HARLEY DAVIDSON AND THE MARLBORO MAN

US, 1991, 99 minutes, Colour.
Mickey Rourke, Don Johnson, Chelsea Field, Daniel Baldwin, Giancarlo Esposito, Tom Sizemore.
Directed by Simon Wincer.

Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man was written by actor Don Michael Paul and directed by Australian Simon Wincer (Phar Lap, The Lighthorsemen, Daryl, and Emmy winner for Lonesome Dove). Mickey Rourke and Don Johnson rely on their screen images and play a pair of middle-aged searchers, Rourke on his Harley-Davidson?, Johnson with his unlit, until the end, Marlboro cigarette. The setting is Los Angeles and Las Vegas 1996 - and an unattractive world it is.

Big companies are run by drug bosses. Bars which are noisy and raucous but nevertheless homely are under threat and owners to be evicted by the banks and companies. The two engineer an armoured car robbery and find that instead of money to pay off the banks, they have taken great amounts of a new drug. Thugs in long black overcoats (echoes of The Good, the Bad and the Ugly westerns) pursue them and there are shootings and shoot-outs.

The film is violent, crass and macho in its stances. Rourke ambles his way through the film, though Don Johnson gives a performance. Of interest for diehard action fans.

1.Road movie, male bonding in the United States, macho action?

2.The world of 1996, California and Nevada, Los Angeles and Las Vegas? Similarities and differences, squalor? The title, the focus on the heroes, the bikes and cigarettes?

4.The macho world, action, searching for self, machines? Male bonding? The role of women, relationships? The sense of right, loyalties, action?

5.Harley and his life, background, fights? The bar brawls? On his bike? Friendship with the Marlboro Man? Their going back into the past? In Las Vegas, the bar, going to Los Angeles? Their old friend and his bar, their other associates? Life in the bar, drinking, the singing, the exotic dancing? The eviction and their decision to rob the guarded van? The set-up, the detours, successful operation? Discovery that they had drugs instead of money? The decision to confront the boss, going into the big building? His outwitting them? Sending his overcoated thugs? Their going to Las Vegas - and the irony of having the tracking device with them? Their eluding pursuit? The confrontation and the shoot-out with the hulks of the planes? The separation of the men - Harley turning up? His search for self, avenging his friends - and the girl who wants to go nowhere and is riding off into the sunset?

6.The Marlboro Man, Robert? Don Johnson's style? Life and background, his searching, unable to settle down, the unlit cigarette? The bar brawls? The bond with Harley? The pursuit by the policewoman - and it being his girlfriend? Their relationship, her wanting permanence, his inability to commit himself? The robbery, the confrontation with the boss? Las Vegas and their being tracked? The chase, separating? The final shoot-out? Their going to the building - and the businessmen, their having paid the helicopter pilot to be on their side, the shoot-out - and the executive clinging to Robert's boot, the heritage from his father - and falling to his death?

7.The bar, its owner, the 40 years, the friends, the style in the bar, their being evicted? The patrons? The staging of the robbery, the deaths of their associates - and the massacre in the bar?

8.The executive, his work in the bank, peddling drugs? The new designer drugs? The drivers of the van and their being held up? The thugs and the western-style shooting? The final confrontation with the main thug, his being outwitted - and the comedy with Harley's inability to shoot?

9.Robert's girlfriend, the policewoman, the ride and the chase? Their relationship, her new boyfriend, his going to her - and the possibility of a future together?

10.Stunts and action - the leap from the high building into the swimming pool? The shooting - and Harley's inability? Violence, macho action, the heroes on the side of right?