Riding with Death is a slapdash conglomeration of two episodes from the short lived NBC series Gemini Man. The central character of Gemini Man was Sam Casey, a secret agent slash big rig driver who gained the power to become invisible via an accident. His agency, INTERSECT, provided him with a wrist watch, or "DNA stabilizer," that allows him to turn his powers of invisibility on and off at will. However, there's a catch: if he is invisible for more than 15 minutes a day he will permanently stay that way. So, that's the set-up for the show. How does the movie fare? Poorly. Casey's condition is explained through an expository text dump at the very beginning. The first half of the film has Casey unwittingly transporting a highly volatile and explosive compound along the California coastline. The scene where his brakes go out and he has to enlist the help of a fellow big rig driver named Buffalo Bill to stop him was enjoyable in its own right. But once that action is over, the film hurriedly transitions to the next plot: Casey having to save Buffalo Bill (now a racecar driver) from a villain who wants to kill him. This second half isn't as focused as the first. Also, it tries to overdub an actress who played Casey's girlfriend in the first half (who had left the cast by the time the latter episode was filmed) into the second. Both halves of the film feature extremely saturated television cinematography which was popular during the 60s and 70s. This method of filming resulted in everything that appeared onscreen seem washed out. How appropriate for a clumsy movie about a washed out show.
5/10
I hear ya on the saturated look. I didn't know anything about it coming in and was able to deduce that it was a failed 70s TV show/pilot. And as that its not terrible, just doesn't feel like a movie.
ReplyDeleteI think I might be interested in tracking down a copy of the original television series that this was pieced together from. It was a terrible movie...but those episodes were interesting in their own way.
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