Big Bad Mama

1974 "Hot Lead - Hot Cars - Hot Damn!"
5.7| 1h23m| R| en
Details

Mama and daughters get forced by circumstances into bootlegging and bank robbing, and travel across the country trailed by the law.

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Interesteg What makes it different from others?
Phonearl Good start, but then it gets ruined
Hadrina The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful
Rio Hayward All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.
Leofwine_draca BIG BAD MAMA is an outrageously cheesy 1930s-era crime comedy from producer Roger Corman; think of it as an over-the-top riff on BONNIE & CLYDE and you'll be right. The slick, speedy storyline involves Angie Dickinson as the titular character, a machine gun-toting criminal who, along with her teenage daughters, wreaks havoc throughout rural Texas. Other notable additions to the cast include Dick Miller as a dedicated lawman, Tom Skerritt as a wildman, and the great William Shatner as a shady character who falls in with the outlaws. The film is very much an exploitation picture, with a simple plot, lots of action and movement, and plenty of nudity from the female cast members. It builds up to an insanely violent climax that attempts to go one better than BONNIE & CLYDE and succeeds admirably.
dougdoepke Crashing cars, splatter guns, sex and nudity—whatever else about Roger Corman, he never made a boring movie, and this one seldom lets up. Take Wilma (Dickinson) and her two hormonal daughters. When they're not sticking a .45 in some moneyman's hapless face, they're stripping down for extra-curricular action. Lucky Skerritt and Shatner, except Skerritt's strictly low-class, while Shatner's a little short in the guts department. But Wilma's got high-class aspirations. So, being a hardscrabble, rural woman, she robs folks out in the open instead of behind boardroom doors.But note the people she robs. All are pillars of what the counter-cultural 70's would call the "establishment". There's the huckstering preacher, the mortgage bankers, the boozy American Legion, and finally the wealthy snobs who think they are the "better people". In fact, their talk about not taxing the better people sounds almost contemporary. Note too that it's the high-class pretender Shatner who double-crosses the others. Yes indeed, screenwriter Norton may have been blacklisted in the 50's, but the political echoes continueThere's no room here for nuance or lengthy dialog. These folks don't waste time talking when there's another bank to rob or another car to crash. It's strictly the fast life for Wilma and her brood. Note how Mom sabotages daughter Polly's wedding, saying Polly'll only wind up on a poor farm with a bunch of skinny kids. That's probably some insight into those bank-robbing desperadoes of the Dust Bowl '30's. And so, America's back-handed liking for up-front outlaws like Wilma and Co. gets another jazzy installment.
preppy-3 In the Depression era Wilma McClatchie (Angie Dicksinson) and her two daughters--Billy Jean (Susan Sennett) and Polly (Robbie Lee)--became robbers to make a living. They are joined by bank robber Fred Diller (Tom Skerrit) and con man William Baxter (William Shatner--yes THAT William Shatner). Wilma has sex with both Fred and William and her daughters go after Fred also!Stupid and sometimes dull. The plot is virtually nonexistent, the dialogue is terrible and (since this is a Roger Corman film) it was made on NO budget (and it shows). Still it has frequent pointless car chases and crashes; plenty of female nudity (Dickinson has nude sex scenes with Skerritt AND Shatner); Corman regular Dick Miller as a policeman and plenty of bloody shootouts. Despite all this going on the movie comes to a screeching halt for dull dialogue stretches which are far too frequent. Sennett and Lee are terrible actors, Shatner and Skerritt are OK but Dickinson is great. She gives her role her all and looks very good nude (especially considering she was over 40). Stupid, bloody and dull but works pretty good on a no-think level. I give it a 5.
bensonmum2 Wilma McClatchie (Angie Dickinson) wants more for her two daughters than depression era Texas can provide. With no money to speak of they set off for California to find their fortunes. Along the way, they rob a bank, pick up a bank robber, mug a preacher, steal the take from a racetrack, take on a penniless drifter from Kentucky, kidnap an heiress, and kill a few people. It's just an ordinary cross-county trip.This is one of my favorite of the Roger Corman produced movies. I realize that it's basically trash, but what fun trash it is. Around every turn there's a robbery, a car chase, a gun fight, or someone having sex. These people are ruthless and will do whatever it takes to get the money they desire. Amid the violence, though, the movie is not without it's moments of comedy. The opening wedding service is simply sublime. I actually found myself laughing out loud.The cast that Corman was able to assemble rivals that of the best movies from the 70s. Angie Dickinson, William Shatner, Tom Skerritt, and Dick Miller are wonderfully cast. But my personal favorite is Susan Sennett, playing one of the daughters. As far as I'm concerned, she steals every scene in which she appears. It's a shame she didn't make more movies.