Kansas City Bomber | | Cast : | Raquel Welch | | Director : | Jerrold Freedman | | Studio : | Warner Home Video | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen | | Released Date : | August 02, 1972 | | DVD Released Date : | May 31, 2005 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), English (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), French (Subtitled) | | Audience Rating : | PG (Parental Guidance Suggested) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | August 13, 2005 | | Summary | This is Raquel's "Raging Bull"!! | Content
 | It's probably too easy to dismiss this movie as a scrappy, dated foray in 1970's sludge, but in '72 it was considered highly unusual and intriguing for a celebrity diva like Raquel Welch to appear in a roller derby drama, and the film was a pretty big hit and generated lots of publicity(Welch even made the cover of LIFE magazine, wearing her No. 11 jersey). I liked the deep-in-thought driving montage of Welch on her way to see her kids(with super-cool jazz music by Don Ellis)and I loved the skating-on-the-street scene with KC and her daughter(wow! Jodie Foster). The track sequences deliver exactly what we want: hard-driving action with some good editing and camera angles, and the satiric behind-the-scenes bits are quite funny(one little old lady spends all her money on roller games). The romantic melodrama with team owner Kevin McCarthy is draggy, but it's interesting how the other skaters react and make Welch the outcast, leading her to fight for self-respect and dignity on the track. The stunt doubles are obvious, and the film isn't a big-budget offering, but it is highly entertaining and has some great moments. Aside from "Hannie Caulder", it gives Raquel her best starring vehicle. |
| Rating | | | Date | July 08, 2005 | | Summary | Review for Kansas City Bomber | Content
| I remembered this movie as being better than it is. the filming is very unprofessional. It looks like a home video. The rollerskating scenes are still good though. |
| Rating | | | Date | July 03, 2005 | | Summary | Should be shown in film schools.... | Content
| OK, this may not be the most popular review for fans of this 1972 Raquel flick, so fans, take a big breath and try to hear the opposite side of the coin here before hitting that big "not helpful" button. I literally had to come out of "Amazon-review retirement" after watching this one (which took two nights to finish). Wow, does this film stink to high heaven. Sorry, fans, but there's a reason why MGM never put this total DUD out on VHS for 30 years. And, thankfully now, for all us cult film fanatics, Warners (who now owns the film) has decided to grace us with this first-ever homevideo DVD release! Oh joy!
The concept is great. RAQUEL WELCH - 60's sultry superstar goddess as a roller-derby queen. How could this fail? Or, even less, how could this at least not be entertaining in a bad sort of way? Well, folks, this film defies all logic and delivers ineptitude, drudgery and tedium all the way. It's flatly directed as if it were a stage play. Long flat takes - set the camera up in one position, shoot the whole scene in one take, don't cut away to any close-ups - just get it all on film quick! And we're not talking cinema verite style here, we're talking bland, dull, flat tedium. Those are the "drama" segments (the parts where Raquel, Kevin McCarthy, Jodie Foster-in it for about one-minute- and some of the other one-dimensional characters interact with each other). The action sequences have a little bit of editing going on and almost come alive in a few sparse moments through the over-padded running time (why is this thing 99 minutes long??). But even the action stuff is so flatly shot and cut together that there's no suspense or excitement to any of it. It's bad when the best parts of the whole film are quick cutaways to weird looking audience members hooting and hollering during the competition sequences. Show me one of THOSE character's stories instead!
Who is at fault here? Well, the so-called "screenplay" is practically non-existant. But, so what, exploitation films have gotten away with worse sins than that! The key failure of this thing is the totally pedestrian direction of every scene, every moment, every single thing about it. Shots go on forever with no cuts, quite a few scenes are jarringly out-of-focus(!!!), the acting and performances are all flat (I would never think I would call the beautiful Raquel Welch "flat"!!!), and the whole look of the film screams ***CHEAP***! Did they shoot this thing in 3 days? Sure looks like it!
Don't even get me started on the hilarious use of stunt-doubles for Raquel and her enemy Helena in all the roller-derby action sequences. Those ridiculous wigs that hang down and cover the doubles' faces in all the racing shots are so terribly obvious that it should make the film fun on a bad-movie level - but, nope, after a few times, it just gets tedious like the rest of the whole debacle.
I really wanted to like this film considering it's been hidden away for so many years now. But, the incompetant direction, editing, and technical skills on-hand are so awful that it doesn't even work on a so-bad-it's-good level. This thing should be shown to film students worldwide for years to come on how NOT to make a film.
Still, as a cult film fan, I must admit I am glad the film is now finally available and that Warners felt the need to rescue it from it's well-deserved hidden obscurity. The DVD presents the film in widescreen and contains the original theatrical trailer (somewhat entertaining). KANSAS CITY BOMBER is a true BOMB, but it is what it is, and I hate to see any film hidden away for so many years as this one has been. So if you can take the pain, check it out to see why you haven't been able to see it for 30 years. And, if you want to see a BETTER roller-derby flick, see the same year's UNHOLY ROLLERS with the luscious, but sadly late, Claudia Jennings. It was a cheap rip-off of KCB, but it delivers the entertainment value and exploitation filmmaking skills totally lacking in this one. It's out-of-print on VHS right now, but will probably hit DVD someday soon (hopefully).
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| Rating | | | Date | July 01, 2005 | | Summary | No Wonder They Made No More Roller Derby Flicks | Content
| This film is a missed opportunity. Roller derby inherently has the ingredients for great sports satire a la "The Bad News Bears" or "Slapshot". Instead the makers opted for melodrama. Instead of concentrating on the action on the rink, which is filmed unspiringly by director Jerrold Freedman, we are inundated with Raquel Welch's affair with her club's sleazy owner (Kevin McCarthy) and her foibles as a single mom. In a way these subplots do give the film some camp appeal but not enough to my liking. This film does contain a couple of good supporting turns by Norman Alden as the club's enforcer and Helena Kallianiotes as Welch's chief rival on the team. Kallianiotes did similar scene-stealing in a bona fide seventies classic, "Five Easy Pieces", with Jack Nicholson. |
| Rating | | | Date | June 11, 2005 | | Summary | Welshed | Content
| Gum chewing doesn't pass for attitude, as Raquel appears grossly miscast in Kansas City Bomber. There's lots of mediocre acting and long baffling music montage scenes of deep-in-thought Raquel driving on the interstate. It's as though the editors needed padding to make this flimsy vehicle feature length.
This film could have been so much more, but opportunities are lost left and right. The culture of Roller Derby, in particular, is generally handled with too much credibility, rather than the campy slugfest that it was on TV. Sometimes there are exceptions to this, like when Raquel mauls one of the referees as he's trying to comment into his microphone --and these moments account for the best boredom relief from the general monotony.
Although one could argue that the scenes on the rollerskating rink have plenty of rough-and-tumble action, they are shot in a flat, clinical way. The swirling kinetic motion begs for something a bit more stylized, edgy and dark. We're also treated to a hulking stunt-double for Raquel, replete with an exaggerated mop of hair to hide the face. It's pretty ridiculous. They should've just let Ms. Welch do ALL of the stunts and take her bruises. She's so very lovely... what's a few missing teeth?
This could have been a cult classic in the best sense but it's more like a slow slide into the lost years of the 70s. What were they thinking?!!!
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