Pulp [DVD]

There are most likely many Michael Caine aficionados out there who may be familiar with this movie, but I was not. I am, of course, familiar with the previous outing by this same team (Producer Michael Klinger and Writer-Director Mike Hodges), Get Carter. While Get Carter was the prototypical gritty British crime drama, this film takes things in another direction and becomes a flat-out black comedy. True to Caine's character's profession as a writer of amoral, violent, sexually charged pulp fiction, the film likewise takes its characters on a similar meandering journey. Caine is near-brilliant as a particular type of British tough-guy. He comes off as all charm and international flair, until he gets into a conversation that bores him, at which point he often becomes testy and down-right nasty, but with a smile and a low-key attitude. And Mickey Rooney is amazing as, what else, a spoiled former Hollywood big-shot. Think James Cagney, but with George Raft's real-life mob connections. Rounding out the cast are Hollywood veteran Lionel Stander, film noir star Lizbeth Scott, a pre-Godfather Al Lettieri, Humphrey Bogart lookalike Al Saachi, and Italian actress Nadia Cassini, who is not so much a good actress as she is beautiful to look at. The music is by George Martin and has that perfect blend of style and atmosphere, as does the backdrop of the whole affair, the isle of Malta. This movie really is a gem, and I am thrilled to have found it.

This is actually one of my Favorite Michael Caine films; a Gleeful send up of Pulp Fiction/Paperback writers and Grade Z Crime Films....The film begins on a great tongue in cheek note; with Michael Caine's dry as a bone writer's narration juxtaposed with a pitch perfect George Martin/Euro /Morricone Score; setting the scene....Caine plays Mickey King; Paperback Pulp Fiction Sleazoid Writer; living a layabout life in tropical exile on the island of Malta.... And suddenly; He gets pulled into a labrynthine murder mystery ; involving exiled Mobsters and Illegal Masonic Lodge goings on....... Basically; it's One Big Shaggy Dog Story; and if you are willing to take the ride; it's quite an entertaining diversion....Great Malta locations; Awesome acting support from Mickey Rooney and Lizabeth Scott make for a nice bout of Cinematic Escapisim...Michael Caine Really seems to be enjoying not taking himself too seriously here!!

1970s' noir-ese British style. Suggest 'Gumshoe' starring Albert Finney and 'The Limits Of Control', a Jim Jarmusch film as follow up viewing. These films are fine reminders of how easily we can get caught up in the dumbing down by all the crash bang movies.

This is a good Michael Caine also starring Mickey Rooney. This movie also stars; Lionel Stander, Lizabeth Scott, Nadia Cassini and Al Lettieri. The movie is presented in Widescreen, color and runs for about 96mins (1hr 36mins). Overall this good movie and I would recommend it.

Fan's of the original "Get Carter" be forwarned. "Pulp" may have reteamed star Michael Caine and director Mike Hodges but lightning has not struck twice here. The story, when not incoherent, meanders and Hodges' stabs at dark comedy crash down with a resounding thud. Even at an an economical 95 minutes the film seems to drag. Lone redeeming qualities here are the ever charismatic Caine and an all too abreviated appearance by Mickey Rooney as an exiled film star.

The movie "PULP" is not one of Michael Cains better films. but being a fan of his I watched it any way, its what I do. acting was not bad. story line weak, but over all I can only give it a one star rating for I probably will not watch it again, to many other better movies to watch again and again. With that being said I am a DVD collector and there it will go, into my collection. The one good note is that I got a good price on amazon so no real money pain.

"The air had the musty smell of dried up dreams.." With writing like this how could I not love Pulp? Also a pleasure to hear Michael Caine intone these words.

Product arrived in an on time as described

well i did like it old movie fan

Not sure why I bought this. I must have been very young when I first saw it. Little to recommend it now, not even Caine.

"Can you walk a little faster?" said the whiting to the snail. "There's a porpoise right behind me, and he's treading on my tail ..."More an off-beat comedy than a drama - which may not appeal to some - PULP is a nice little blend of Alfie and Harry Palmer, and is a sadly unregarded gem that has nevertheless become a bit of a cult film loaded with many inside jokes. The 'three Michaels' - Mike Hodges, Michael Caine and Mike Klinger - may not have hit similar paydirt as with their Get Carter, but the sheer knowing coolness of pulp writer Mickey King's (Caine) Chandleresque voiceover dialogue is carried off with caustic wit, panache and style ("The day started quietly enough, then I got out of bed."); in fact, there are four Michaels if one adds Mickey Rooney - and a fifth if one includes the main character, Mickey King. Fearing possible stereotyping as a Hard Man, PULP was intended to be the opposite of Caine's hard-hitting Jack Carter character: affecting the relaxed raffish air of the self-satisfied ex-pat (he left London and his lucrative job as a funeral-director, and elbowed the wife and three kids), Mickey King glides about the Mediterranean in a dapper white corduroy suit (it's where Jarvis Cocker got both his 'look' and the band's name!), churning out cheap gangster fiction paperbacks under ludicrous aliases (Guy Strange, Gary Rough, Dan Wilde, Les Behan, newly-discovered Indian writer Dr. O.R. Gann, and struggling Nigerian author S. Ódomi) and hard-boiled titles (Kill Me Gently, The Kneetrembler and My Gun Is Long). In fact, his voiceover dialogue of heroic action is the opposite of his real-life reaction when confronted with dangerous situations - starting with a succession of taxis completely ignoring his hails!Neatly filmed on Malta, G.C., the film is an odd joy from beginning to end, with several little pastiches that are hommages to John Huston (the FBI agent who appears to be Bogart enquiring from whom appears to be Peter Lorre after what turns out to be a Maltese falcon ...) and wonderful quirky characters. King's publisher, Markovic, is "a Greco-Albanian born in Budapest" with a bladder problem. Obviously vegetarian, the Mysterious Englishman, Mr. Balmoral (Dennis Price), is reading Alice In Wonderland for the 118th time, and so well able to insult steak-eatin' folks from steak-lovin' Texas; could he be part of the developing mystery? Lionel Stander puts in a nice turn as a laid-back, ageing wiseguy ("His name was Ben Dinuccio. It was the nicest thing about him."). Starting at the Temples of Zonq, leggy Nadia Cassini (Liz Adams, who became a starlet in Italian trash flics and softporn films) shows why hotpants were - and still are! - great. Swarthy and moustachioed, Al Lettieri (Ben Miller) plays ... well, Al Lettieri, the stereotyped rôle he can never get away from: the 'heavy' - as he did in THE GETAWAY and MR. MAJESTYK - who dons the priest's garb and eventually meets with an undignified (for a heavy, that is) end. One of Gilbert's ex-wives, sexy-voiced Lizabeth Scott (Princess Betty Cippola) shmoozes suggestion as she knows The Establishment are really In Control of events.But the real treat is Mickey Rooney as the faded film star, Preston Gilbert, ejected from Hollywood for his Mob associations. In a villa on a private island, with his deaf mother, companion Liz (he's her sugar-daddy) and his PR-man Dinuccio, semi-reclusive Gilbert lives the life of the wealthy idler reliving past glories by playing old 78s and corny soundbites from his Cagneyesque old gangster films, and inflicting practical jokes on unsuspecting tourists. Delightfully hamming it up, his poncing around in his skivvies [I creased-up at the double-mirror bit] and applying his toupée is a marvellous send-up of himself! With the Big Sleep approachin' Gilbert hires King to ghostwrite his lifestory plus a few revelations - "a death-rattle in paperpack, eh?" according to a sceptical King. Preston insists the book come with an opening quote from Samuel Goldwyn, "We all passed a lot of water since then."Hodge's cutaway scenes show a nice eye for detail. Elections are due, so throughout there are street marches by elderly and not-very-impressive hangers-on of the New Front party of creepy law-and-order politician Prince Frank Cippola - a comment on then-topical real-life Prince Borghese and the quasi-establishment, certainly neo-Fascist, Spada movement. "The wizard ringing in," the dignified pain of ashamed former Partisan Signor Lepri, and the "retired gunman who drew too late - twice" supping cola at the 42nd Street Bar (King sits under a plaque saying Ave Maria) add to the quirky mystery.Poignant are the closing scenes. Whilst King feverishly hammers out the imagined ending to his own ordeal (in which he rehashes passages from previous novels), Cippola's shooting-party have hounded a wild boar toward his shooting platform (in a scene that would be unacceptable today). Trapped in a dead-end, the wretched beast has nowhere to go. Safe from the boar's frantic attempts to charge the wire, it's an easy shot, no real competition. Having bagged his kill, unassailable aristocrat Cippola raises a glass of champagne to the camera. "I'll get you, you bastards ..." wails King, unable to scratch an itch ...Pity the only DVD 'extras' are subtitles in several foreign languages. But to fans it's still a gem.

Caine in the 1970's made some interesting films & some strange films, this I think is both. Never really a fan of it but wanted to revisit it & it was cheap here on Amazon, so why not? Still not a fan, but a decent wide screen copy & maybe 1 day I will get the hang of it? I think it's a black comedy, but still maybe appealing to others, I put this & Peeper in the same bracket, maybe missed opportunities?

Every actor should watch every Michael Caine movie. His acting classes for BBC are brilliant.When Spencer Tracy asked what a young fan wanted to be, the answer was "I want to be an actor."Tracy shot back the ultimate truth: "Well, don't let anyone catch you at it!"Caine is the modern King of that statement.This film is really quirky with a wild performance by Mickey Rooney - by the way, Spence believedthat Mickey Rooney was one of the greatest actors in the history of the movies.