99 & 44/100% Dead (1974)
Call Harry Crown
[+]
99 and 44/100% Dead!Call Harry Crown
| Tagline(s): | Everyone is dying to meet Harry Crown. |
Nomination Year: 2012
SYNOPSIS: We watched it and now we're all
wondering what the heck was 99
& 44/100% dead. Did anybody get strung up
for supposed cattle rustling and left to
die? Nope. Did anyone get shot at, set on
fire and crunchered
in a metal squishy device and STILL keep on
coming? Nope. OooOoooOooo! I got it! Someone
was a skilled assassin but suffered amnesia when a job went wrong! Ahhhh...nope.
Then what was only about 0.56% alive?
The answer is...I think this movie got someone else's title. Somewhere, someone is watching a horror/drama movie where the hero is a bubbling mutilated corpse that Will! Not! Die! and they are trying to figure out what's so Mafia Wars of New York about it.
This movie is about an up-and-coming crime boss of the NYC underworld (Big Eddie), who is successfully muscling in on the established crime boss (Uncle Frankie)'s territory. Uncle Frankie isn't doing well at all, in fact the local bookie gives the incumbent 5 to 8 odds (which still isn't 99 & 44/100% of anything), but then Uncle Frankie has an ace up his sleeve. Uncle Frankie has the clout to call on Harry Crown, hit man extraordinaire, to come help him out (Movie factoid! One of the alternate titles for this project is indeed Call Harry Crown, which makes a lot more sense than 99 & 44/100% Dead). Of course, Big Eddie also has a hit man, so things don't go exactly swimmingly for Harry when he comes back to his old haunts.
Speaking of swimming, the best part of the film was the sort of endcapping travelogue diorama of "things that get sent into the East River." Apparently, it's a whole festival of people in cement shoes, contraband, and other things that either needed to get dumped in a hurry or were dumped as a message. The East River is also surprisingly clean with a cheery background ragtime music ambiance. This has nothing to do with Harry but you know someone is going to end up in the bottom of the river before the film is done.
In fact, you know a lot about this film before anything happens. Will Harry kindle the love spark with his old flame? Will there be a misunderstanding between old flame and new vixen? Will said flame come to some harm because of Harry? Will Harry's assassin padawan get his assassin jedi spurs at the end of the flick? Will David Caruso eventually find acting inspiration in Harry Crown's eyeglass wear? Will there be a climactic fight between Harry and Big Eddie's crack-shot hit man in a laundry facility? OK, we didn't guess the laundry facility exactly, but you can see where we felt like we were practically writing the movie before it happened. I can't say any of the flick caught any of us by surprise.
Movie Factoid! Not only did Ann Turkel, the old flame, wind up marrying Richard Harris just after this movie, she was nominated for a Golden Globe for her acting. I have to wonder if all the other actresses that year were positively horrific because all I can say about Ann's acting is that it was the least stoned performance of any of the girls on this film. Hmmm, if the title were 99 & 44/100% stoned, that might explain a lot....
Then what was only about 0.56% alive?
The answer is...I think this movie got someone else's title. Somewhere, someone is watching a horror/drama movie where the hero is a bubbling mutilated corpse that Will! Not! Die! and they are trying to figure out what's so Mafia Wars of New York about it.
This movie is about an up-and-coming crime boss of the NYC underworld (Big Eddie), who is successfully muscling in on the established crime boss (Uncle Frankie)'s territory. Uncle Frankie isn't doing well at all, in fact the local bookie gives the incumbent 5 to 8 odds (which still isn't 99 & 44/100% of anything), but then Uncle Frankie has an ace up his sleeve. Uncle Frankie has the clout to call on Harry Crown, hit man extraordinaire, to come help him out (Movie factoid! One of the alternate titles for this project is indeed Call Harry Crown, which makes a lot more sense than 99 & 44/100% Dead). Of course, Big Eddie also has a hit man, so things don't go exactly swimmingly for Harry when he comes back to his old haunts.
Speaking of swimming, the best part of the film was the sort of endcapping travelogue diorama of "things that get sent into the East River." Apparently, it's a whole festival of people in cement shoes, contraband, and other things that either needed to get dumped in a hurry or were dumped as a message. The East River is also surprisingly clean with a cheery background ragtime music ambiance. This has nothing to do with Harry but you know someone is going to end up in the bottom of the river before the film is done.
In fact, you know a lot about this film before anything happens. Will Harry kindle the love spark with his old flame? Will there be a misunderstanding between old flame and new vixen? Will said flame come to some harm because of Harry? Will Harry's assassin padawan get his assassin jedi spurs at the end of the flick? Will David Caruso eventually find acting inspiration in Harry Crown's eyeglass wear? Will there be a climactic fight between Harry and Big Eddie's crack-shot hit man in a laundry facility? OK, we didn't guess the laundry facility exactly, but you can see where we felt like we were practically writing the movie before it happened. I can't say any of the flick caught any of us by surprise.
Movie Factoid! Not only did Ann Turkel, the old flame, wind up marrying Richard Harris just after this movie, she was nominated for a Golden Globe for her acting. I have to wonder if all the other actresses that year were positively horrific because all I can say about Ann's acting is that it was the least stoned performance of any of the girls on this film. Hmmm, if the title were 99 & 44/100% stoned, that might explain a lot....
Jeannette Quirk
"Alas, Poor Yorick"
John Frankenheimer
Richard Harris
Edmond O'Brien
Bradford Dillman
Ann Turkel
Constance Ford
Zooey Hall
Katherine Baumann
Karl Lukas
Tony Brubaker
Chuck Connors
