So when you watch a movie, what do you expect? Maybe some fun, or some thing to think about, or both. The trouble with The Warriors is that it has none of the above, AND an army of lovers as well!
While everybody says that it's a great movie, they always forget to tell why. And when I watched it, I didn't find it great at all, yet for endless reasons..
It has a very thin, fragile, rather nonexistent plot. So someone framed some ones, therefore they're chased by other some ones. In other movies, that could make an action, comedy, kids cartoon, or art house movie. But here, it isn't this or that. It's a desert, full of air, with horrifying silence!
Why The Warriors are framed? The movie's ghost of a script answers proudly through the framer himself: "No reason. I just like doing things like that!". Smart motive? Nope. It's stupid laziness!
Then, who's the movie's "evil guy"? OK, he is some guy, who looks confident, and does nothing but listening to the news flash every now and then. For me, he's useful only for a good laugh; especially when he shows up wearing sunglasses at night, and in doors!
So what about the conflict? Well, it's a loop; where the leads meet one gang, fight them, and then escape, one time after another. The only thing that may change is the gang's name, costume, and gender. I believe that in the lowest movies, video games, or comics, there must be a kind of aggravation; where the conflict's steps get harder, and the fights get hotter, leading to a big climax. This time, FORGET IT UTTERLY. Nobody cared of doing anything like this. Insignificance was the name of the game, and they played it devotedly!
What about the characterization? Nihility my friend. The Warriors' leader is the leader for what exactly?! I don't know, and the movie itself doesn't know. There is some rival for him, who's here to call everybody "Faggot!!", and doesn't do a thing else, not even being a "rival" in anyway. The leads are 8 copies of blank original that has no back story, no clear characteristics, and sometimes no dialogue!
I'm clueless how that movie was criticized for its violence at the time?! Enough to say that it's an action that has no action in the first place. Any Tom & Jerry short had tons of action compared to this sterility!
The details are strange for strangeness. I mean an empty city that has only gangs?!! So where are the people that these gangs robe?? Moreover, subway that has no tickets, and no passengers. Police forces, and thugs, that have no guns. And a movie that has no mind!
And after years and years of releasing it cinematically, the movie's makers remembered noting on the DVD edition that it takes place in the future. But what did happen in that future to make New York a deserted city, that has thousands of criminals, 1 newsstand, and so vigilant vice squad?!! 2 years later, John Carpenter would fix it up, and do it more correct, in Escape from New York (1981), by turning the whole city into a huge and crowded prison. See, nice things happen when you use your head a little!
Does it have a satire? YEAH. In one moment, a group of well-dressed boys and girls, coming out of a prom maybe, run into the dusty leads in the subway. Ahh, the war of classes, the social irony, and the eloquent visual commentary! To tell you the truth, I'm bluffing. Because in terms of intellectual depth, seriousness, or any point of view; our dear movie is between mute and naive!
So what's here to enjoy, or to watch?? I'll tell you: Andrew Laszlo's cinematography, the special atmosphere, the different gangs' designing, the songs, the no cheap dealing; by avoiding immersing us in sex, drugs, and cursing (a la today's movies), and the pure ambition of remaking Xenophon's Anabasis in some modern time.
It's pathetic that director Walter Hill tried to make a meaning out of this joke on his 2005 Director's Cut DVD edition, when he added an opening prologue to link the movie to Anabasis, and to assure that we're about to watch "A story of courage". It takes a lot of carriage indeed to make a movie that bad, and that vapid, then dare to connect it with something surely million times better and richer!
I really can't understand how The Warriors is called a masterpiece, a cult classic, a great movie. Actually these allegations are great nonsense themselves. Because this is the worst remake of The Fugitive I have ever seen, one of the emptiest movies in history, and an extremely overrated dud. It may have any meaning though in the context of America in the 1970s. However, I'm not an American, and I didn't watch it in the 1970s. Congratulations for its 70s-American-fans exclusive group then. I just hope that someday, one of them tells us a reason for this movie's greatness. Otherwise they're talking about another movie, with the same title, that I didn't watch yet!
Finally, a question: How at one point the leads managed to outrun a speeding bus.. on their feet??!!
While everybody says that it's a great movie, they always forget to tell why. And when I watched it, I didn't find it great at all, yet for endless reasons..
It has a very thin, fragile, rather nonexistent plot. So someone framed some ones, therefore they're chased by other some ones. In other movies, that could make an action, comedy, kids cartoon, or art house movie. But here, it isn't this or that. It's a desert, full of air, with horrifying silence!
Why The Warriors are framed? The movie's ghost of a script answers proudly through the framer himself: "No reason. I just like doing things like that!". Smart motive? Nope. It's stupid laziness!
Then, who's the movie's "evil guy"? OK, he is some guy, who looks confident, and does nothing but listening to the news flash every now and then. For me, he's useful only for a good laugh; especially when he shows up wearing sunglasses at night, and in doors!
So what about the conflict? Well, it's a loop; where the leads meet one gang, fight them, and then escape, one time after another. The only thing that may change is the gang's name, costume, and gender. I believe that in the lowest movies, video games, or comics, there must be a kind of aggravation; where the conflict's steps get harder, and the fights get hotter, leading to a big climax. This time, FORGET IT UTTERLY. Nobody cared of doing anything like this. Insignificance was the name of the game, and they played it devotedly!
What about the characterization? Nihility my friend. The Warriors' leader is the leader for what exactly?! I don't know, and the movie itself doesn't know. There is some rival for him, who's here to call everybody "Faggot!!", and doesn't do a thing else, not even being a "rival" in anyway. The leads are 8 copies of blank original that has no back story, no clear characteristics, and sometimes no dialogue!
I'm clueless how that movie was criticized for its violence at the time?! Enough to say that it's an action that has no action in the first place. Any Tom & Jerry short had tons of action compared to this sterility!
The details are strange for strangeness. I mean an empty city that has only gangs?!! So where are the people that these gangs robe?? Moreover, subway that has no tickets, and no passengers. Police forces, and thugs, that have no guns. And a movie that has no mind!
And after years and years of releasing it cinematically, the movie's makers remembered noting on the DVD edition that it takes place in the future. But what did happen in that future to make New York a deserted city, that has thousands of criminals, 1 newsstand, and so vigilant vice squad?!! 2 years later, John Carpenter would fix it up, and do it more correct, in Escape from New York (1981), by turning the whole city into a huge and crowded prison. See, nice things happen when you use your head a little!
Does it have a satire? YEAH. In one moment, a group of well-dressed boys and girls, coming out of a prom maybe, run into the dusty leads in the subway. Ahh, the war of classes, the social irony, and the eloquent visual commentary! To tell you the truth, I'm bluffing. Because in terms of intellectual depth, seriousness, or any point of view; our dear movie is between mute and naive!
So what's here to enjoy, or to watch?? I'll tell you: Andrew Laszlo's cinematography, the special atmosphere, the different gangs' designing, the songs, the no cheap dealing; by avoiding immersing us in sex, drugs, and cursing (a la today's movies), and the pure ambition of remaking Xenophon's Anabasis in some modern time.
It's pathetic that director Walter Hill tried to make a meaning out of this joke on his 2005 Director's Cut DVD edition, when he added an opening prologue to link the movie to Anabasis, and to assure that we're about to watch "A story of courage". It takes a lot of carriage indeed to make a movie that bad, and that vapid, then dare to connect it with something surely million times better and richer!
I really can't understand how The Warriors is called a masterpiece, a cult classic, a great movie. Actually these allegations are great nonsense themselves. Because this is the worst remake of The Fugitive I have ever seen, one of the emptiest movies in history, and an extremely overrated dud. It may have any meaning though in the context of America in the 1970s. However, I'm not an American, and I didn't watch it in the 1970s. Congratulations for its 70s-American-fans exclusive group then. I just hope that someday, one of them tells us a reason for this movie's greatness. Otherwise they're talking about another movie, with the same title, that I didn't watch yet!
Finally, a question: How at one point the leads managed to outrun a speeding bus.. on their feet??!!