Some strange, but good, twists and turns ahead
Typically, I’d chide a film like Fast-Walking for being too smart. If there is one type of film I deplore it’s the type where a writer or director flaunts a “can-you-keep-up-with-me” attitude. It’s the reason I never get that into Law & Order. Twists and turns are best left to car commercials. Fast Walking is full of them, but this neo-noir about a corrupt prison guard has enough for three films. It also has a few amazing things going for it, each of which makes the clever, but slightly convuluted plot palpable.
Like his role in Videodrome, James Woods perfectly plays a man who feels he’s in control of his life, but is obviously in over his head. When Timothy Carey takes a beating you know that crazy fool demanded real body blows. M. Emmet Walsh goes Full Monty. Fans of gonzo monologues get two or three great ones from Tim McIntire . What keeps this film in most folks memory Kay Lenz is sex appeal. However, what I found oddest of all were the two actresses employed to play the parts of hookers. Barbara Eaton and Bonnye Brown look like real hookers. I’m not talking strippers. I’m talking work-a-day whores. It’s quite rare to see something that trashy in an otherwise non-grindhouse feature. Even odder is how the scene where he hoses them off with a garden hose reminds me a lot like the scene in Pulp Fiction where Vincent and Jules get washed clean of brains and blood.
