When screenwriters Alan Trustman and David M. Wolf set out to write Hit!, they originally had Steve McQueen in mind for the role of the main protagonist, but ended up with Billy Dee Williams, after director Sidney J. Furie (Palme d'Or nominee and BAFTA winner for best British movie—The Ipcress File) joined the project. Billy Dee was the right choice after all, with his portrayal of Nick Allen garnering sympathy from the viewers. He transformed himself into a father devastated by the death of his daughter from a heroin overdose and a man ready to do everything he can so that nobody else feels the pain he felt when he buried his child.
When Allen, a federal agent, suggests to his boss that they should “hit” the leaders of the heroin organization, he gets shot down. But that does not stop him from putting together a group of misfits, all of whom have a very specific set of skills. He trains them for an operation that will destroy the entire heroin trafficking ring once and for all. Furie conducts the cast expertly, giving each member of the team enough time to shine and stay in the viewer’s mind, Richard Pryor in particular. Enriched with a score by Lalo Schifrin, the two hours and fourteen minutes fly by rather quickly.
In 1972 a neophyte Spanish media company created a rare platform for artists to explore classic genre imagery with a sophisticated cinematic sensibility.
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Illustrator Brooks Wilson is an artist who has hit a wall with his career. While trying to move past it and acquire new projects to work on, he is also...
