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Short Time (1990)
Captain: "And any short time goof-off that doesn't bust his ass to bring this guy in, is going to be as popular around this precinct as a reggae band at a Ku Klux Klan rally."
With less than two weeks until he's retired after 30 years on the force, Burt Simpson (Dabney Coleman) is determined to make it. But after he is misdiagnosed with a terminal illness and told he has only a short while left, he fears his son and ex-wife will lose every penny he's saved because his insurance only covers line-of-duty deaths.
Determined to set his family for life, Burt engages in suicide-by-criminal actions, daring criminals to kill him more than any sane man would.
I gotta say, this film is hysterical to the bone. Coleman is so play-it-safe at first before he's given the wrong lab results that it's hard not to find his chemistry with partner Ernie (Matt Frewer) amusing. And yes, they are named Burt and Ernie, for all you Sesame Street buffs (my dad busted a gut when he realized this himself).
I hunted down a good DVD of this film (hard to find beyond old VHS tapes) over the past few years ever since James Rolfe's video about some of the best car chases in films (I've seen some of his other picks, such as Bullitt or The Seven-Ups). The car chase Coleman gets into here is really something, almost like a Blues Brothers smash-up. His car is busted to shit and he keeps driving after these two guys trying to get himself killed for his family's sake.
And then department keeps giving him new awards and shit, and you laugh yourself silly.
This film isn't anything phenomenal, true, but it does a damn good job anyway.
Highly recommend.
Captain: "And any short time goof-off that doesn't bust his ass to bring this guy in, is going to be as popular around this precinct as a reggae band at a Ku Klux Klan rally."
With less than two weeks until he's retired after 30 years on the force, Burt Simpson (Dabney Coleman) is determined to make it. But after he is misdiagnosed with a terminal illness and told he has only a short while left, he fears his son and ex-wife will lose every penny he's saved because his insurance only covers line-of-duty deaths.
Determined to set his family for life, Burt engages in suicide-by-criminal actions, daring criminals to kill him more than any sane man would.
I gotta say, this film is hysterical to the bone. Coleman is so play-it-safe at first before he's given the wrong lab results that it's hard not to find his chemistry with partner Ernie (Matt Frewer) amusing. And yes, they are named Burt and Ernie, for all you Sesame Street buffs (my dad busted a gut when he realized this himself).
I hunted down a good DVD of this film (hard to find beyond old VHS tapes) over the past few years ever since James Rolfe's video about some of the best car chases in films (I've seen some of his other picks, such as Bullitt or The Seven-Ups). The car chase Coleman gets into here is really something, almost like a Blues Brothers smash-up. His car is busted to shit and he keeps driving after these two guys trying to get himself killed for his family's sake.
And then department keeps giving him new awards and shit, and you laugh yourself silly.
This film isn't anything phenomenal, true, but it does a damn good job anyway.
Highly recommend.
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