Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Bereamic Awesome Movie

Mabel Munoz Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

Tyreece Hulme One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

goods116 Slightly better than average Blaxploitation type film, somewhat more interesting due to cameo from Elliot Gould. Roddy McDowall is also a familiar face (best remembered, at last by me, for Planet of the Apes series). Otherwise plot is paper thin and the few action scenes are mediocre. This is only worth a view for "deep tracks" 70s film buffs (like me) or those interested in the Blaxploitation genre (although this one is kind of on the border of the genre). For anyone else, it's not worth your time at all, the movie is not gripping at all and instantly forgettable.

Kyle McElravy In the mid-1970s, Fred Williamson decided to form his own production company, Po'Boy Productions, to produce his own films, without any studio interference. He had already produced and starred in BOSS N***** and ADIOS AMIGO!, a western comedy that featured Richard Pryor as his sidekick. This latest entry is a very amateurish revenge picture with an unlikely all-star cast and limited production values, but hey, it has Fred Williamson in it, what's not to like about it?The film centers on a loner of a man, Johnny Barrows (Williamson), who is dishonorably discharged from the army after striking his vicious commanding officer O'Malley (played by martial artist Aaron Banks). He returns home to Los Angeles, but his welcome consists of getting mugged by two criminals and then getting arrested by the police for vagrancy. He eventually is bailed out and gets a job cleaning restrooms at a gas station by a racist redneck of a jerk, Richard (R.G. Armstrong). His attitude takes Johnny to a boiling point and he winds up in jail again, but a local good-guy crime boss (Stuart Whitman) bails Johnny out and offers him a proposition to be a hit man to wipe out a rival crime family. He accepts it, but soon regrets it when various near-misses complicate his quest to rub out the other bosses, which makes us believe a familiar face is responsible for it.MEAN JOHNNY BARROWS is a bad film, but Williamson, at least, gives it his best shot despite the disjointed script and occasional poor direction. The supporting cast also brightens up the movie, Roddy McDowall, Luther Adler, Mike Henry, Leon Isaac Kennedy, and even Elliott Gould shows up in a comic role as a fellow tramp who shows Johnny the ropes about surviving on the streets. Worth a look.

dbborroughs Slow dull Fred Williamson directed film about the title character,played by Williamson, getting tossed from the army for punching a white officer who tried to kill him and ending up in the middle of a mafia war between two rival families. Just okay action (not counting the laughable martial arts) and okay exposition sequences are done in by dead pacing and dull direction. This film feels wickedly padded with several sequences of Williamson on the street trying to find a job set to meaningful music. It stops the film dead and I wanted to reach for the remote. The sad thing about this film is that the basic plot is very good and it has some nice twists. The problem was that I kind of stopped really watching and let the film drift into the background, only coming back to the film when something interesting happened, which was then followed by my drifting out again. Not really worth a look.

TigerMann I can't say that this film was any good. There isn't much to be said about the plot, acting, direction ... anything, really. I like Fred Williamson, but "Mean Johnny Barrows" certainly isn't the high water mark in his resume.That being said ... the scene with Williamson and Elliott Gould was, I thought, really touching. Not necessarily in the context of the movie itself ... but I couldn't help but notice that probably 95% of that scene was improvised by both Williamson and Gould. As I understand it, both men became friends while filming Robert Altman's "M*A*S*H," and I suspect that Gould probably did the "Professor" role as a favor to his friend Williamson.The scene is set in the first act of the movie and is relatively short ... I'd say about three or four minutes in length. It doesn't add any sort of perspective to the plot at all. It probably could have been cut from the film altogether, were it not for Elliott Gould's namesake.Anyhow ... Gould's "Professor" character attempts to educate Williamson's "Barrows" on how a bum ought to live. The two find a clueless man ordering a hot dog and root beer from a street vendor. After a little smooth talking from Gould, he entices the "man with the popsicle shirt" to purchase "a couple dogs with some kraut" for he and Williamson. This scene is totally improvised by both men, leaving the other poor guy in stitches. And in the context of the movie, Williamson's "Barrows" would probably not be laughing it up and saying things like "shall we?" unless he was completely intoxicated or some other way out of his element. I suppose it was refreshing to see these two "old friends" having a good time NOT taking themselves or the scene too seriously.It's probably pretty silly, but that scene really tickled me. I'm a huge admirer of Elliott Gould's earlier work, but until the moment I saw him on screen, I had no idea he was in this movie. It was a nice surprise. Made this movie a little more palatable. Though I suppose I've seen worse movies by comparison, I doubt that "Mean Johnny Barrows" is a feather in either Fred Williamson's or Elliott Gould's cap.