It's mid-July and the Twin Cities is in the grip of a gnarly heat dome causing temps and humidity to spike way beyond what I would consider tolerable. In honor of this totally abysmal weather, I'm publishing a list from Apache Revolver #1 (currently sold out of its second run!) all about crime films characterized by unrelenting, sun-blasted environments. I can't tell you these films will help you beat the heat, but maybe you'll find some comfort in unfortunate miscreants that are having a harder, sweatier time than you are.
Nothing adds to the pressure cooker of stress and paranoia like cranking up the temperature. The following are 5 killer crime films dripping with perspiration.
1. Dog Day (1984) -Tonally bizarre genre piece and the only French film I believe Lee Marvin ever did. After an armored car job goes sideways, Marvin's professional thief hides out at a farm populated by a family far stranger, cruel, and exploitative then himself. Absolutely gonzo, nihilistic thriller with echoes of Prime Cut.
2. The Hot Spot ( 1990) -A steamy thriller helmed by Dennis Hopper featuring Don Johnson, Virginia Madsen, and Jennifer Connelly. The desert sun beats down mercilessly on a small town filled with bad people doing bad things. The blazing day gives way to neon nights in what amounts to a beautifully stylized, melodramatic neo noir
3. The Great Okinawa Yakuza War (1976)- One of the most ferocious Yakuza films of the 70s. An absolute ripper of bloody action and meanspirited violence couched against the relentless tropical heat of Okinawa. Sonny Chiba is both charmingly outrageous and terrifying brutal as a gang leader on the rise. Perhaps the most intimidating popsicle eating scene this side of 8 Million Ways to Die's snow cones.
4. Stray Dog (1949) - Kurosawa's elegantly lyrical but no less tense tale of very hot, very bad day for a young police detective played by Tashiro Mifune. This is a much classier film than I usually write about but the suspense is exquisite and it captures post-war Japan beautifully.
5. Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974)-Peckinpah's tour de force death trip is one of the sweatiest, grimmest, most fatalistic tales set to celluloid. Warren Oates never had a finer moment and the fact that he is in some ways channeling Fuller himself adds another layer of self-loathing to an already potent vision. Pour the tequila and fire up Guantanamera.
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