Allan C
I remembered this film being better, but I was less impressed rewatching it this time. Having just watched director Abel Ferrara and writer Nicholas St. John’s earlier MS .45, I was expecting something much for exciting and edgy, but FEAR CITY is tame in comparison and seemed as if the two were making a conscious decision to make a more conventional thriller, and a rather tepid thriller at that. Tom Berenger plays an ex-boxer who’s now a “Talent Agent” booking strippers for different gigs, but his life gets complicated when a killer targets his girls. At first, the cops, led by Detective Billy Dee Williams, think this is a gang war and the mob doesn’t like all this police attention. The film could have taken an interesting turn at that point if it channeled Fritz Lang’s M, where the underworld works together to find the killer when the police won’t or can’t, but instead, it’s a lot of cliched plot threads (Berenger is haunted by killing a guy in the ring. He’s also heartbroken over ex-girlfriend Melanie Griffith). Worst of all, there’s hardly any action or suspense, which is not what you want in a thriller. Ferrara does provide some occasional striking images and I did enjoy all location photography of seedy pre-Giuliani NYC, which is a nicely grimy time capsule of a specific time and place. There are also quite a few cool character actors in supporting roles and the film does have a solid climax, featuring boxing versus martial arts, which finally does deliver some action, but the lead-up to that finale isn’t worth it. Below is my review from the last time I watched this in 2011.
4-10-11
Fear City ***
If not for being directed by Abel Ferrara and written by Nicholas St. John, the team behind the excellent "King of New York", I'm not sure I would have taken much note of this film. However, knowing that there were some talented people behind the camera on this film, I did take it a bit more seriously than say the similarly themed "Vice Squad". There is an excellent cast of character actors and also a pre-famous Tom Berenger and Melanie Griffith in lead roles. Jack Scalia however is woefully outclassed by the talented cast around him. The story is a typically lurid Ferrara story, about a serial killer targeting strippers. If a film being described as "lurid" sounds like a good thing to you, you'll probably enjoy this film. If "lurid" makes a film sound cheap and tawdry, then you should probably stay away from this one. And one interesting bit of trivia, the killer is never named in the film and the actor did not receive an on-screen credit. The actor is still unknown to this day.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
07/03/24
Full Review
delysid d
a fun but sleazy watch
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
06/16/21
Full Review
Audience Member
A serial killer and an expert on martial arts is preying on strippers in Manhattan's Times Square in New York. Night after night, he visits smoky strip clubs, waiting for his victims and then randomly slashing and killing them. Matt Rossi (Tom Berenger) is a former boxer trying to escape his past whom is currently employed at a talent agency which caters exotic dancers to mafia-controlled strip clubs all over Manhattan. Matt and his business partner, Nicky Parzeno (Jack Scalia), are relentlessly dogged by Al Wheeler (Billy Dee Williams), a persistent police detective on the case of the murdered strippers, and is hoping to find something to nail both Matt and Nicky on. Matt is trying at the same time to reconcile with his former flame, Loretta (Melanie Griffith), whom also works as a dancer. With the police constantly hounding them, and under pressure from the mob to do something about the killings, Matt must somehow face his inner demons to find the killer before he strikes again...
"Fear City" is a low budget b-movie thriller from Abel Ferrara adding a mix of sex, nudity and violence to portray Times Square in the early 80´s, but at the same time he was most certainly looking for tabloid headlines and shock value to get an audience in the cinemas. The movie was originally made by 20th Century-Fox, but they decided that it had too much nudity, sex, violence and drug references for them, so they sold it to the independent Aquarius Releasing. Compared to Ferrara´s quite disturbing, but much more effective and visual "Ms. 45" (1981), this follow up is pretty disappointing. First of all the antagonist, the so called Karate killer makes no sense in my book. I guess due to the success of several martial arts movies back then, they decided that the killer should use martial arts and some how connect his killings to a cleaning of both himself and the city of New York in an eastern philosophical way. Did it work? No. Despite some ok names in the main roles (Berenger, Williams etc), I hardly believe any of them feel all that happy about their performances in this film. Melanie Griffith has never been a very good actress and "Fear City" doesn´t change that fact. It was however nice to see some old 80´s crushes passing by in the shape of Rae Dawn Chong and María Conchita Alonso. Abel Ferrara is good at showing the sleezy side of NYC and that has partly become his brandmark. But, he is quite uneven as a director, and this is a good example of the downside of his profession. The acting is so so, the dialogue so so, the action pretty ridiculous. But, you get a glimpse of some ok tension/ drama once in a while in the film. Nice to have seen it, but "Fear City" is hardly something you would see twice.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
02/21/23
Full Review
Audience Member
Thriller Fear City follows a psychopathic Grim Reaper killing strippers, and a stripper manager hunting him down. Both the protagonist and the antagonist have background stories. The protagonist was a pro boxer, who's career got cut off. A stupid and cliche background story, which gives the character to much of an invincible feel. The antagonist is a religious nut who's ridding the city of filth, I suppose it's better than just a business rival. This film is sexy galore, the strip club scenes contributed greatly to the film. Whenever the movie was feeling dry the audience can escape to a strip club, which creates a whole new atmosphere. I can appreciate people going to one as an escape now. Well this is until all the good strippers are killed/assaulted/scared for their lives. The kills in this film weren't intense due to how dumb they looked, with a white martial arts master holding nun chucks. The film doesn't have many thrills, but has enough pros to make it somewhat pay off.
Rated 2/5 Stars •
Rated 2 out of 5 stars
01/12/23
Full Review
Audience Member
The script was written with good subplots but it seems to forget how to connect them to the story at hand. See it more for nostalgia of a young Tom Berenger.
For my full review of Fear City (1984), check it out on this IMDB link: http://imdb.com/title/tt0087247/reviews-25
Rated 2.5/5 Stars •
Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars
02/06/23
Full Review
Audience Member
A great cast but feels like wasted potential thanks to a confusing and flawed script.
Rated 3/5 Stars •
Rated 3 out of 5 stars
01/29/23
Full Review
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