Killing Machine
Killing Machine
| 10 May 1984 (USA)
Killing Machine Trailers

After a gang of thugs brands a hard working truck driver a traitor and murders his bride, He retaliates by being even more violent than his attackers.

Reviews
BelSports This is a coming of age storyline that you've seen in one form or another for decades. It takes a truly unique voice to make yet another one worth watching.
Marva It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,
Lela The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.
Edwin The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.
bkoganbing Watching this film Killing Machine Americans Margaux Hemingway, Richard Jaeckel and Willie Aames looked so jarringly out of place among the Spaniards and other European types in this Spanish produced film, you have to figure that they did this one for the paycheck and the European trip. Hope the checks cleared for them.Jorge Rivero of the Mexican cinema and best know to American audiences as Pierre Cardona from the John Wayne western Rio Lobo is our protagonist. A former terrorist he's settled down to the simple life of a truckdriver in Spain. He has a California kid brother-in-law in Willie Aames and a pregnant wife in Ana Obregon. Rivero gets involved in a dispute between Spanish and French truck farmers and his wife is killed. After that he's a Killing Machine and he sure has the expertise.Lee Van Cleef is the organized crime figure head of the union. He never looks out of place because he's the same smirking, sardonic Van Cleef we know from a gazillion American and spaghetti westerns. He knows it's a turkey, but gobble he doesn't.I doubt the film will get the restoration it needs. The sound is terrible, the acting is phoned in performances, and the direction most pedantic. Sounds like these truck farmers were peddling some spoiled fruit.
Leofwine_draca KILLING MACHINE is a low budget thriller made as a Spanish/Mexican co-production. It's about an everyday trucker who runs foul of the usual mafia types and suffers the murder of his wife in a burning truck as a result. What follows is a mix of cameos from aged actors (Richard Jaeckel, Aldo Sambrell, Willie Aames) alongside local talent (Frank Brana and Hugo Stiglitz), some gritty action sequences, political subtext, and the usual dubbed performances. The hero of this one is Jorge Rivero, once a muscular beefcake star of the 1970s, now decidedly middle-aged.I actually found KILLING MACHINE better than expect given the resources available. The opening part is slow but keeps you watching, while the action hits hard throughout and there's little sentiment or wishy-washy stuff. Lee Van Cleef plays a lawyer but brings a suitable air of menace to his part. The main problem with it is the lack of availability of a decent print; as it stands it's fuzzy throughout and would benefit from improvement. It's hardly the kind of film you'd want to go to the effort of watching again, but it does the job well enough for a one-off viewing.
phibes012000 What can I say? First of all no stars for this turkey. I saw Killing Machine on one of those old '80s videocassette deals hosted by Sybil Danning. She is actually the best thing about the program, because the movie stinks big time! It is billed on the video box to star Lee Van Cleef, Richard Jaeckel, Willie Aames, and Margaux Hemingway. They are more like guest stars, because the real star is some Spanish bum that I've never seen before and never want to see again. Its supposed to be about a truck driver that is attacked by French unionists: they kill his wife, and he goes after them. It is never fully explained why the unionists are angry at the truck drivers other than the fact that they carry fruit that is evil (I guess...like I said...It is never explained). Lee Van Cleef plays a lawyer (!) that covers things up for the union. There's an interesting scene that is supposed to be in a courtroom, but it looks like the scene was shot in a cheap conference room in some warehouse. Cleef was very old here, so the idea of him being some kind of tough guy is demolished by his aged appearance. Hemingway looks astonishingly bad, and her acting reflects her awful appearance. Richard Jaeckel (mispelled?) makes the worst performance by William Shatner look good, and Willie Aames is annoying as always. Aames had passed over his teenage good looks, so there isn't even anything good to look at. I heard later that he bottomed out on drugs and converted to Christianity (no small favor for movies...stay out, Willie!) PLEASE SKIP THIS TRASH! UPDATE 08/04/05: I originally voted this the worst film I saw in 2005, but then I saw High Tension and changed my mind.
NIKOS SONIC (1966nm) A profesional hit-man has started a new life as a track driver in Spain. In a travel to France, carrying oranges, escorted by his lovely wife, he will run into a lot of problems, because of the local mafia that is trying to control the market of fruits. He will try to stay away from trouble, but his beloved wife, by mistake, will find a horrible death, trapped inside the truck, when They will put fire in it. After this, he is simply forced to return back to his old ways, find through his old contacts all the guns and information that he needs and then kill each and everyone of the bad guys. Simple film, with ordinary plot and flat characters, for entertainment without any expectations. For those who like this kind, not so bad for rent and see in the video.