User Reviews

**SOME SPOILERS** The only why you can make any sense of "Five Minutes to Love" is look upon it as some kind of metaphor to the the late 1950's and early 1960's "Beat" as well as "I'll do whatever I wan't" generation with Harry's junkyard as being the center of the Universe in the movie. Harry runs this junkyard together with two unstable work-hands. One an ex-high school football hero, Blowhard, who got into deep trouble when he knocked up a girl who, according to him, was making it with the entire football team. Left out in the cold and getting hooked on drugs Blowhard ended up in Harry's junkyard doing the kind of menial work that he feels is beneath his true vocation. That of being the CEO of a Fortune 500 multi-billion dollar cooperation.

Also at Harry's junkyard is his live-in girlfriend who he pimps off to his costumers the Pooch. As well as Norman a mentally unbalanced lunatic who's got, if you believe what he says, an 180 IQ but wasn't smart enough to remember to return a number books that he checked out of the library. And, in his sick and disturbed mind,thus became a fugitive from the law for doing or not doing it.

With all this going on at the junkyard Ben & Edna's, with their four month daughter, car breaks down outside the yard with Ben going in to get help, a starter, so he can get back on the road again. Harry who's been having trouble with the police about a number of stolen cars that ended up chopped up at his junkyard sees in Ben the perfect pasty to frame for the crimes. That he and his two employees Blowhard and Norman have been committing.

Ben picked up by the police, on a tip from Harry, and brutally worked over to get a confession out of him leaves his wife, who's totally ignorant to what happened to her husband, at the mercy of the deranged Blowhard who chases her, with the baby in her arms, all over the place. All this to the sounds of such loud and brain-twisting jazz music that it makes the last stanza of the rousing 1812 symphony, with the cannons blasting away, sound like theme song of Mister Roger's Neighborhood! We also get an incisive and penetrating speech by Norman about all the ills in the world around us and how life is not fare to a super genius like himself. Who's giant and unlimited intellect is being squandered away at Harry's junkyard because of his troubles at the local library which he, of course, had nothing to do with. It wasn't that the he was late in retuning the books it was the library that was wrong in it's unreasonable attempt of wanting Norman to bring them back!

The crazy story-line the ear-splitting music and the wild loud and over-the-top speeches go on and on until a new spin in brought out on the scene. That has to do with what Harry's been doing at his junkyard in regard to the stolen and chopped up cars, after the police could get nothing out of Ben, and that's that the brain addled Blowhard is the culprit in these crimes.

Blowhard who's recovering from a stab wound that he got from Enda during his fight with her is now brought down to the police station where he's secretly given a knife by cop DeCarlo, whom Harry's been blackmailing, to do Harry in. As you would expect the butterfingered Blowhard blows it. Bumbling and stumbling all over the place Blowhard gives the cops enough time to come to Harry's rescue. The police get to Harry's junkyard just in the nick of time and gun Blowhard down before he can do any damage.

Ben who was released by the cops now comes back to Harry's junkyard to have it out with him over what he did in framing him for Harry's crimes. This results in another ridicules scene with both of them slugging it out and Harry ending up, with a number of his ribs broken, in the Pooch's arms as the movie finally and mercifully ends.

A truly horrific low budget film which looks as if it was photographed with an old local .T.V. station's worst camera. This is trashy drama depicting trashy people performing the most degrading of activities. Featuring only one familiar face among a cast filled with unknowns who deserve to remain such. Rue McLanahan had not even made a name for herself on stage or in T.V. soaps when she starred in this noisy disaster. It all takes place near or at a junk yard where Rue hangs out, allegedly turning tricks. Everybody screams at each other as the camera spins around like a top. A plot concerning pot drives the film, but the only place this ends up is in the sewer.

Rue McClanahan is the star of two movies that are packaged together on the same DVD by Something Weird Video. She completely embarrassed herself in the first one ("Walk The Angry Beach")--will she do the same with "Five Minutes To Love"? You betcha.

The film begins with a prologue with Paul Leder as himself. He introduces the film and talks about his being in the film. This is priceless, as you get to hear him say that after reading the script he said "I wouldn't play that role for a million dollars" and "why would anyone want to make a film like this?". He should have stuck with his first responses to the script but somehow was convinced to be in the movie! Instead, he produced and acted in this silly film and uttered these very prophetic lines.

"Five Minutes To Love" begins with a guy and his wife and young child traveling when their car breaks down. He goes to a junkyard to get a part to fix it where he meets the most bizarre folks. The owner of the place (Leder) seems to have no interest in selling him the part--telling the man to 'do some push-ups and then we'll talk about it'! Then, when he meets the owner's girl (McClanahan), she behaves like she's either on something or brain-injured. She prattles on and on and talks about sex and lesbianism--and you can't help but feel a bit embarrassed for her in this sleazy role--mostly because it makes no apparent sense. In some ways it's like a younger, dumber and even more horny version of the character she played on "The Golden Girls". Where all this goes next is pretty weird--but the poor sap with the broken down car is getting set up to take a fall.

This is a very funny film--though I assume it was not intended as a comedy. Leder's performance is about as subtle as a 2x4 upside your skull and McClanahan's performance is just plain weird...and sleazy. As for King Moody (who played 'Starker' on "Get Smart"), he mostly did a lot of push-ups, occasionally acted menacing and danced about for no apparent reason--he was playing a real odd-ball to say the least. Then, there was the Nietzsche-spouting beatnik. What was he doing in this film?! How the rest of the folks in the film were able to keep from laughing when they were acting (especially McClanahan--who had the most thankless role) is beyond me. The fact that the script writer (if there was one) was able to come up with such nonsensical dialog is beyond me. Once again, it can only be attributed to drugs or brain injury--as it is among the worst dialog in film history--and only a shade better than that in "Plan 9 From Outer Space". Overall, the film is almost bad enough to merit 1 star, but I'll give it 2 as it had a few tense moments and the actors (other than the four I mentioned above) weren't too bad. Only for those who love bad films or hate McClanahan or the morbidly curious.