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Greetings, and welcome to VIEWING THE CLASSICS. Here you'll find capsule reviews of vintage movies from the early days of cinema through the 1970s, with a special emphasis on sci-fi, horror, and mystery movies. Be sure to check out the Pages links, where you can find a Film Index of all my reviews, links to the reviews organized by cast members, directors, and other contributors, and links to my reviews of the films of talented young director Joshua Kennedy.

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Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Targets (1968)

Starring Boris Karloff, Tim O'Kelly, Arthur Peterson, Monty Landis, Nancy Hsueh
Directed by Peter Bogdanovich
(actor & director credits courtesy IMDB.com)

While an aging horror film star plans his retirement, an unbalanced young man prepares to perpetrate a real life horror story with an arsenal of guns he's acquired.

Per IMDB, this was the powerful debut feature for director Bogdanovich, and it offers a choice role to Karloff late in his career, essentially playing himself in a deft juxtaposition of his classic monster of the past with a senseless monster of the present day in the sniper killer played by O'Kelly.  Fans of Karloff, as I am, will relish his kindly demeanor, some amusing scenes he plays with Bogdanovich, portraying a screenwriter, and Hsueh, as his lovely secretary, and his determined showdown with O'Kelly at the movie's climax.  This was not to be Karloff's last film, but it's a fitting coda to his remarkable career.

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