Monday, December 10, 2018

Border Cop - 1979

I remember for some reason I got really intrigued by Telly Savalas a while back.  After I saw him as Blofeld and after I saw him in Horror Express I did some deep dives and tried to find horror movies with him.  I think my interest soon turned to other things, and I'm pretty sure I haven't seen him in anything since.  So imagine my joy when I got a Savalas movie in the 70's set.

Imagine my excitement (which wasn't much to begin with, mind you) as I watched this long, talky, bland as fuck late 70's border-concerned cop drama.  Imagine as I watched it, hoping that it was originally a made for TV film just so that it wouldn't be very long.  It was the full 90 minutes though, so no luck with that one.  Also, some of the movie is in Spanish.  There is no subtitle option on this DVD, and I had no idea what they were saying.  Sure hope it wasn't important!

Telly plays...  wait, oh shit.  Teleplays?  Telly plays...teleplays?  See what I'm doing here?  Telly plays Frank Cooper.  He's a cop on the border of Mexico and the US, fulfilling Trump's dream of keeping all them illegals out.  He's sympathetic sure, but he's also got some racial ideas of his own it seems, and he's not the most likable guy ever.  He clashes with the usual border-crossers, the local street gang thugs and prostitutes, and generally upholds the law.

And shit.  What the fuck does one say about this movie?  There's not much.  I'm looking for something interesting to say about it, and here's what I found.  Border Cop does feature a real cow being killed.  On IMDb, they list the year for the movie wrong.  Sorry IMDb, I'm going to assume my 70's boxset is right on this one, since Wikipedia agrees as well.  And lastly, IMDb trivia tells me "One of the first US indie films to premiere in the US on pay cable TV (HBO) without a US theatrical release."  So, that's kind of cool I guess.  But to imagine paying for this dreck, ouch that sucks.

I read another review right now which made me feel like I missed this being potentially not that bad, but in the end, do I fucking CARE?  No!  I don't care.  This could easily have been not awful.  But I got through it, in my memory I wasn't totally drunk or anything, and it fucking counts whether I have anything to say about it or not.  I'll give it 1.5 stars for Telly Savalas.

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