Busting (1974)

Studio: MGM
Theatrical Release: Feb. 24th, 1974
DVD-R Release: Jan. 3rd, 2012
Rating: R
Review by Craig Sorensen


Vice detectives Michael Keneely (Elliott Gould of The Muppet Movie) and Patrick Farrel (Robert Blake of Our Gang) don’t play by the rules, like most movie cops.  Tired of busting prostitutes and pimps only to have them end up back on the street in the morning, the two cops decide to turn their attention to head man Carl Rizzo (Allen Garfield of Orgy Girls ’69).  Unfortunately for them Rizzo has the legal system wrapped around his little finger.

Busting is the kind of ‘counter-culture’ establishment movie that was very prevalent during the 70’s after the success of M*A*S*H.  I don’t know what it is about watching people who seem to have nothing but contempt for their jobs and the system that they work in, yet put their life on the line.  I guess there’s a bit of wish fulfillment there (I know there are a few people at work I’d like to call assholes and yet still keep my job).  Where as most films like this seem to revel in sending up the stiffness and uptightness of ‘the establishment’ with their character’s devil-may-care attitude, Busting takes a darker tact.  Nothing that the characters do in this film will ever matter.  All of the people they bust are out on the streets in no time and their bosses are all working for Rizzo the gangster.  Any time they make headway in their case they get chastised by their bosses and given busy work to keep them out of the way (for some reason always involving homosexuals).  They’re just a couple of guys fighting the system, only in this case, the system wins.  It lends a slightly depressing edge to the film.  So Busting does seem to come up a bit short in the comedy department.  That might not be much of a problem though as it does deliver a few good action set-pieces.  There is a foot chase scene in the middle of the film that is shot with long take tracking shots that works really well.  This leads into a pretty suspenseful grocery store shoot-out.

It’s probably not a coincidence that Elliot Gould stars in both this and M*A*S*H (and S*P*Y*S for that matter).  And he plays the role well so I can’t find fault with his casting.  Gould does most of the heavy lifting in the film though.  I don’t dislike Robert Blake, he just seems so low key in this.  It feels like there should be someone at least on par with Gould.  I can’t help but imagine what this would feel like with Donald Sutherland in the Patrick Farrel role (too busy making Dan Candy’s Law?).  I guess you kind of get used to him in the course of the film.  Allen Garfield is appropriately sleazy as the villain Carl Rizzo.  You also get a small part for Sid Haig and Antonio Fargas (Huggy Bear himself) playing a homosexual.  I guess you’ll have to decide for yourself whether or not that’s a selling point.

MGM’s DVD-R of Busting looks pretty good to me.  The film was shot with a lot of soft focus so it’s not the most sharp looking film but I imagine this is pretty close to how it looked in theaters.  Sometimes the color timing seems to fluctuate between cuts, most notably during the gay bar raid scene.  The bar is supposed to be lit with red lights but it seems to switch from red to orange to magenta anytime there is a cut.  This may very well be how the film looks though.  I’m willing to give MGM the benefit of the the doubt as I’ve been pretty happy with how the transfers on these made-on-demand discs have looked.  Again, like all the other MGM Limited Edition Collection films, the only extra you get is the trailer.  And you should be happy that you get that I guess as some of these you don’t even get that much.