Hard Times | Full Movie | Movies Anywhere

Name: Hard Times
Released: 1975-10-9
Cast: Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Jill Ireland, Strother Martin, Maggie Blye

Hard Times

PG
1h 40m
1975

94%

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Charles Bronson demonstrates exactly what tough is in this two-fisted action drama about a drifter suddenly caught up in the fight game during the Great Depression. Chaney (Bronson), a down-on-his-luck loner, hops a freight train to New Orleans where, on the seedier side of town, he tries to make some quick money the only way he knows how, with his fists. Chaney approaches a hustler named Speed (James Coburn) and convinces him that he can win big money for them both. Chaney wins a few tough illegal fights bare-fisted but Speed's carelessness with his money and indebtedness to a gang of thugs forces Chaney to fight one last match with Street, a huge monster of a man. The final bout is a no-holds-barred, knock-down, drag-out fight that Bronson fans will love.

Director:

Walter Hill

Producer:

Lawrence Gordon

Writer:

Walter Hill, Bryan Gindoff, Bruce Henstell

Cast:

Charles Bronson, James Coburn, Jill Ireland, Strother Martin, Maggie Blye

Rotten Tomatoes® Score

TOMATOMETER®

94%

Reviews

New Yorker

Pauline Kael

Hard times offers excitement that makes you feel good; Walter Hill respects the loner myth.

As hard as the hits land every time, it’s the capitalist exchanging of cash and leveling up of wagers on these beaten men’s ability to sock each other out that knocks you down the hardest.

So often a monolithic actor in mediocre films, Bronson’s beady-eyed smirk in this context acquires a droll dignity suggesting graduation from the school of million hard knocks, and every supporting role is colorfully filled.

[T]here's much to admire here, especially the fine combination of cinematographer Philip Lathrop's images and Roger Spottiswoode's editing of the exciting fight sequences.

HARD TIMES is still an enjoyable film, and the depression-era settings are painstakingly captured.

January 15, 2019

FULL REVIEW