Fred ‘The Hammer’ Williamson films are so macho and testosterone filled that merely watching them will probably make your balls grow by two sizes. After blaxploitation fell out of fashion in the States, Williamson simply took his act on the road, with Italy being especially responsive to his talents. Perhaps because it got left behind in the VHS era and as far as I can tell never made it to DVD or Blu, The Messenger tends to get overlooked in favour of the Black Cobra series or his post-apocalyptic movies, when it comes to talking about Fred’s ‘eye-talian’ period.
Beginning as unsubtly as it means to go on –with the film’s title playing over a freeze frame of the back of someone’s head being blown off- The Messenger stars Williamson as Jake Sebastian Turner, a world famous jewel thief who has just been released from prison in Italy. A man of many talents, as well as a jewel thief, Turner is also a Vietnam veteran, a weapons expert, a green beret and a music prodigy. Given these skills its little wonder that Italian high society is soon fawning over Turner, with an Italian sexpot unable to control herself and having to flash her breasts at Turner, while a Eurotrash guy is similarity awestruck, referring to him as “THE LEGENDARY Jake Sebastian Turner”.
Starring, directed by, co-produced, and based on a story by Fred Williamson, The Messenger makes no bones about being a vanity vehicle with Williamson donning a tux, giving himself a sex scene, showing off a few dance moves and delivering an anti-drug sermon (“you can’t make babies with this stuff running through your system”) all within the first ten minutes of the film. Unfortunately Turner also rivals Charles Bronson’s character in the Death Wish series when it comes to being a living, breathing bad luck charm to others. Any woman who gets close to him predictably gets raped and/or murdered a few scenes later. No soon as Turner befriends young Italian beauty Nicole, then she is being sexually assaulted by two drug dealers, then gets sexually assaulted again this time by her sadistic uncle. Turner’s wife Sabrina fares little better. Having become a high class prostitute with an expensive cocaine habit while Turner was in jail, Sabrina gets machine gunned down by vengeful Mafiosi after ripping them off over a cocaine deal. Crude, below the belt dialogue includes a Mafioso speculating that Sabrina may have hid the missing coke “up her nose, up her cunt, how do I know”, while Turner delivers this touching eulogy to his recently deceased spouse “for once a month for three years she dragged her butt out to prison, now that means more to me than whose fly she unzipped, or whose dick she sucked”.
The Messenger suggests Williamson may have gotten a heads up over the (then) upcoming Death Wish IV: The Crackdown and thought that if that film’s storyline was good enough for Bronson, it was good enough for him too. In an echo of the Death Wish IV plot, Turner is befriended by a rich man who has lost a family member to drugs, and offers to finance Turner’s one man war on the drugs trade. After a shaky start during the film’s Italian set opening, The Messenger improves considerably once the action relocates to America, with Turner going on a nationwide tour of vigilantism. One that takes him from the impoverished backstreets of Chicago, to the tacky glitz of Las Vegas, and with a few stop overs in Hollywood too. As with Death Wish IV, the plot is little more than an excuse for a series of anti-drug set pieces, with Turner initially gunning for street level dealers before moving up the chain and pitting rival drug cartels against each other.
As if The Messenger wasn’t already stepping on Cannon’s shoes enough, thanks to the Death Wish IV similarities, the UK Video distributor added insult to injury by releasing the film as Messenger of Death, which just so happened to be the title of another upcoming Cannon/Bronson film as well. Since both The Messenger and Death Wish IV were shot at roughly the same time, it is difficult to say who ripped off who, or whether the similarities between the two (both films feature the same ‘twist’ about their hero’s rich enabler) were just one of life’s strange coincidences.
What slim storyline there is between action set pieces in The Messenger seems to have doubled as an excuse for Williamson to put other hard working, B-movie veterans on the payroll. Christopher Connelly plays a tough FBI agent whose sneaking admiration of Turner brings him into conflict with a ball busting police captain, played by an especially sweary Cameron Mitchell, who as per usual seems in constant danger of drowning in his own cigar smoke. Best of all is Joe Spinell who is his reliably super-sleazy self as Mafia bigwig Rico, squeezed into a variety of Tom Jones castoff Las Vegas shirts and at one point seen partying with a pair of butt naked hookers. Watching Connelly, Mitchell and Spinell share a scene –and trade insults- is an exploitation movie dream come true, with the added poignancy of knowing that neither Connelly or Spinell were long for this world. Spinell actually looks fairly healthy here (well as healthy as Joe Spinell could look) and seems to be having a ball in the role, yet ironically it was Mitchell –who appears in worse shape of all three- who had a few more years of chain smoking his way through B-Movies left in him.
The Messenger never lets you forget though that it’s all about Fred…Fred looking cool smoking cigars…Fred looking cool blowing away the bad guys…Fred looking cool walking away from burning vehicles. The Messenger gives you the spectacle of a blaxploitation icon basking in all his badass glory, while the soundtrack piles on the praise “you know he’s coming for you…come on babe…listen to the messenger”. Williamson’s ego might be bigger than any wall his pal Trump will ever build, but give him a stage and a suitcase full of Lira and the guy sure can entertain, as the VHS box sez ‘he always delivers’.
Note how ‘of
death’ is awkwardly added on, every time the film’s name is mentioned in the
trailer.
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