Prime Cut (1972)

Director: Michael Ritchie

Cast: Lee Marvin, Gene Hackman, Sissy Spacek

Synopsis: An enforcer for a Chicago crime syndicate travels to Kansas to secure payment from a defaulting cattle baron.

What a bonkers movie this is: gangsters turned into sausages, naked teenage virgins sold at cattle markets, a hard man called Mary Ann (Gene Hackman – The Conversation, Zandy’s Bride), car-eating combine harvesters, sausage-wielding hit-men – this one’s got them all.   It’s also got Lee Marvin (Monte Walsh) acting very cool as a dapper fixer for the Irish mob in Chicago who’s dispatched to the mid-west to secure payment from a defaulting Hackman who literally turned their last enforcer into sausage-meat.   This one has a real ‘70s feel to it even though it’s not generally recognised as a classic – which, of course, it isn’t: character development is zero and the bad guys are like something out of a 1940’s comic strip.   Despite that, it’s great fun – and Sissy Spacek (JFK, The Help), who isn’t generally regarded as a classic beauty, looks gorgeous.

(Reviewed 30th September 2011)