John Badham's "Bird on a Wire" was made in 1990, a time when Mel Gibson was still the epitome of coolness not the romantic type à la Tom Cruise or the tougher version à la Kurt Russell but the fun one, relying on a buddy who'd endure his shenanigans and make the reactions even funnier. With his looks, his goofiness, his infectious smile and his daringness to make lousy jokes, Gibson was the perfect half of any cinematic duo.
It was also a time where Goldie Hawn was that sexy, sassy and prissyy bombshell who could play the dumb blonde in distress and display her best physical attributes in a way that would make feminist cringe but never at the expenses of her own comical abilities. Hell, even the villains, played by three recognizable faces: David Carradine, Bill Duke and Stephen Toboloski, the Big Bad, the Muscle and the Nerd didn't need much to say, they were "bad", acted "bad" and got a satisfying enough demise. What else to ask for?
So "Bird on a Wire" isn't exactly a film you watch seeking depth and subtlety. It's an action buddy-romance whose only excuse is to stretch a long narrative cord where chases, stunts and romantic interludes will be hung one after another with gags and Hawn's screams as clothespins. It might not be everyone's cup of tea but at a certain time where Sunday nights were airing action thrillers we didn't care much for plot conveniences. As a matter of fact, I saw "Bird on a Wire" in a Sunday of 1994 one week before or after "The Rookie" and if you check my review of that film, what I said could perfectly apply to "Bird": these movies knew what to deliver to audiences who knew what to expect.
That's the point, you're looking for Eastwood playing his usual hard-nosed curmudgeon, you expect Gibson to be that sympathetic goofball and Goldie Hawn to be the butt-joke (literally)... to be fair, there are a few decent shots on Gibson's buttocks so the fansservice is equally distributed.
Now, there's no need to thoroughly examine the plot, Gibson plays Rick Jarmin, a man hiding after having testified against two drug criminals, he left Marianne (Hawn) fifteen years earlier before they'd get married and destiny crosses their paths again at some garage of Detroit. Figuring his cover is blown, he asks federal agent Lou Baird (Tobolowski) to assign him somewhere else, ignoring that the man's a snitch working for the two criminals and it's a matter of time before they pay him a visit.. for business reasons, but you can tell it's personal too. Obviously, Rick is a goner.
By the way, even as a 12-year old, when I saw the old black garage owner (Harry Caesar) having that paternal talk with Rick, I knew he wouldn't make it to the next Sunday church sermon... a similar thing happened in "The Rookie" with Eastwood. Now that I think of it, the "Black guy dies first" was one of my earliest-known movie tropes. So the bad guys come, Marianne accidentally saves the day and twenty minutes later, they're in the run, accused of the murder of Rick's boss and the rest is just a mix of Mr-and-Mrs-Smith arguments and in extremis escapes in the most improbable and neck-risking way (on the top of 20-store hotel, a crop duster) Ebert figured it was a possible homage to Hitchcock's sense of setting up his action climaxes, well, I'm sure Hitchcock would have been glad to live a time where occasional up-skirt glimpses were allowed.
Each step leads us to one of the Rick's former hideouts, we discover he used to be a hairdresser, in a salon where everyone acts gay and I confess that trope was overused even by the 90s standard and seems a little dated. There's another halt at a farm where he worked as a handy man and given how glad Joan Severance was to see him again we gather he must have been quite handy indeed (Hawn's reactions in that part makes the sequence all worthwhile). And finally there's that night in the motel with an infamous roach landing on Marianne's hair and a climax at the zoo where you know the baddies' funerals won't have open coffins.
Now, I feel that I have to abandon that guilty pleasure zone and start to be a little more critical. First, beyond the personas of the heroes, what I loved is the true chemistry between them, in a scene where the two are trying to resist the temptation of having sex, the dialogue sounds real in a corny way. There's an interesting flashback sequence that reveals a little more depth about Rick. In fact, this is a film that shines from these little touches, like having a mobster birthday party with a man dressed as a pig and carrying a machine-gun, that's the kind of detail that can really hook me to a film.
Now, my main criticism concerns the plot, I figured hard to believe a man of Rick's intelligence never suspected that Baird could be the mole, that he keeps telling him his whereabouts. This is the guy who suspected the breakfast guy in the hotel. Speaking of that, when she said she ordered croissants and prunes, the "waiter" says "some bread and fruit", how didn't that alert them? It is also possible that Hawn overplays the sassy prissy woman and should have had one substantial part in the final triumph. And for the police, they only appear during the first half and disappear without posing any threat for the evil trio. Thinking about it again, how will Rick prove he didn't kill his boss?
Of course these considerations hardly matter ... this is a fun action thriller film emblematic of a time viewers under 30 wouldn't remember, a time of free-spirited and fun-driven mindset that sadly vanished from our screens: the early 90s.
It was also a time where Goldie Hawn was that sexy, sassy and prissyy bombshell who could play the dumb blonde in distress and display her best physical attributes in a way that would make feminist cringe but never at the expenses of her own comical abilities. Hell, even the villains, played by three recognizable faces: David Carradine, Bill Duke and Stephen Toboloski, the Big Bad, the Muscle and the Nerd didn't need much to say, they were "bad", acted "bad" and got a satisfying enough demise. What else to ask for?
So "Bird on a Wire" isn't exactly a film you watch seeking depth and subtlety. It's an action buddy-romance whose only excuse is to stretch a long narrative cord where chases, stunts and romantic interludes will be hung one after another with gags and Hawn's screams as clothespins. It might not be everyone's cup of tea but at a certain time where Sunday nights were airing action thrillers we didn't care much for plot conveniences. As a matter of fact, I saw "Bird on a Wire" in a Sunday of 1994 one week before or after "The Rookie" and if you check my review of that film, what I said could perfectly apply to "Bird": these movies knew what to deliver to audiences who knew what to expect.
That's the point, you're looking for Eastwood playing his usual hard-nosed curmudgeon, you expect Gibson to be that sympathetic goofball and Goldie Hawn to be the butt-joke (literally)... to be fair, there are a few decent shots on Gibson's buttocks so the fansservice is equally distributed.
Now, there's no need to thoroughly examine the plot, Gibson plays Rick Jarmin, a man hiding after having testified against two drug criminals, he left Marianne (Hawn) fifteen years earlier before they'd get married and destiny crosses their paths again at some garage of Detroit. Figuring his cover is blown, he asks federal agent Lou Baird (Tobolowski) to assign him somewhere else, ignoring that the man's a snitch working for the two criminals and it's a matter of time before they pay him a visit.. for business reasons, but you can tell it's personal too. Obviously, Rick is a goner.
By the way, even as a 12-year old, when I saw the old black garage owner (Harry Caesar) having that paternal talk with Rick, I knew he wouldn't make it to the next Sunday church sermon... a similar thing happened in "The Rookie" with Eastwood. Now that I think of it, the "Black guy dies first" was one of my earliest-known movie tropes. So the bad guys come, Marianne accidentally saves the day and twenty minutes later, they're in the run, accused of the murder of Rick's boss and the rest is just a mix of Mr-and-Mrs-Smith arguments and in extremis escapes in the most improbable and neck-risking way (on the top of 20-store hotel, a crop duster) Ebert figured it was a possible homage to Hitchcock's sense of setting up his action climaxes, well, I'm sure Hitchcock would have been glad to live a time where occasional up-skirt glimpses were allowed.
Each step leads us to one of the Rick's former hideouts, we discover he used to be a hairdresser, in a salon where everyone acts gay and I confess that trope was overused even by the 90s standard and seems a little dated. There's another halt at a farm where he worked as a handy man and given how glad Joan Severance was to see him again we gather he must have been quite handy indeed (Hawn's reactions in that part makes the sequence all worthwhile). And finally there's that night in the motel with an infamous roach landing on Marianne's hair and a climax at the zoo where you know the baddies' funerals won't have open coffins.
Now, I feel that I have to abandon that guilty pleasure zone and start to be a little more critical. First, beyond the personas of the heroes, what I loved is the true chemistry between them, in a scene where the two are trying to resist the temptation of having sex, the dialogue sounds real in a corny way. There's an interesting flashback sequence that reveals a little more depth about Rick. In fact, this is a film that shines from these little touches, like having a mobster birthday party with a man dressed as a pig and carrying a machine-gun, that's the kind of detail that can really hook me to a film.
Now, my main criticism concerns the plot, I figured hard to believe a man of Rick's intelligence never suspected that Baird could be the mole, that he keeps telling him his whereabouts. This is the guy who suspected the breakfast guy in the hotel. Speaking of that, when she said she ordered croissants and prunes, the "waiter" says "some bread and fruit", how didn't that alert them? It is also possible that Hawn overplays the sassy prissy woman and should have had one substantial part in the final triumph. And for the police, they only appear during the first half and disappear without posing any threat for the evil trio. Thinking about it again, how will Rick prove he didn't kill his boss?
Of course these considerations hardly matter ... this is a fun action thriller film emblematic of a time viewers under 30 wouldn't remember, a time of free-spirited and fun-driven mindset that sadly vanished from our screens: the early 90s.