A-Z GUIDE TO MOVIES AND TV SHOWS PARODIED BY MAD, CRACKED, CRAZY, ETC. UP TO 1996. THEY HAVE NOTHING TO DO WITH THIS. SPOILERS AND OTHER NON-SEQUITURS, TOO. SOMETIMES THESE THINGS HAVE WORDS OR SITUATIONS WE DON'T USE ANYMORE. YOU KNOW, 'CAUSE THEY'RE OLD.
Updated daily. There's posts besides this one archived in the sidebar on the right, you clods!
if you're at a laptop or desktop, right-click and open link on pages and they'll be clearer and legible in a new window.
Friday, September 23, 2022
MARATHON MESS
MARATHON MAN (1976)
dir:John Schlesinger
MAD #191, June 1977
w: Stan Hart
a: Mort Drucker
Thomas “Babe” Levy (Dustin Hoffman) is a graduate student working on being a marathon runner. His brother Doc (Roy Scheider), who Babe thinks is an oil executive is actually a secret government agent, and Doc's partner is Peter Janeway (William Devane). Their job is to get Szell's diamonds. Szell (Laurence Olivier), is a Nazi they are protecting in exchange for tracking down other Nazis.
Szell's brother helps him retrieve the diamonds but gets into a road rage fight with another motorist and both are killed.
Doc is working his job in France as a diamond courier for the government. Szell is coming to America to retrieve his diamonds so no longer needs the U.S. Government and has sent an assassin after Doc, who Doc foils. Babe, studying for his doctorate at the Columbia library meets his girlfriend Elsa (Marthe Keller)
On a date in Central Park, Babe and Elsa are mugged. Later Doc comes to visit him and the next day takes him and Elsa out to lunch. Doc exposes Elsa as not being really Swiss and suspects she may be working for Szell, but to not get his brother mixed up in any of this, he says her lies are a ploy to get a husband for a green card. That night Doc confronts Szell telling him to leave Babe out of this. Szell doesn't trust him and stabs him.
Doc comes to Babe's apartment wounded, then dies. Janeway comes in and says who Doc really was and needs Babe for bait to catch the Szell and the Nazis. Later when he's taking a bath, the same men who mugged him break into his home and kidnap him. Doc is tied up in a warehouse while Szell keeps asking him “Is it safe?”
Szell tries to torture Babe put is rescued by Janeway. Janeway turns out to be on the side of the Nazis and drives him back, and they drill a hole in his front teeth. He escapes and being a runner, runs away from them out onto the freeway.
Babe finally escapes and asks for Elsa's help. They escape to her country home and once they get there he realizes she's working for the Szell and has set him up, and Janeway drives up soon. All he wants to know is where Szell is and he finds out. Szell is strolling through the diamond district to have his secret stash appraised and is recognized by a few survivors who recognize him. Babe finally confronts Szell alone and leads him at gunpoint to a water processing facility in Central Park. Szell has his diamonds in his briefcase, and Babe force him to eat them Szell refuses, Babe throws them in the water, and Szell chases after them, but not before impaling himself with the switchblade he has hidden in his arm.
Cover for the British edition.
MARATHON JAM
Cracked #141, May 1977
a: John Severin
King Kong was a big blockbuster around the same time, so of course Cracked had him on the cover for several issues.
Before coming to the U.S., Szell disguises himself by shaving himself bald.
Cover for German edition of Cracked.
MARATHIN MAN
Crazy #28, August 1977
w: Jayson Wechter
a: Walter Brogan
No comments:
Post a Comment