Five Minutes To Live/Comments

From The Grindhouse Cinema Database

< Five Minutes To Live

As an artifact, this film serves as a decent time capsule. It features a young Johnny Cash playing "Johnny Cabot," a murderous hood on the lam and looking for his next big score. He partners with Fred Dorella (Vic Tayback) and they set off to kidnap a bank president's wife in exchange for $70,000. As usual, Bill Karn (Ma Barker's Killer Brood (1960)) tried to develop this as a noir-style crime flick complete with Dorella's confession upfront and narration throughout. However, the movie turns out to be more lighthearted in the end. One interesting feature to this film is its California suburban setting. Much of Tayback's and Cash's dialog centers on condemning the stale, boring life generated by the suburbs. This sentiment would continue to grow throughout the remainder of the 1960s. In addition, Johnny Cash wrote and performed the film's title track "Five Minutes to Live (with Merle Travis--a noted soundtrack artist in his own right). You will also see him picking his guitar throughout and serenading his captive. Overall, this is your typical early 1960s drive-in schlock. Were it not for the appearance of Johnny Cash it would be difficult to watch. How's his acting? Let's just be thankful he stuck to his music!

Reviewed by Texploited

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