Cheap 10 to Midnight (Video) (Charles Bronson, Lisa Eilbacher, Andrew Stevens) (J. Lee Thompson) Price

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10 to Midnight
"A slickly made, suspenseful and scary movie."~Los Angeles Times <
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>A cop. A killer. A deadline. <
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>Charles Bronson is "a hero all the way", (Variety) as a rogue cop pursuing a deranged killer in this action-packed suspense thriller. Serving up vigilante justice as only he can, Bronson delivers on of his most riveting performances in the "exceedingly well-made" (Gene Siskel) film. <
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>Bronson plays Leo Kessler, a cynical Los Angeles cop on the trail of Warren Stacy (Gene Davis), a homicidal maniac who turns rejection from beautiful women into the ultimate revenge. When the legal system sets Stacey free, Kessler plants evidence to put in behind bars for good. But Keller's plan backfires, leaving him with only one option: to hunt down Stacey on his own...before the crazed killer strikes again! <
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>If you like action-thrillers then this is the movie for you. One of my favorite Bronson movies, and I highly recommend it.

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Not fascist, just fed up!
It's been said more than once that pop culture is simply a mirror of the society that creates it. If that's the case, the glut of "street justice" movies that appeared during the 70s and 80s can only point to an American public fed up to the eyeballs with an epidemic of street violence and a broken-down, back-logged criminal justice system which was incapable of either protecting the citizenry or punishing the criminals. Probably the most famous of the "street justice" flicks is Clint Eastwood's "Dirty Harry," but the actor who, round for round, shot the largest number of psychopaths, hopheads, drug dealers, rapists, muggers, gangsters, and all-purpose scum was Charles Bronson. By the time the "Death Wish" series alone was finished, there probably wasn't a single professional baddie in Central Casting who hadn't been bludgeoned, immolated or gunned down by Chuckie B. Good for him! <
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>"Ten to Midnight" is not exactly that sort of flick, but the spirit is there. Bronson plays Leo Kesseler, a burnt-out LA detective whose faith in "the system" (as it is always referred to in this type of movie) has long since gone the way of mood rings, encounter groups, and all the other I'm OK - You're OK, now-let's-get-in-the-hot-tub-and-groove touchy-feely affectations of the early 1970s. What Kesseler has instead is the bleak reality of the early 1980s, when the big cities of our fair land all had extensive areas resembling downtown Stalingrad circa December 1942, and nearly as much shooting, and a good cop could hardly shoot a fleeing criminal between the shoulder blades without getting himself in hot water. Such is the legacy of all those "you're not evil, you're misunderstood" social experiments in the wake of the 60s. <
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>One guy who really is evil, and not misunderstood, is Warren Stacy (Gene Davis), a smarmy, creepy narccisist and sociopath who despite his ripped pysique and boy next door good looks cannot get a woman due to his horrible personality. His release comes in a disgusting parody of the sexual act, when he strips naked and then uses a knife to obtain satisfaction with the ladies. Stacy, however, is no ordinary nut case but an extremely clever and calculating killer, who is careful have an iron-clad alibi during all his crimes. Nevertheless, his smug arrogance and general air of evil convince Kessler that he's behind the string of vicious murders. In the movie's most memorable (non-violent) scene, Kessler and his straight-arrow partner pigeonhole Stacy in a police interrogation room, confront him with some sex toys found in his apartment, and provoke him into a truly frightening display of rage, in which he is literally drooling and smashing things. Gene Davis deserves kudos for truly creeping me out during this scene: when Bronson cracks his icy veneer of superiority, out gushes the torrent of slime and pus in his brain. It's a horrible and compelling moment. <
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>When Kessler realizes he has no hard evidence against Stacy, he plants some to ensure the sleazoid will never stab again. Like the torture scene in "Dirty Harry," however, it backfires; Kessler's evidence-tampering is found out and Stacey walks. Now begins the "cat-and-mouse" game between the suspended Kessler and the vengeful Stacy. Again, there are similarities to "DH," in which both men taunt and stalk each other, with Kessler getting the upper hand as the film goes on. Unfortunately for Bronson's Kessler, his plan to torment Stacy (not a very good plan considering his personality) backfires a second time when the killer realizes that Kessler has a sexy daughter of just the age Stacy likes to "date." <
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>The end of the film, which I first saw on TV when I was a kid, scared the hell out of me. Without spoiling it, I will say that when a naked,knife-wielding, sexually twisted psychpath is unleashed in a nurses' dormitory in the middle of the night, only truly bad and disgusting things can ensue. Some people think of this as a rather generic potboiler, but it is unusual in the way it jumps around from detective story to slasher film, thriller to "street justice" fantasy. The negative chemistry between Bronson and Davis is also quite entertaining. <
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>"Ten to Midnight" is not, however, a fascist or right-wing film. Neither, for that matter, are the "Death Wish" flicks. They simply reflected the mood of the period, in which most people were fed up with rampant crime and violence in our big cities and had lost faith in the police to do anything about it. Kessler's disgust with the impotence of his own system doesn't make him a Nazi; it simply reflects the frustration of somebody who became a cop to protect people from criminals and finds himself powerless to do his job. And as "Death Wish's" Paul Kersey would be the first to tell you, in a land where there is no justice, a man is compelled to make his own.

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Still Good Viewing for me, maybe for You.-probably worth 3-1/2 Stars
The Story Line has been discussed to death by other Reviewers, so I'll try to help you see if this movie is for you. Being and older person now, I saw this when I was younger, and the appeal was and is: Gene Davis IS the Killer you can really dislike. There's just nothing about him you can like, and he rubs me the wrong way in everything he is, as a person in this movie: his lines, the sound of his voice, his arrogance, you nameit-the guy plays a great Killer! <
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>That being said, the movie and surroundings are a bit dated, so the appeal for younger fans will probably not be there. It also lacks the "speed" of modern crime movies, but, for me, being an older person, it works. The conversations are a bit stiff and stuffy, but it's vintage Bronson, and the ending is definitely different from most movies of this type. <
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>Older people, like myself, like these older movies BECAUSE they Don't have a lot of high speed chases and bar room brawls, so it's definitely not for everyone, and probably not for younger movie fans. I would bet that you'll remember the Killer and you'll remember the ending. <
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>Finally, the audio and video are about as good as it gets for a movie this old, and both are more than acceptable.