Tuesday 12 June 2012

The Warriors

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Year:1979
Country of origin:USA
Director:Walter Hill
Genre:Homo-erotic brilliance
Starring:Michael Beck, James Remar, Dorsey Wright, Brian Tyler, David Harris, Tom McKitterick
Rating:5/5
IMDB link:http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080120/
Tagline:They are 60,000 strong.
Favourite line:"You're standing right now with nine delegates from 100 gangs. And there's over a hundred more. That's 20,000 hardcore members. Forty-thousand, counting affiliates, and twenty-thousand more, not organized, but ready to fight: 60,000 soldiers! Now, there ain't but 20,000 police in the whole town. Can you dig it?"

The gayest film ever made?
Certainly a strong contender.

The plot:
Cyrus, leader of the Gramercy Riffs, the most powerful gang in New York City, calls a midnight summit of all New York area gangs, requesting them to send nine unarmed representatives to Van Cortlandt Park.
The Warriors, from Coney Island, are one such gang.
Cyrus proposes the assembled crowd a permanent citywide truce that would allow the gangs to control the city.
Most of the gangs laud his idea, but Luther, leader of the Rogues, shoots Cyrus and frames the Warriors.
The Warriors "war lord" Cleon is beaten down by the Riffs who believe the Warriors responsible for Cyrus' death.
With Cleon's fate unknown the other Warriors escape.
Unbeknownst to the Warriors the Riffs call a hit on them through a radio DJ.
Caught behind enemy lines, The Warriors must battle their way from The Bronx to their own patch, Coney Island, with every gang in the city now out for their blood….
(synopsis taken from the relevant Wikipedia page)

Genuinely hilarious, this screams cult classic from every frame.
Stylistically, this separates itself from the norm by virtue of a comic book feel. Though in no way a superhero movie, it does feel a little similar, as scenes are interlinked by the screen morphing into comic strip style banners, catching the viewer up on events that have been taking place elsewhere.
It’s really effective.
A musical masquerading as a tough guy movie, this is West Side Story, punk style, with the Jets and the Sharks replaced by The Riffs, The Baseball Furies, The Orphans and the eponymous Warriors.
Each gang, to distinguish themselves from their rivals, are bedecked in the most outrageously garish clobber, each gang member dressed identically to the other. And this is where the homo-eroticism comes in. Tight leather tunics over bare chests, arse-hugging faded blue denim jeans, biker jackets and leather chaps, at times you half expect the music from The Blue Oyster Bar circa Police Academy 1 to start playing.
It’s absolutely marvellous.
Back to the musical nature of the piece.
Though there is no actual dancing, there is clear choreography. Prog-rock style riffs and noodlings wibble and nurdle in the background as rival gangs face each other off, jog along darkened streets provocatively or scarper from The Law. Occasionally, the musical genre switches to a bit of a disco feel, which only serves to add to the sexual orientation of the damned thing.
Massively dated, with a risible script and terrible production standards, I loved every gay second of it.
A cult classic, and no mistake.

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