I saw this movie while studying in Edinburgh in the 80's. Loved it too. A light and fairly fluffy storyline with the prerequisite villain and good guy formula to the fore. However, the "highpoint" for me was the car chase featuring an MGB GT convertible doing some very silly stuff. Great action, and a spectacular end to this chase. Also, one little line from the movie is still quoted by my brother and I all these years later - when Harris goes to make a tricky maneuver in his car, he tells his passenger to put on her safety belt as he's about to do a "Brodie", and then yanks on the handbrake and spins the car in the middle of the road. Fun film, dated now but the CN Tower stunt is scary when you realise that someone actually did the jump, AND got paid handsomely for the privilege.
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richardhorne7 September 2006
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Chase_Witherspoon23 July 2010Obscure Canadian comedy (belatedly released in 1984 after sitting in the canister since 1980) with Harris as a mild mannered accountant who inadvertently saves the life of drunken Beverly D'Angelo, resulting in being employed by the family matriarch (Reid) to manage their ill-gotten gains. Meanwhile, estranged brother and former heir to the fortune (Plummer) is desperate to get his hands on the stash, as are two hoodlums (Chaykin and Rubinek) working for mobster Peter Donat, and the CIA (Gammell).
Some amazing car chases and a rousing finale atop Toronto's Needlepoint tower (hence the title) are action bookends to what is an engaging, humorous and action-filled 85 minutes. The stunt-work is addictive and enough itself to warrant another viewing (particularly the nail-biting climax).
Chaykin and Rubinek make a likable pair of nitwit goons, and the appearance of Harris, Plummer and D'Angelo lend a certain prestige that can't easily be ignored. Not especially sophisticated in its humour (largely slapstick and situational), "Highpoint" earns a laugh or two without pretense or self indulgence and I found it highly entertaining. Arguably Harris' best of a bad lot during the eighties, if that's a useful benchmark. -
greenheart17 June 2018It just makes you wonder what the screenwriter was thinking. Okay lads, we'll have sword fighting, car chases and crashes, a pony and trap chase, people flying into water in their vehicles and slowly sinking, horses and oooh, I know, let's get some laughs with people sneezing and getting trapped in lift doors. Just as you can't quite believe what you're watching, we have s peeded up sequence with people talking speeded up like Benny Hill used to do. Why Christopher Plummer, just why? Richard Harris had the oddest accent I've heard in a while. Thank goodness for Beverley D'Angelo who at least looked amazing. There's a line during the showdown on the CN Tower that says "Leave them, they're idiots" Advice I probably should have taken!
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Wizard-88 April 2015The Canadian movie "Highpoint" is a strange movie. On one hand, it wants to be a serious homage to the kind of thrillers Alfred Hitchcock made. But on the other hand, it also wants to be a kind of spoof of those Hitchcock movies. Needless to say, mixing the two tones results in quite a mess. It's obvious that the filmmakers tried to save this in the editing room, but the different tones still result in an inconsistent feeling. It doesn't help that each tone isn't very well done. The mystery angle isn't very clear, and the comedy is painfully unfunny (they even try doing a chase sequence Keystone Kops style.) The movie looks a lot better than most other Canadian movies from the same period (it obviously had an ample budget), but its slickness doesn't hide its unsatisfying soul. Only for viewers who really want to see how Canadians would do Hitchcock... or who want to see Christopher Plummer sport a ridiculous-looking moustache.
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Someone had to be high to think that casting Beverly D'Angelo and Christopher Plummer as brother and sister would be realistic. Add Richard Harris and Kate Reid film, with Harris acting like a complete ninny throughout and Reid subjected to all sorts of indignities, and you've got one of the most consistently unfunny films ever made. This is a complete fiasco in every way, with Plummer's character believed to be sent to his death in the very first scene (where you don't even see him), and then he shows up do a complete jerk as he Reveals His presents to his mother and sister. He gets a well-deserved slap across the face from mom, and perhaps he should have gotten that for the worst performance he ever gave.
Harris plays an accountant looking for a job. Any job, and he makes the mistake by taking one working for the family after saving D'Angelo's life. Maury Chaykin and Saul Rubinek are the dumbest villains ever, out to kill off Plummer's entire family under the orders of Peter Donat. They are a combination of Yosemite Sam and Wiley E. Coyote in their efforts to commit this murder, that is, in the worst Warner Brothers cartoon that anybody could ever imagine. Chaykin and Rubinek get their comeuppance every time they try to do something nefarious, and after a while of seeing them found without their clothes on (just their shorts), it's just not funny anymore. For me, the only memorable bit was a visit to the former Eaton Centre in Toronto which I visited with family shortly after this was made, having dinner in the spinning restaurant at the top. To see it from outside the window where Plummer and Harris have a confrontation made me have an appreciation for having been inside.
Harris, never seeming to close his mouth, spouts the desire for booze throughout, obviously a waiting for the start of his turn to reprise his film role as King Arthur on stage in "Camelot", and Plummer overplays the fey scoundrel so badly that you desperately want to see his character knocked off. It's amazing that nobody spotted how bad this was during filming and took a break to make changes in the script. No wonder it barely got a release. To watch it however, my mouth was as agape as Harris's because I couldn't believe that something this wretched could actually be made with such legendary talent attached. This does indeed rank as one of the top 10 worst comedies made in the 1980's, and that's out of the hundreds that I've seen that were complete bombs. -
mcgrew25 September 2015This movie is pretty terrible, but I gave it an 8 out of 10 because hidden away inside it is a great little (shorter) movie.
If you:
* take out all the scenes with Maury Chayken and Saul Rubinek (who are fine actors, but most certainly not here)
* take out all the speed-up-the-movie-for-humor scenes (most notably the chase through Quebec - indeed, drop most of that chase entirely)
* take out everything before the opening credits (that is, the tedious 'backstory', which is explained just fine later in the movie -- indeed better.)
* leave in everything with Richard Harris and Christopher Plummer (who appear to have someone else writing their dialog from the pretty awful stuff written for everybody else.)
... then there's a cracking good fish-out-of-water story joined with a swashbuckler trying one game too many.
So, be ready with the fast-forward button, and you might just have a good hour or so. -
raymond-gilroy31 May 2020It came as a shock to me when I read all the negative reviews. I just watched this show today Sunday May 31st. 2020 & thought it was an excellent movie. See it if you can you won't be sorry.
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eddy-285 September 2000Peter Carter's last film (The late director of Rituals, Wolf Dog and The Intruder Within) directs this comedy and action film with Richard Harris as an undercover cop. Some of the scenes could very well be funny another film like this was made called Kuffs with Christian Slater. Carter supposely died of a Heart Attack shortly after this films release.