film is an
Italian/Turkish co-production and was filmed in Istanbul, Turkey. But really I was just grasping at straws for
an introduction this week.
Members of The Organization are
murdered at the command of the villainous Joseph (I love the genericity of
foreign language genre film character names, don’t you?), who wants total
control of the crime world in Istanbul.
The unlikely-named Tony Tiger (Irfan
Atasoy, also a co-writer on the film and a man who perhaps enjoys Frosted
Flakes a bit too much) and his family are targeted soon thereafter, but Tony
survives, thanks to former flame (no pun intended; when you read further you’ll
understand) Olga (Feri Cansel). Calling upon three buddies he bonded closely
(perhaps intimately) with during “The War,” including Nick (Richard Harrison) a gambler, Gordon (Gordon Mitchell) a Judo expert, and
Brady (Fikret Hakan) a crooner, Tony
plots his vengeance.
Four for All is, first and foremost, a revenge story, and in this
it is, like so very many films from Turkey, both straightforward and quite
insane. Tony certainly has good reason
to be out for blood, as I think almost anyone who is tortured and whose family
is ruthlessly murdered does. But the
four killers really go the extra mile for Tony.
They beat his son Nino (and I have to say here that the actors actually
do throw this kid around and smack him up a bit, unless the boy was in reality
an amazing stuntman, and the scene was extraordinarily blocked out, but I doubt
it). They rape his wife. They tie Tony up, spread eagle and face down,
hanging over the carnage. Then they
light his house on fire. Now, that’s a
total “goon service” package, if ever there was one. What this all does, of course, is gives Tony
a reason to go on living, a singular purpose to his now-miserable
existence. Characters like him cannot
move on or find closure like normal human beings. The retribution beast must be fed (maybe this
is why his surname is Tiger?), and nothing else matters. Olga offers him solace (kind of), and while
he stays with her, there is no indication that the two ever reignite (no pun
intended…again) their former relationship (and the handling of Olga throughout
the film is something I’ll let you discover for yourself if you choose to watch
this movie). His friends are there for
him, but Tony is myopic in his obsession.
He has to be. He has no other raison
d’etre, now that his family has been destroyed.
I think that the interesting thing about this drive in cinema is that it
can end in death for the hero as easily as he can walk away from it at the fade
out, but, either way, he will not emerge unscathed, and quite often, the
protagonist finds that his revenge, though cathartic for characters (and
audiences), ultimately is meaningless.
The film is also an Assemble the
Team story, and the camaraderie between the four men (referred to directly as
The Four Musketeers, though I think that reference is fairly superficial here)
is heightened to an unrealistic degree (this in a film rife with unrealistic
touches). In the flashback scenes to
their time in “The War” (I assume this is a reference to Vietnam [though possibly
not], since all the guys are the same age then as they are in the present), the
men are shown laughing and having a good old time (as you would expect of
soldiers during wartime). Nick, Gordon,
and Brady are also shown running (practically skipping with glee) from
different sides toward Tony (who inhabits the camera’s POV), calling out his
name, because Tony is the center of the group and of this story. This will be revisited as a visual motif when
the four meet up again before and after their “mission.” Tony stands on a silent hilltop. As he turns, each of his friends approach
from separate (yet deliberately geometric) directions. These men are so dedicated to their bond,
they actually stack hands to display their solidarity with one another (I
always think of the origin story of The Fantastic Four when I see this type of
visual, but that’s just me).
Nevertheless, the film, its
characters, and its structure are distinctly comic-book-esque. The cabal of gangsters is straight out of a
James Bond film. They gather at a long
table, sneer at each other, and discuss their business with the polished
casualness of executives delivering quarterly budget reports. They all dress like they were peeled off a
Dick Tracy cartoon with a glob of Silly Putty (and it should be said, I believe
this film may have the most magnificent collection of mustaches ever assembled
under one roof). They wallow in their
cruelty, chuckling and grinning as they go about their work.
By that same token, our heroes’
story is divided up in such a way that I was immediately reminded of the
longtime structure for DC Comics’ early Justice League of America books (and
others like The Sea Devils and so forth, but the JLA stands out for me and is
the most recognizable to folks for our purposes here today). In the comics, there would be a basic threat
introduced (say, Starro or Despero, it doesn’t matter). The characters would then split up and each would
tackle some aspect of the peril in individual chapters before they would all
gather again at the end to finally vanquish their foe. The same thing happens in Four for All, where each of the boys
tracks down and roughs up one of the four assassins (Gordon chases Bob from a
Turkish bath house, Brady busts up Johnny’s wedding day, Tony lures Brahma
[Brimmer? Brummer? Who the hell can tell from the various pronunciations heard
in the movie] to a remote locale, Nick goes skiing in pursuit of Charlie). Funny enough, this is one of the most
entertaining aspects to the film, since it helps keep the pace moving, gives us
varied setups (while still sticking strictly to a formula), and showcases just
how outlandish this whole affair is. Tony’s
plan is utter nonsense from stem to stern, and no one with half a brain would
agree it, but like reading an old JLA comic, it’s enjoyable nonsense, and in
this I can honestly state that I didn’t mind the gravy so much.
MVT: The action in the film
is practically non-stop, and it’s all goofy fun.
Make or Break: The classic
underworld meeting that kicks off the film lays all of this picture’s cards on
the table. S.P.E.C.T.R.E. would be
proud.
Score: 6.5/10
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