AKA Bridge Across Time.
When I heard there was a weird little movie that has David Hasselhoff trying to apprehend a killer who my or many not be a time-travelling Jack the Ripper then I just knew I had to see it. Don't pretend you wouldn't at least have some morbid curiosity about it.
The plot is pretty much what I've just said. It all starts with a missing stone that is recovered and then placed back on the old London Bridge that is now in Arizona. That missing stone may be very powerful, and may well bring back the famous murderer, Jack the Ripper. Who would believe such a theory though? Detective Don Gregory (Hasselhoff) would, especially when he starts to match up murders with dates that correspond to the dates of the original Ripper murders. Struggling to convince Chief Dawson (Clu Gulager) while he argues with Anson Whitfield (Lane Smith, effectively playing his character as if he's Murray Hamilton in Jaws), Gregory eventually comes up with a plan that will require the use of Angie (Stefanie Kramer), a woman he has just started a relationship with.
Director E. W. Swackhamer seems to have a large body of TV work to his name (and this was a TV movie first shown back in the mid-1980s), but there's enough canny casting and good pacing here to show him as someone who knows what they're doing in that medium. Writer William F. Nolan has a couple of better-known properties that he will be remembered for, but he is equally deserving of praise for doing what he can with something that could have been so much worse.
This is silly, especially when playing up the moments that invite comparisons to Jaws, but it's consistently entertaining. The Hoff is a capable enough lead, delivering his usual level of charisma that somehow keeps him feeling like a bigger star than most TV actors without ever being right for lead work in theatrical features, and it's great to see Gulager and Smith in their supporting roles. Kramer is stuck with the most thankless role, but she does fine, and I was pleasantly surprised to see Adrienne Barbeau given some screentime.
If you want more serious movies that make use of Jack the Ripper then there are many to choose from. If you want some Ripper tension with some time-travel in the mix then I'd point you towards the excellent Time After Time. But if you want something that has "Saucy Jack" travelling to our time due to some mysterious bridge magic, and then causing consternation and trouble for a cop who you just know is going to eventually have to reconsider his stance of not using his gun (tied to a tragic incident in his past), well . . . this is the film for you.
6/10
If you have enjoyed this, or any other, review on the blog then do
consider the following ways to show your appreciation. A
subscription/follow costs nothing.
It also costs nothing to like/subscribe to the YouTube channel attached to the podcast I am part of - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCErkxBO0xds5qd_rhjFgDmA
Or you may have a couple of quid to throw at me, in Ko-fi form - https://ko-fi.com/kevinmatthews
Or Amazon is nice at this time of year - https://www.amazon.co.uk/hz/wishlist/ls/Y1ZUCB13HLJD?ref_=wl_share
No comments:
Post a Comment