Protraph Lack of good storyline.

Acensbart Excellent but underrated film

Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Marva-nova Amazing worth wacthing. So good. Biased but well made with many good points.

NateWatchesCoolMovies Mark L. Lester's Night Of The Running Man, not to be confused with the Schwarzenegger classic of a similar moniker, is a mean spirited little urban thriller with Scott Glenn in one of his primo amped up psychopath roles. In the spirit of Scorsese's After Hours, a hapless cab driver (Andrew Mcarthy) finds himself being hunted through the Las Vegas nightscape after one of his fates is murdered right in front of him, but not before leaving behind a suitcase full of millions. The hot man called in to pursue the funds is David Eckert (Glenn), a sociopathic monster with a heavy artillery, bent on retrieving the case and killing as many people along the way. One is reminded of the cult flick Judgment Night as the poor cabbie is forced to run all willy billy through the urban hustle, constantly evading Glenn's lunatic presence. Further villainy is provided, albeit of the more hammy variety, by a scene stealing John Glover as an associate of Eckert's who also casts his net to catch McCarthy, his scenes are so arch and bizarre that they almost swerve the thing into slapstick comedy territory. You can do way worse in budget B movie land, and this one clearly seeks to entertain with it's broad characteristics and blatantly trashy tone. Plus, Glenn is, quite literally, killer good.

merklekranz "Night of the Running Man" opens with a real "grabber" of an opening, as likable cab driver (Andrew McCarthy) unintentionally gets involved with a fare who has a bag of money stolen from the mob. When the bag guy is killed, McCarthy decides to run with the bag. Enter Scott Glenn as an arrogant "fixer', who is sent by the head boss (Wayne Newton) to retrieve the million dollars and eliminate the cab driver. Glenn is excellent as the somewhat paranoid, darkly sadistic, methodical hunter. Along the way, John Glover becomes a colorful accomplice of Glenn's. This film has excellent character development, a compelling story, a sympathetic hero, and is unpredictable. Highly recommended. - MERK

Raymond Pay TV movie channels seem to be on a recession with the rest of the world and the schedules have lately been filled with rather unknown movies with somewhat known actors, this movie being a prime example. I don't actually mind and I try to catch as many of them as new movies aren't often any better. Every geek who grew up in the 80's knows Andrew McCarthy (who was not in The Breakfast Club btw, as another reviewer said), Scott Glenn is even today in every other movie and the director had a couple of hits in the 80's, so somewhat promising setup.The plot itself is pretty good in all it's simplicity, you have a hit-man chasing a cab driver who took the opportunity to get rich with money which is not his. The chase is on and the scenery changes with a rather nice pace.What doesn't really work, is the leading man McCarthy. I'd say he's just too weary and pathetic and you don't really get a hold of his character. The movie could've benefited from someone a bit more gutsy and charismatic as the lead. At times it feels as if McCarthy and Scott Glenn are in two separate movies, McCarthy in a low budget TV movie and Glenn doing a real movie.As of writing this, I realised it's not even that old a movie. It kind of feels like a movie that was made in the 80's, but it's post-Pulp Fiction afterall. The movie probably just surfaced too late, it might've been more successful in the 80's when you didn't expect thrillers to be bigger than life with a lot of twists and turns. Night of the Running Man is very straightforward stuff.

chasfenwick About once a year I check to see if this flick is scheduled for release on DVD. It still isn't (Jan 05).I only have about 30 titles that I own on DVD, but I would definitely purchase this one. It has some very memorable scenes (yes, some are quite graphic and gruesome, but I wouldn't call it "gratuitous" violence). I'd say it is a decent production in every way, but for some reason it seems to be treated as a very obscure movie.Actually, I had to go to a movie buff message board to find the title, which I had forgotten. But it didn't take much of a description for a true movie buff to recognize what movie this is!!!