B Plus Movies

In continuation of a week of videos only available on VHS, I’d like to discuss three words that get my interest every time: women with guns. As we near the end of the first decade of the twenty-first century, the bad ass gun toting chick is now a cliche. In earlier times it was an oddity, a role reversal taking the gender almost always put in distress and making them the aggressor, usually with style and deadly beauty. I think the concept has worked well in B movies mostly because it not only challenges an age old stereotype but it offers the possibility of naked boobs.

Take the British import Killing Time.

Like many good titles, Killing Time has a double meaning. The first nuance is characterized in the initial plot establishing moments in the film in which we meet a British cop who wants a mobster dead for killing his partner. He wants it so bad, in fact, that he’s willing to hire a smoking hot Italian hitwoman to do the job even though he has no way to pay her.  It’s time for some killing.

The second meaning comes from the situation that occurs after the hitwoman does her work and the story that takes up most of the movies time. She misses the mobster, but still eliminates a great number of said mobster’s thugs.  Her job done, she retires to a hotel room where she awaits her reward.  There she is targeted by a number of lesser hitmen who have been pressed into service by the cop to take her out so that he doesn’t have to come up with the cash. For most of the movie, she is in a hotel room, killing time.

The movie has lots of flying bullets, some sexy moments with the killer and a little buffoonery to compliment it’s film noir plot line. I found it clever and easy to watch, even bizarre at times. There are a lot of good points to this picture.

Alas, the movie has its issues. The person whose actions causes the most people to be killed is the cop, despite the fact he’s presented as a sympathetic character. Some of the scenes are a little ill paced. The movie also cribs notes off of other crime dramas, so much that its Tarintinoesque and John Wooian touches come off not as homage but imitation.

Killing Time falls solidly in the B slot. It’s not worth buying a VCR to watch, but it’s worth picking up in the dollar bin if you happen to see it.  Killing Time is an entertaining film and perfect way to … well… do I have to say it?

Just don’t expect it to rock your world.

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