Friday, February 11, 2011

Happy Birthday Burt Reynolds

With a fair few obituaries on this blog, it's only fair that I include something to celebrate on Straight-To-Dvd-Heaven, every once in a while...Namely that Burt Reynolds is 75 years young today.
Former halfback, stunt-man and all round 'good old boy'...Burt Reynolds was one of the biggest box office stars of the seventies, starring in such classics like DELIVERANCE, THE MEAN MACHINE, SHAMUS, HUSTLE, SEMI TOUGH, SMOKEY AND THE BANDIT (the criminally underrated) STARTING OVER, CANNONBALL RUN, SHARKY'S MACHINE (my personal fav along with) STICK, HEAT, MALONE and RENT-A-COP.
His good looks, killer timing and fun movies, often detracted from the fact that Mr Reynolds is also a great actor and director (Sharky's Machine are proof of both attributes)
Sadly though, as the eighties winded down, cinema had new box office champs (Arnold, Sly, Cruise, etc) but reynolds kept at it, and has appeared in a diverse range of DTV projects, before having a mini revival with BOOGIE NIGHTS (1997) before returning to mostly DTV work.
Some notable DTV releases being, THE MADDENING, RAVEN (fuck yeah...'Raven-Team' zippo lighters!) BIG CITY BLUES, (Albert Pyun's) CRAZY SIX, PUPS and his Logan Mcqueen movies.

Hollywood might have a short memory Burt, but i salute you on your 27, 375 days on 'gods blue and green' misery orb....All the best 'Bandit' (I may even watch SHARKY'S MACHINE tonight, or better yet...order that R2 import of HEAT, that I've been after for so long off E-bay?)


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