Reviewed By: Steve Genier

Directed By: Norbert Meisel

Cast: Robert Forster, Nancy Kwan, Joe Spinell and A. Martinez

Reviewed from the Lightning Video print which runs 94 minutes.

Imagine, a quiet evening sitting at home with your son awaiting your husband to show up from a hard day of work. Now, image the same scenario only having your house full of blood-thirsty gangsters sticking the barrel of sawed-off shotguns in your face. Which would you choose? At least you can sit here and think to yourself, I'm lucky..I get to make that choice. Well the same can't be said for Christine Halloway and her son, for what they we're totally oblivious to is about to stab them right in the heart. Upon arrival home, Christine's husband and closet gangster is shot and killed along with her son. She manages to escape vowing for revenge. Enter cabbie Jason Walk, small time money runner for local racketeer, Fat Al. Having his only problems with collecting overdue bets, he manages to make the wrong turn by running into Christine. As she hires him to unknowingly to participate in her plot for revenge. Things take a turn for the worst and Jason is now caught up in a world of shit! His back against the wall, he must take on what's been avoiding all his life, charge. As Christine is in hiding, Jason tries to make sense of it all. As the trio of blood thirsty hoods get closer, people begin to turn up dead including Jason best friend Tony. Now, Jason is truly walking on the edge!!

I can see why Quentin Tarantino castled Robert Forster in the role of Max Cherry in Jackie Brown. He has that persona of a hard luck guy with a kind heart. Always falling for the victims, both in Jackie Brown and in Walking The Edge. The element that Forster seems to do well is the transition of his character from one of the of the spectrum to the other. Very well written script showcases a very good role from both Forster and the very beautiful Nancy Kwan (Christine). She has a very interesting film background coming into this one. Two films that come to mind are the 1973 action-thriller Wonder Women, where she plays the diabolical Dr. Tsu who has an arsenal of deadly all girl army. The other being the French/Italian/US1967 spy actioneer The Corrupt Ones. Although the direction of this film is very weak, the editing seems to hold things together as the often bloody action-thriller holds your interest from start to finish. Blazing guns, post-disco beats and a funky dress code smear across the screen, helping the slow at times pace of this hidden 80's gem. The action scenes often turn up bloody and well paced, again due to the editing. Hey, how can you forget the classic Joe Spinell casted as his usual bitching-bad guy. He continues his string of dirty low-life roles that made him notable in such films as Maniac and Vigilante.

This is one film i would love to upgrade with a brand new shinny Anchor Bay widescreen edition, and I've seen it very cheap as well. I could have avoided buying this beat-up ragged VHS copy, but like most films of this caliber..I like to test drive before upgrading.

3 Bitch Slaps