Death Race 2000
Director: Paul Bartel
Year Released: 1975
Rating: 2.5
Set in one screwed up, alternative future, five accomplished racers - including perennial favorite (and much beloved) Frankenstein (David Carradine) as well as Machine Gun Joe Viterbo (Sylvester Stallone) and Calamity Jane (Mary Woronov) - have to drive from New York City to New Los Angeles to meet the President and are given bonus points for running people over on their trip there. Bartel's style tends to be gaudy and abrasive but there's campy, dark fun to had in watching this - you can't take the swastikas or encouragements to drive into the elderly seriously, nor should one give much (serious) thought to the (post-Watergate, decidedly disgruntled) "politics" present therein, as this is more or less a variation on The Most Dangerous Game (pre-Hunger Games and Battle Royale). Sly apparently provided some of his own dialogue, which, in its entirety, is not exactly Oscar-worthy.
