Taglines: “Please God, don’t let him get caught.”
Straight Time movie synopsis. After many juvenile detentions and six years in prison, the small time thief and burglar Max Dembo is released on parole. Max has an initial friction with his nasty parole officer Earl Frank, but the officer agrees to let him live in a hotel room if he gets a job within a week. Max goes to an employment agency and the attendant Jenny Mercer helps him to get a job in a can industry.
Max is decided to begin a new life straight and visits his old friend Willy Darin and his family. When Willy brings Max home, he injects heroin and leaves his spoon under Max’s bed. Max dates Jenny and on the next day after hours, he finds Frank waiting for him snooping around his room. Frank finds the spoon and sends Max to prison for tests to prove whether he had a fix or not.
Despite the negative result, Frank leaves Max for a week imprisoned. When Max is released again, Frank gives a ride and presses him to tell who had a fix in his room. Max hits Frank, steals his car and seeks out his former friends to restart his life of crime. Jenny lodges Max at her place and has a love affair with him. Max and his best friend Jerry Schue successfully rob a bank; but after a jewelry heist in Beverly Hills, where Max loses Jerry and Willy, he leaves California and Jenny and heads alone elsewhere.
Straight Time is a 1978 American crime drama film directed by Ulu Grosbard and starring Dustin Hoffman, Harry Dean Stanton, Gary Busey, Theresa Russell, M. Emmet Walsh, Kathy Bates, Sandy Baron, Jake Busey, Tina Menard, Stephanie Ericsson and Dave Kelly. The movie is based on the novel No Beast So Fierce, by Edward Bunker, who also acts in the movie.
About the Production
The screenplay was written by Alvin Sargent, Edward Bunker and Jeffrey Boam, based on Bunker’s novel No Beast So Fierce. Dustin Hoffman was the director of the film when shooting began, but ultimately decided to give up that role, resulting in Grosbard being hired.
This film both starred Gary Busey and introduced his seven-year-old son Jake. It was the second film for actress Theresa Russell; it also featured an early screen appearance by Kathy Bates. Busey went on to earn an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor as the lead in The Buddy Holly Story which was one of three films released between March and May 1978 in which he had a leading role; the other two were Straight Time and Big Wednesday. Russell’s film career includes roles in Impulse and Whore. Bates would win the Academy Award for Best Actress and a Golden Globe Award, playing deranged nurse Annie Wilkes in the Rob Reiner film Misery, as well as thirteen Emmy award nominations for her work in television.
The film became the subject of litigation between Hoffman and the First Artists Production Company over creative control. Before Hoffman had finished editing the film, First Artists exercised a clause to take over the project since the shoot had gone 23 days over schedule and approximately $1 million over budget. Hoffman’s lawsuit alleged that his right to the final cut had been violated and that the take-over clause did not mean he forfeited all creative control. First Artists’ countersuit claimed that Hoffman’s “derogatory statements” damaged the film’s reception and box office performance. The outcome of the litigation has not been disclosed.
Straight Time (1978)
Directed by: Ulu Grosbard
Starring: Dustin Hoffman, Harry Dean Stanton, Gary Busey, Theresa Russell, M. Emmet Walsh, Kathy Bates, Sandy Baron, Jake Busey, Tina Menard, Stephanie Ericsson, Dave Kelly
Screenplay by: Alvin Sargent, Edward Bunker, Jeffrey Boam, Nancy Dowd, Michael Mann
Production Design by: Stephen B. Grimes
Cinematography by: Owen Roizman
Film Editing by: Sam O’Steen, Randy Roberts
Set Decoration by: Marvin March
Art Direction by: Dick Lawrence
Makeup Department: Vivienne Walker, Bob Westmoreland
Music by: David Shire
MPAA Rating: None.
Distributed by: Warner Bros. Pictures
Release Date: March 17, 1978 (United States)
Views: 253