Mr. Majestyk

Who knew the lives of small farmers in the early 1970s was so fraught with danger?

Charles Bronson just wants to get his melon crop in to market so he can keep his farm, but keeps having problems. First he's got some yahoo that tries to force Bronson to hire his random drunks to pick the melons, when Bronson already hired workers. When Bronson beats the guy up - including a very satisfying part where he smashes the yahoo in the nuts with the guy's own shotgun - he ends up being arrested by the useless local shitbag cops.

That puts him in lockup with a big-time hitman, who doesn't appreciate it when Bronson refuses his offer to help him escape. So now he's trying to get his crop in, while this hitman and his goons linger around and make trouble. I was not expecting the killer to have his own henchmen, but he seems like a pretty sloppy hitman anyway. The cops know the hitman's around, but being useless shitbags, are content to sit back and wait for him to actually try to kill Majestyk before stepping in.

It's interesting to me just how long it takes for Bronson to actually start fighting back. I guess it helps put across how he really is only concerned about trying to keep his farm above water. As he points at, if Renda kills him, he won't have to worry about it. But until then, he's got shit to do. Or maybe he figures the cops want to catch this killer badly enough he really can just leave it to them.

Even once he does finally fight back, it's really more of a hint-and-run game on his part. There's a lengthy chase sequence with him in his beat up pickup leading them down all these roads, letting the bad guys unfamiliarity with the roads help pick them off for him.

There's a certain amount of poetic justice, because Renda had made this big deal about how Majestyk was never going to know when he was gonna get it. Might happen at any time. Tomorrow, next week, whenever. And then Majestyk turns it around him, leads Renda and his guys by the nose right where he wants them, lets them trap themselves and then turn on each other.

As these kinds of movies go, it's not bad.