By Erin Free
In this regular column, we drag forgotten made-for-TV movies out of the vault and into the light. This week: the 1975 gangster drama The Kansas City Massacre, starring Dale Robertson, Harris Yulin, Bo Hopkins, William Jordan and John Karlen.
After Arthur Penn’s bullet-blasted 1967 masterpiece Bonnie And Clyde laid waste to the box office, shifted cinematic attitudes toward violence and unconventional sex, and helped usher in The New Hollywood, expert exploitation house American International Pictures quickly turned out a pack of tommy-guns-blazing, Prohibition-era outlaw gangster rip-jobs, many of which stood capably on their own two feet as fascinating works of art.
The likes of Bloody Mama (1970), A Bullet For Pretty Boy (1970) and Boxcar Bertha (1972) are all seamy, rip-roaring delights, but one of the best of the cycle was undoubtedly 1973’s Dillinger, directed by the great John Milius (read much more about him here) and starring the equally great Warren Oates as the eponymous bank robber and folk hero. This tight, fast-paced, tough-talking little gem had many high points, but one of the highest is master character actor Ben Johnson’s brilliant turn as legendary crusading FBI agent Melvin Purvis, who was also played by Christian Bale in Michael Mann’s now largely forgotten Public Enemies (2009), with Johnny Depp as Dillinger.
When expanding into the world of television in the 1970s, American International Pictures toyed with the idea of positioning Ben Johnson as the lead in a weekly series tracking the various exploits of Melvin Purvis. Though the proposed TV series never eventuated, two telemovies did, with Dale Robertson (best known for the popular western TV series Tales Of Wells Fargo and a host of character roles) taking on the role of Melvin Purvis in Melvin Purvis: G-Man (1974) and The Kansas City Massacre (1975).
Though frequently and erroneously described as Dillinger “spin-offs” or “continuations”, these two telemovies exist wholly on their own terms, united solely by their lead character. The timelines, for instance, are completely different, with many characters who were killed in 1973’s Dillinger reappearing in the subsequent films, instantly putting paid to any notion of the telemovies being sequels to Milius’s mighty work. The famously outspoken director was, however, engaged as a writer on Melvin Purvis: G-Man…though he didn’t exactly warm to the ways of the small screen.
Milius described Melvin Purvis: G-Man helmer Dan Curtis (the cult hero who created the gothic soap opera Dark Shadows, produced the famed 1972 telemovie The Night Stalker, directed the equally famed 1975 telemovie Trilogy Of Terror, and directed the cult 1976 horror feature Burnt Offerings) as “this asshole director” and chafed under network pressure. “I don’t like the way the networks screw around with you,” Milius told Film Comment in 1976. “The pay isn’t the thing that turns me off; I’m not out to get the most money. You slave and toil over the thing and then they cut this out, cut that out, change this, for some damn reason. I won’t tolerate that. I don’t work hard on something to have it bowdlerised that way.”
By the time of 1975’s The Kansas City Massacre, Milius was well and truly gone, with his Melvin Purvis: G-Man co-writer William F. Nolan taking the reins alongside Ric Hardman, and Curtis once again in the director’s chair. While Melvin Purvis: G-Man (which, incidentally, appears impossible to find online) tracked Purvis’s pursuit of famed bootlegger, kidnapper, killer and bank robber Machine Gun Kelly (Harris Yulin), The Kansas City Massacre has the titular gunfight as its centrepiece, and Purvis’s trailing of bank robber Pretty Boy Floyd (Bo Hopkins) and his various associates (William Jordan’s John Dillinger, Elliott Street’s Babyface Nelson, Robert Walden’s Adam Richetti) as its narrative driver.
The film moves like a freight train and comes punctuated with punchy, expertly staged shoot-outs, car chases, police pursuits and fist fights. Towering above it all, however, is Dale Robertson, an actor who never achieved great fame, but who is utterly perfect as the grandstanding Melvin Purvis. The fur-collared coats and simmering cigars provide the character window dressing, but Robertson’s swagger, booming, scratchy voice, curious accent, and extraordinary air of authority really drive the whole show. It’s a damn shame that American International’s proposed TV series never happened, because Robertson would have been a week-in, week-out delight as the tough G-Man with a heart of gold. Sure, that may not be historical fact, but it works on TV.
Robertson gets great support too. Cult fave Bo Hopkins (who has appeared in this column previously in Dawn: Portrait Of A Teenage Runaway and Rodeo Girl) offers plenty of nuance as the honourable and essentially decent Pretty Boy Floyd, and Harris Yulin (playing a different role to the one he had in Melvin Purvis: G-Man, like several other members of the cast) is wonderfully menacing as mob heavy John Lazia. Character actors Matt Clark, William Jordan (slightly undercast as John Dillinger), Robert Walden and John Karlen are all rock-solid in lesser roles.
A crackerjack small screen take on a genre big in exploitation cinema, The Kansas City Massacre resounds with a winning mix of rich characterisation, burnished period detail, and perfectly placed bursts of gunfire.
Availability: The Kansas City Massacre is fairly easy to find online, but it’s a dub taken from an old VHS tape (hello, Starmaker Entertainment!), so the quality is fairly degraded. It is, however, certainly watchable.
If you enjoyed this review, check out our other vintage telemovies 21 Hours At Munich, Because He’s My Friend, Rodeo Girl, Citizen X, Relentless, The Connection, Zuma Beach, The Third Girl From The Left, Snowbeast, Stagecoach, Terror On The Beach, Strange Homecoming, The Possessed, Memorial Day, That Certain Summer, Elvis And The Beauty Queen, Scandal In A Small Town, Victims For Victims: The Theresa Saldana Story, The Seduction Of Gina, Blue Murder, The Brotherhood Of Justice, The Wave, The California Kid, The Cracker Factory, Night Terror, Inmates: A Love Story, The Shadow Riders, CHiPs: Roller Disco, Dawn: Portrait Of A Teenage Runaway, Young Love, First Love, Escape From Bogen County, The Death Squad, Hit Lady, Brian’s Song, The Defiant Ones, A Cry For Help, Trilogy Of Terror, Policewoman Centerfold, Smash-Up On Interstate 5, Something Evil, Savage, A Step Out Of Line, The Boy In The Plastic Bubble, The Dirty Dozen: Next Mission, A Very Brady Christmas, The Gladiator, Elvis, The Rat Pack, Silent Victory: The Kitty O’Neil Story, Terror Among Us, The Hanged Man, Hardcase, Charlie’s Angels: Angels In Vegas, Vanishing Point, To Heal A Nation, Fugitive Among Us, To Kill A Cop, Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders, Police Story: A Chance To Live, Murder On Flight 502, Moon Of The Wolf, The Secret Night Caller, Cotton Candy, And The Band Played On, Gargoyles, Death Car On The Freeway, Short Walk To Daylight, Trapped, Hotline, Killdozer, The Jericho Mile, Mongo’s Back In Town and Tribes.
