Walter Hill
73 connections found
Filmography
The Long Riders 1980 
48 Hrs. 1982 
The Warriors 1979 
The Driver 1978 
Hard Times 1975 
Undisputed 2002 
Bullet to the Head 2012 
Johnny Handsome 1989 
Southern Comfort 1981 
Supernova 2000 
Red Heat 1988 
Dead for a Dollar 2022 
Streets of Fire 1984 
Trespass 1992 
Geronimo: An American Legend 1993 
Last Man Standing 1996 
Wild Bill 1995 
Crossroads 1986 View:
Connections, in both directions
Walter Hill’s 1978 stunner The Driver is a big influence here — hell, the legendary filmmaker makes a vocal cameo at the end as a court room translator — as is what Wright refers to as The Holy Trinity of Nineties L.A. action-crime thrillers: 1991’s Point Break, 1992’s Reservoir Dogs, and 1995’s Heat.
While Baby Driver is undoubtedly influenced by the likes of Heat, Reservoir Dogs, and The Driver–so much so that eagle-eyed fans should keep their eyes peeled for a Walter Hill cameo–the film is the singular product of Wright’s creative vision.
With “Baby Driver,” his first film since 2010’s “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World” set on this side of the Atlantic, Wright pays exuberant pop tribute to pictures like Walter Hill’s 1978 cult favorite, “The Driver,” as well as its ultra-stylish, ultra-violent 2011 descendant, Nicolas Winding Refn’s “Drive.”
Though the screenplay gives him a halfhearted backstory about being with his parents, as a child, when they died in a car crash (and that would make him want to become a driver?), most of his motives remain a blur; given a chance to flee, he hesitates, not because, like Ryan O’Neal in “The Driver,” or Ryan Gosling in “Drive,” he runs in some existential groove of his own devising but because he’s barely a character at all.
And the film takes a smart approach to cameos, too (see: a brief appearance from rappers Big Boi and Killer Mike, a nod to both the film’s musical trappings and its Atlanta setting; and a voiceover cameo from director Walter Hill , whose The Driver is one of the film’s main inspiration points).
Its set-up — Baby (Ansel Elgort), who listens to music so constantly that it’s baked into almost every single scene of his movie, is the best getaway driver in the game but, needless to say, winds up in over his head with a crime lord (Kevin Spacey) — lacks for fussiness à la Walter Hill’s The Driver (an obvious comparison made all the more legitimate by that director’s passing cameo towards film’s end), though Wright et al.’s prowess makes it, for me, a cut above entirely.
He’s an avatar for Stahelski’s homages to classic cinema of the past, from a tribute to Lawrence of Arabia ‘s match cut in the beginning to the close-up of a Black female DJ’s mouth ushering in our final chase, in a nod to Walter Hill’s The Warriors .
Not only are there affectionate tributes and homages to cinema, with references to Buster Keaton (an ongoing in-joke between films), Walter Hill’s The Warriors , Laurel and Hardy’s The Music Box , Mission Impossible and many more, but it traverses between genres.
The chase sequence that ends with human bodies vs. speeding autos in Paris is such a showstopper that you almost don’t care about the velvet-voiced D.J. narrator blurring the line between The Warriors homage and rip-off.
Any movie that begins with a jump cut from “Lawrence of Arabia” and climaxes with an all-out homage to Walter Hill’s 1979 version of a western, “The Warriors” (complete with taunting DJ and distinctive neighborhood goons), is going to win me over.
"Chapter 4" baldly steals inspiration from Walter Hill's "The Warriors" as gangs and gangs of crazy, wannabe assassins pop out of nowhere, all easily dispatched by Wick, who by this time has become invincible, comically falling down an Odessa-Steps-inspired 222-step stone staircase with Inspector Clouseau-like aplomb.
The homage to Walter Hill’s The Warriors (with a D.J. issuing directions to a bounty’s location) is perfectly in keeping with the aesthetic.
The Purge: Anarchy (2014)
Directed by James DeMonaco
influenced by The Warriors (1979)
Music Plot Themes
As the motley, bickering quintet traverses the dark and deadly streets, trying to survive against ridiculous odds, some old-school synth music helps create a brooding B-movie vibe reminiscent of The Warriors and Escape From New York, but unfortunately it doesn’t last long.
That might remind some viewers of similar films such as Walter Hill's "The Warriors" where a small group of characters must make their way across a city at night and avoid or fight off those who wish to do them harm.
Writer/director DeMonaco returns to the series with the burden of exposition already eliminated, allowing him to treat downtown L.A. as a cruel playground where every intersection brings with it the promise of a new threat: Sergeant and company run afoul of white-collar poachers, territorial snipers, and mask-wearing gangs, who bring to mind The Warriors.
By adding a variety of bad guys here, DeMonaco gives The Purge: Anarchy a bit of The Punisher meets The Warriors vibe, which is something I instantaneously fell in love with.
In fact, we'd advise against it because The Purge: Anarchy stands firm on its own two feet and has more in common with classics like The Warriors (including an auditory homage to the classic Barry De Vorzon score during a key chase sequence) and Escape From New York than it does with the Ethan Hawke and Lena Headey starring snoozer.
Now The Purge: Anarchy employs the same concept as wallpaper for an action-thriller that swipes alternately from The Warriors and Escape from New York but lacks the style of either.
Drive (2011)
Directed by Nicolas Winding Refn
influenced by The Driver (1978), Hard Times (1975), The Long Riders (1980), The Warriors (1979), Undisputed (2002)
Plot Characters
A surprisingly high fraction of “Drive” is indebted to “The Driver,” Walter Hill’s whittled-down thriller of 1978.
The most obvious reference is Walter Hill's schematic action flick The Driver: This 1978 paean to professional cool in the person of Ryan O'Neal more or less provides Drive's title, premise, uninflected antihero, and minimalist existentialism, as well as its two-dimensional attitude.
Walter Hill, a fine writer-director who knows a thing or 12 about helming testosterone-tinged flicks with an existential bent about them (Hard Times, The Warriors, The Long Riders, Undisputed, many more), once orchestrated a solid little film in this milieu called The Driver.
Ryan Gosling stars as the film’s never-named protagonist (shades of the similarly nameless heroes of “Two-Lane Blacktop” and “The Driver”), who works by day as a mechanic and occasional Hollywood stunt driver, and sometimes by night as a fast and furious getway-car driver for thieves.
In fact, I can readily imagine a rabid cult following coalescing around Drive, which looked at a distance like a contemporary remake of Walter Hill’s The Driver (it’s actually based on a recent novel by James Sallis) but turns out to play more like a hypothetical remake of The Driver from ca. 1984-87.
Walter Hill, a fine writer-director who knows a thing or 12 about helming testosterone-tinged flicks with an existential bent about them (Hard Times, The Warriors, The Long Riders, Undisputed, many more), once orchestrated a solid little film in this milieu called The Driver.
The movie borrows plenty from its betters, including Spaghetti Westerns (the climax occurs in a desert near Bakersfield), Walter Hill's "The Driver" and "Kill Bill" (one scene finds the hit man's blond babe fiancée firing off rounds while still wearing her slit-up-to-there wedding dress).
The nickname itself is a reference, to "The Driver," a cult pulp film of the '70s.
What it was at the time was, ironically, a more realistic take on gangs compared to the likes of 1961’s West Side Story, a simplistic narrative with a narrow focus told in the vein of a comic book or pulp novel.
But in spite of the film taking a more West Side Story approach to depicting gang violence as opposed to Gangs Of New York , there is something compelling about these urban kids not just engaging in a fight for their survival but the inherent tragedy when it appears that not all of them will make it.
"Clockwork Orange and West Side Story," he states succinctly.
Già segnalatosi negli anni precedenti con L’eroe della Strada e Driver l’imprendibile , di essenziale eleganza formale in quel loro disegno rigorosamente deterministico di personaggi dalla «vita violenta», il regista giungeva infine nel 1979 alla sua opera più compiuta e più matura, senza nulla perdere di quella sua strenua riflessione sulla violenza, qui emblematizzata in moduli narrativi che ora assumono il ritmo e i toni di un drammatico musical (quasi un aggiornato West Side Story , per intenderci), ora le asprezze realistiche di un torvo scorcio di ‘notti brave’ (completamente estraneo peraltro alla compiaciuta ambiguità dell’ Arancia meccanica di Stanley Kubrick).
Sergio Leone borrowed the plot for "A Fistful of Dollars," the spaghetti Western that launched Clint Eastwood.
In fact, he adapted the film from "Yojimbo," the Akira Kurosawa samurai-for-hire classic that was remade once before as "A Fistful of Dollars" with Clint Eastwood.
In 1964 Sergio Leone relied on elements from Hammett and Kurosawa for his Spaghetti Western "A Fistful of Dollars."
In “The Heat,” Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy put a feminine spin on the buddy copy film, a male-dominated sub-genre made popular by movies like “48 Hours” and “Bad Boys.”
Bullock and/or McCarthy are in every scene, driving the film in the way that Nick Nolte & Eddie Murphy drove “48 Hours” or Charles Grodin & Robert DeNiro drove “Midnight Run.”
They’re as tough as any male pairing of the genre — Gibson and Glover in “Lethal Weapon,” Murphy and Nolte in “48 Hours” — but they bring a strong “girlfriends” feeling to the table.
“48 Hours” blended the kind of rapid-fire jokes, serious shootouts, and blatant disregard for “by the book” police work that’s since become a trademark of such movies.
“Fighting” has a hook perfectly timed for the new Great Depression and recalls such previous films as “Hard Times” (1975) and “Every Which Way But Loose” (1979).
John Wick: Chapter 3 - Parabellum (2019)
Directed by Chad Stahelski
influenced by The Warriors (1979)
Visuals Plot
And for those of us old enough to remember, there are scenes where you can see where director Chad Stahelski pulls from cult films like the 1979 classic, The Warriors when John is being chased throughout New York City.
The opening fight sequence is by far the best and most frenetic the film has to offer, as Wick scrambles for safety across Manhattan while countless gangs of assassins spill out of the woodwork in pursuit; it’s like watching a hyper-caffeinated version of “The Warriors” played at triple speed.
Speaking of 80s action classics (or late 70s in this case), Parabellum excitedly lifts structural cues from The Warriors and Assault On Precinct 13 .
At one point, John runs from the countless bands of thugs after him—each dressed thematically, as if New York is divided amongst The Warriors-esque assassin cliques—leading (in this case) a group of vaguely English dandies into a horse barn, where, upon activating his environment, has two different horses kick two different men to death, their skulls collapsing like deflated souffles.
The kids invoke Deliverance by name at one point, but in its stripped down narrative thrust and its level of sustained suspense, the film it most vividly recalls is Walter Hill�s masterful bayou thriller Southern Comfort.
The Hitman's Bodyguard (2017)
Directed by Patrick Hughes
influenced by 48 Hrs. (1982)
Plot Characters
Depending on the scene, The Hitman's Bodyguard plays like an homage to and parody of '80s bromantic mayhem, like 48 Hrs. with a shorter deadline.
Nick Nolte and Eddie Murphy had chemistry in “48 Hours”.
Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L Jackson team up as a pair of bickering, sharp-shooting, hard-punching action partners in a movie that replicates, step by formulaic step, the familiar and now oddly dated template of the inter-racial buddy movies of the Eighties (think 48 Hours or Lethal Weapon).
Wright taps into a lineage of action filmmaking oriented around moral relativists through Baby, whose rationale that he’s only a passive driver in these criminal schemes (along with his refusal to carry a gun) recalls Drive , which recalls Walter Hill’s The Driver , which recalls Jean-Pierre Melville’s Le Samouraï , and so on.
Since time immemorial, or at least since 1978’s “The Driver,” getaway drivers in the movies have been portrayed one way — stoic, silent, professional, guys with a “code.”
Wheelman probably works better as a technical exercise than the white-knuckle thriller it aspires to be, but those eager to watch another The Driver (or, surprisingly, Locke) will find much to admire in Jeremy Rush’s debut as a writer-director.
Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Directed by Cathy Yan
influenced by The Warriors (1979)
Visuals
Decked out like a member of a roller-derby-themed girl gang from the cult classic, “The Warriors” (one of many films “Birds” references), Harley begins the picture by breaking up with The Joker – or “Mr.
There are visual and stylistic nods to films ranging from “The Warriors” to “Kill Bill.”
Well, Kurosawa has inspired other good American movies (his “Seven Samurai” was remade as “The Magnificent Seven,” and “Yojimbo” also loosely inspired “A Fistful of Dollars”), but here the attempt to move the story from Japan to Texas seems pointless, because the movie made from it isn't Kurosawa, or a Western, or a gangster movie, or anything else other than a mannered, juiceless, excruciatingly repetitive exercise in style.
Jimmy “Bobo” Bonomo (Stallone) has borrowed his “code” from the anti-hero of John Woo’s “The Killer” – “No women, no kids.”
On peut retrouver plusieurs éléments utilisés pour ces films dans ses films hong-kongais comme Bullet to the Head et les deux A Better Tomorrow, mais surtout dans The Killer , qui propulsera sa carrière sur la scène internationale.
The buddy cop thing was pioneered by Eddie Murphy and Nick Nolte in 48 Hours, and then aped endlessly for 20 years.
What emerges is a lean, surprisingly artful programmer, closer in spirit to something like Don Siegel's Riot in Cell Block 11 than to typical boxing fare.
Gangs of New York (2002)
Directed by Martin Scorsese
influenced by The Warriors (1979)
Visuals Themes
The colorful gangs, armed with whimsical makeshift knobby cudgels, edged weapons, filed teeth, and spiked footwear (no firearms), bear names from the Asbury source the Plug Uglies, the Shirt Tails, the Bowery Boys but wear costumes reminiscent of Walter Hills The Warriors.
But in spite of the film taking a more West Side Story approach to depicting gang violence as opposed to Gangs Of New York , there is something compelling about these urban kids not just engaging in a fight for their survival but the inherent tragedy when it appears that not all of them will make it.