Hit Lady (1974)

Powerful

How sad is this?

The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Yvette Mimieux is a very unlikely lady to play the lead in "Hit Lady". After all, she's rather petite, cute and looks very innocent and anything but dangerous. However, she's a cold-blooded contract killer...and a very good one at that! Plus, Mimieux wrote the script with herself in mind!!The story begins with Angela (Mimieux) going to a barbecue and singling out an old man (Keenan Wynn) and talking with him at length. He invites her to go on a horseback ride...and she kills him when there are no witnesses about them. Next, she receives a call from her contact...he has one more contract. But she initially refuses, she's just retired. But the amount she is to be paid is astronomical...and this would really help her with her new life with her struggling boyfriend (Dack Rambo). So she has a condition...she wants to know more about the guy before he accepts. The mark is a union leader, Jeffrey Blaine (Joseph Campanella) and they really want him dead very badly! So yo see Angela as she goes to work and arranges to 'accidentally' meet Jeffrey at a concert. And, over time, she really comes to like this guy...so what's she to do?!The film is enjoyable and worth seeing. Mimieux created a nice script. My only reservation was the ending...I did see that coming and many others will as well.

The synopsis for Hit Lady can be written in a single sentence, Yvette Mimieux portrays a hitwoman eager to leave the assassin for hire business. In the same vein, the film is a rather uncomplicated affair, usually the case with television's "movie of the week" films of the 70's, but here the lean story and budget is to the film's benefit. The excellent Mimieux carries the film more than capably and her co-stars all perform nicely as well. With a title like "Hit Lady" many today might expect this to be full of gunfire and explosions, this is certainly not the case, but it does happen to be a very engaging and well written (Mimieux is credited with the screenplay) film.While Hit Lady is not an action film, it's star Yvette Mimieux is no stranger to the action film genre, her credits include the excellent mercenary film Dark of the Sun. Here, she provides a fine screenplay and gives an engaging performance, in a written interview she stated she had hoped to direct the film as well, but for whatever reason that did not happen. What's also of interest is the film's pedigree in the murder for hire film genre. The film's director Tracy Keenan Wynn (who also has a small role) appeared alongside Charles Bronson in the mafia hit-man film "The Mechanic". Clu Gulager who stars as Mimieux's former hit-man boss, starred alongside Lee Marvin portraying a pair of hit men in Don Siegels "The Killers". On a final note, one wonders if this perhaps served as inspiration for the excellent French film La Femme Nikita, that tells a tale of a trained assassin wanting to leave the business, and her male mentor who stands in the way. Recommended.

Very entertaining film from the '70s, produced by Aaron Spelling and written by Yvette Mimieux, who stars in it, looks gorgeous (it is, after all, Aaron Spelling), and surrounds herself with men, particularly Dack Rambo.Mimieux plays a woman in a man's job - she's a hit woman. Though very successful knocking people off, she gets tired of it and, in love with Rambo, wants to retire from the business and live with him in Mexico. Her costars, besides Rambo, are Clu Gulager, Joseph Campanella, Keenan Wynn - basically all men.There's one very fun scene at the airport when Mimieux, attempting to disguise herself, offers a woman (Mitzi Hoag) outrageous money for her coat. I'd have handed it over too.Obviously a very brainy woman in real life, Mimieux does this cold, impersonal kind of role very well, and she's a real knockout in this (as usual). The film contains a very neat twist as well. Highly recommended.

Yvette got out her yellow legal pad and #2 pencil and scripted herself a juicy part in this Aaron Spelling-produced TV flick. She plays an attractive blonde, shanghai-ed into killing people for money. She wrote herself into virtually every scene and put herself into an area usually reserved for men....especially at this time of 1974. This film pre-dates "Charlie's Angels", but has a similar sort of angle. Mimieux goes "undercover" in designer duds and works over her targets with charm and sex appeal (she even struts around at length in a skimpy bikini...revealing a very fit figure.) The film is simple and trite at times, but still modestly entertaining. Joseph Campenella is given the (thankfully!) rare chance to engage in a sex scene, Keenan Wynn has just a cameo and Clu Gulager is sporting a few too many shades in his hair color....strange. The best part is hot-to-trot Dack Rambo in his PRIME. He slinks in in jeans that look like they couldn't contain one more skin cell, gets caressed from behind while his jeans are half open (revealing dischordantly cute and chaste little white briefs) and just basically looks edible in a role that would normally have been "the girlfriend part". His yummy face and thick, beautiful hair threaten to steal the film from Ms. Mimieux, but since she wrote it, he isn't around all that long.