David
02-02-2010, 11:16 AM
*Spoilers in summary - not in review*
Urbane criminal mastermind Pepe Lusara breezes into Los Angeles and promptly rents a dilapidated mansion from a puzzled realtor. It will serve as both temporary lair and meeting site for the crew of thieves he'll soon employ to assist him.
Following an edgy encounter with Williams (Brad Trumbull), the career crook instructed to corral the other professionals needed, Lusara alone begins a series of mysterious late-night robberies - in which the commodity stolen is a steaming, toxic acid.
When the L.A. sports arena is selected as the most desirable of several possible targets, the thickly-accented lothario follows the venue's middle-aged cashier Elizabeth (Lisa McDonald) into a local watering hole, where he charms her off her feet - and into a motel.
An affair begins, and while a deeply smitten Elizabeth brushes up on her technique by consulting 'The Modern Sex Manual' - Williams finds and recruits three-time losers 'Spooky', Carter, and Sammy for the heist.
Tempers flare at the team's initial meeting - but just as the caper's kinks are ironed out, and Lusara secures the last drop of acid he needs, Elizabeth throws her lover a curve and offers him the keys to the arena's cash - claiming to have been on to him from the start. Gushing false humility, Lusara promises to squire her around Mexico with the ill-gotten gains.
With the aid of an 'inside person' the heist goes smoothly - but as the men leave a gently bound and gagged Elizabeth behind and high-tail it to the getaway car, Carter takes a painful fall and spills his bag of loot. Enraged, Lusara shoots him in the face before scooping up the bills and speeding away with the others. A car switch and a bit of comical cross-dressing insure their anonymity.
Back at the mansion the men surround a table covered with cash, anxiously awaiting the split - but Lusara insists they first raise a celebratory glass. Having been slipped 'mickeys', Spooky and Sammy collapse while a furious and apparently immune Williams lunges at his back-stabbing boss. Lusara unloads several shots into him before dragging the dying man into the bathroom - and submerging him in a tub filled with stolen acid.
Disguised as an aging cripple, Lusara drives his exited ex-cashier south of the border - refilling her cocktail glass so often she passes out on the way. While she's unconscious he pulls the car over, douses it in flammable liquid, and pushes it over a seaside cliff - confident he's now tied all loose ends as he watches the flaming convertible hurtle down.
Fade in - Rio de Janeiro - some time later. One night after some hard partying with two lovely young local girls, a goateed Lusara passes out in his hotel room - and suffers through feverish flashbacks of his many vicious murders. When he wakes, the girls and his money are gone.
Back in L.A. with a brand new look, Lusara returns to the bar where he first seduced
Elizabeth, and finds that he still has 'it' when he lures a mysterious barfly away from her drink - and into a motel room. Waiting until the two are alone, the woman chillingly transforms into an angel of death - removing her disguise and revealing herself to be a horribly scarred Elizabeth! Packing heat and seeing red, she grazes him with a bullet - then kicks off a prosthetic leg at her shocked would-be murderer. A second shot hits Lusara in the head, sending him staggering out into the night, only to collapse in a nearby gutter.
For years it wasn't any more than a hazy mirage on the noir landscape - but this Nouvelle Vague-influenced obscurity is thankfully now trickling into availability - and this fan means to expedite the flow. Essentially an exercise in low-budget/drive-in sleaze filmmaking, 'RHOTD' is the brainchild of one-man-band (writer/director/editor/makeup/star) Aram Katcher - a nondescript actor of Armenian origin who not unlike the character he plays, deftly pulls off an unlikely coup.
Though a bit self-aware at times, this briskly-paced and hard-edged neo-noir should come as a welcome discovery to fans of the sub-genre. Consistently entertaining and sensibly short, it is without a single recognizable face or name in the credits - yet despite some technical shortcomings (poor sound, rough editing), 'RHOTD' boldly rises above it's budget restrictions to reach a respectable level of artistic achievement - snugly fitting within the lineup of other harsh 60's noirs ('Brainstorm' and 'Point Blank' among them). As in those films, the atmosphere in 'Right Hand' is thick with illicit sex, psychosis, and hair-trigger violence.
Well-suited for those wee-hours cult screenings with friends - when different standards are employed - 'RHOTD' is, in this fan's estimation, a minor classic. A rough, uncut gem that just may outshine many a more well-known noir thriller.
Urbane criminal mastermind Pepe Lusara breezes into Los Angeles and promptly rents a dilapidated mansion from a puzzled realtor. It will serve as both temporary lair and meeting site for the crew of thieves he'll soon employ to assist him.
Following an edgy encounter with Williams (Brad Trumbull), the career crook instructed to corral the other professionals needed, Lusara alone begins a series of mysterious late-night robberies - in which the commodity stolen is a steaming, toxic acid.
When the L.A. sports arena is selected as the most desirable of several possible targets, the thickly-accented lothario follows the venue's middle-aged cashier Elizabeth (Lisa McDonald) into a local watering hole, where he charms her off her feet - and into a motel.
An affair begins, and while a deeply smitten Elizabeth brushes up on her technique by consulting 'The Modern Sex Manual' - Williams finds and recruits three-time losers 'Spooky', Carter, and Sammy for the heist.
Tempers flare at the team's initial meeting - but just as the caper's kinks are ironed out, and Lusara secures the last drop of acid he needs, Elizabeth throws her lover a curve and offers him the keys to the arena's cash - claiming to have been on to him from the start. Gushing false humility, Lusara promises to squire her around Mexico with the ill-gotten gains.
With the aid of an 'inside person' the heist goes smoothly - but as the men leave a gently bound and gagged Elizabeth behind and high-tail it to the getaway car, Carter takes a painful fall and spills his bag of loot. Enraged, Lusara shoots him in the face before scooping up the bills and speeding away with the others. A car switch and a bit of comical cross-dressing insure their anonymity.
Back at the mansion the men surround a table covered with cash, anxiously awaiting the split - but Lusara insists they first raise a celebratory glass. Having been slipped 'mickeys', Spooky and Sammy collapse while a furious and apparently immune Williams lunges at his back-stabbing boss. Lusara unloads several shots into him before dragging the dying man into the bathroom - and submerging him in a tub filled with stolen acid.
Disguised as an aging cripple, Lusara drives his exited ex-cashier south of the border - refilling her cocktail glass so often she passes out on the way. While she's unconscious he pulls the car over, douses it in flammable liquid, and pushes it over a seaside cliff - confident he's now tied all loose ends as he watches the flaming convertible hurtle down.
Fade in - Rio de Janeiro - some time later. One night after some hard partying with two lovely young local girls, a goateed Lusara passes out in his hotel room - and suffers through feverish flashbacks of his many vicious murders. When he wakes, the girls and his money are gone.
Back in L.A. with a brand new look, Lusara returns to the bar where he first seduced
Elizabeth, and finds that he still has 'it' when he lures a mysterious barfly away from her drink - and into a motel room. Waiting until the two are alone, the woman chillingly transforms into an angel of death - removing her disguise and revealing herself to be a horribly scarred Elizabeth! Packing heat and seeing red, she grazes him with a bullet - then kicks off a prosthetic leg at her shocked would-be murderer. A second shot hits Lusara in the head, sending him staggering out into the night, only to collapse in a nearby gutter.
For years it wasn't any more than a hazy mirage on the noir landscape - but this Nouvelle Vague-influenced obscurity is thankfully now trickling into availability - and this fan means to expedite the flow. Essentially an exercise in low-budget/drive-in sleaze filmmaking, 'RHOTD' is the brainchild of one-man-band (writer/director/editor/makeup/star) Aram Katcher - a nondescript actor of Armenian origin who not unlike the character he plays, deftly pulls off an unlikely coup.
Though a bit self-aware at times, this briskly-paced and hard-edged neo-noir should come as a welcome discovery to fans of the sub-genre. Consistently entertaining and sensibly short, it is without a single recognizable face or name in the credits - yet despite some technical shortcomings (poor sound, rough editing), 'RHOTD' boldly rises above it's budget restrictions to reach a respectable level of artistic achievement - snugly fitting within the lineup of other harsh 60's noirs ('Brainstorm' and 'Point Blank' among them). As in those films, the atmosphere in 'Right Hand' is thick with illicit sex, psychosis, and hair-trigger violence.
Well-suited for those wee-hours cult screenings with friends - when different standards are employed - 'RHOTD' is, in this fan's estimation, a minor classic. A rough, uncut gem that just may outshine many a more well-known noir thriller.