Tubi Thursday: 10 to Midnight (1983)

 After watching an '80s Film last week (with Rifftrax), let me stay in that Decade.

It's a completely different feel, however, as it is a Cannon Film...

The late '70s to mid '80s were all about vigilantes...who are also Cops.  This is no exception.

A man acts like a complete jerk to some ladies in a Movie Theater...    

...but sneaks out to kill a lady.

He does so while nude- save for rubber gloves- to leave no clues.

Yep, nothing could come off of a body at a crime scene.  Certainly not hair or nails.

A Cop- Charles Bronson- has a new partner- Andrew Stevens, from The Terror Within Films- know that this murder is related to a previous one.

Mind you, we are just told this, so between this and abruptly following the killer, I feel like I missed a Film.

Is there a 9 to Midnight that I have to see first?

The killer went to the Funeral and knows to look for the Diary, which has his name in it.

Of course, we saw the Cops go to look at the victim's stuff.  Is it then a surprise when they have it?

Well, it is to the killer...and the roommate, who decided to cook eggs in her '80s lingerie.  

Wait, what?

The Theater alibi holds- since they don't check into it- and the Cops won't do more, angering Bronson.

He plants the 2nd victims' blood on the guy's clothes and they arrest him.

Shockingly, his deceit is revealed and...

Bronson confesses, ending the Trial before it starts and losing his job.

Now the killer really wants Bronson's Daughter dead, so things come to a head.

The Ending is kind of forced and abrupt.

This is the big, scary Film that my Mother was freaked out by.  Weird.  And yes, that was why I added it to my Queue months ago.

It is a Cannon Film, so you know what to expect.  It thankfully has more depth than you might think.  Bronson isn't just the cliche of him that many people have based on Films he made around this time.  He doesn't deliver any monologues or anything, but he plays a real-feeling person.

The killer, likewise, gets alot of attention.  We don't really know why he kills, which is a shame.  There's a really despicable part that focuses on him getting advice to 'act crazy to escape punishment.'  His Lawyer- Character Actor Geoffrey Lewis- tells him to act like he is both Schizophrenic AND has Dissociative Identity Disorder.

In a Film with about a dozen murders in it, this is the part that bugs me the most!

The Soundtrack is great, so I can ignore the dated aspects mostly.  

Honestly, the fact that Bronson does something bad and faces consequences for it helps this one a bit for me.  

That ending though...I mean, did you have to do it?
He was naked and covered in blood, screaming about how he was going to lie and then come back for revenge.  Would that have held up in Court?

Regardless, I was expecting worse here...although now I need to check my closet for Yuppies.

Bronson was in far worse Cannon Films- by the same Director no less- after this.  If you can put on your blinders a bit, this is actually pretty good.