Mean Johnny Barrows

This film has a great start with the funky title track by Gordon Staples and the String Thing. Staples’ music is used throughout to good effect. The story focuses upon Fred Williamson as a former football star and decorated soldier returning to Los Angeles trying to find purpose in his life. They have him walking the streets looking totally lost, and again the music is blasting during these sequences with the lyrics emphasizing his situation. That allows Williamson to be contemplative at first instead of the tough guy hero he usually played. Next there’s a very interesting cast including Stuart Whitman and Roddy McDowall as the sons of two different mobsters, and a brief cameo by Elliott Gould as a bum. The one drawback is the martial arts scenes are really bad. Williamson and his foes couldn’t fight so they looked stiff and slow. Otherwise this was a very surprising movie.

I have to say Freddy Williamson acting is the best of the cast and that is saying something considering the people who are in it, especially with Roddy McDowell. The worst part of the movie is the fact Freddy also directed it,....my god the awkward cuts get worse the more it goes on. Freddy stick to acting, the ending is soooo stupid it boggles the mind. All in all I l loved the horrible mobsters trying to act like mobsters, cute actually. The female lead is perfect to Freddy, good pick.

"Mean Johnny Barrows" is about dishonorable discharge veteran who can't find a job because of past allegation. The only job offered goes against his moral code,but soon he is in the game as a dangerous hitman.This movie has a lot of twist and turn, but Big Bad Fred is alway one step of his enemies.Like the movie poster, Fred comes with two double barrel shotgun to give his enemies a one-way ticket to hell.The 1970's playbook on military tactic in cinema is on display,with Fred using his skill to outwit a scheming mobster and his deadly girlfriend.

Got that B*tch in the end! Good ol landmine! 👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾👏🏾

This was fun to watch. I was si happy when he finally changed his uutfit. LOL

The print used for Mean Johnny Barrows has deteriorated badly. Why Amazon would allow this to be sold as HD I don't know.The movie has several big stars of the 1970's and would have been good film to watch.

👍

This is the only version that does the film justice. Code Red did an outstanding job getting this film on to DVD. First time available in widescreen. Special features are great especially the audio commentary with Fred Williamson. Highly recommended.

Johnny Barrows is dishonorably discharged from the army after striking a fellow officer. Once he arrives back home, he's mugged and then picked up by two racist cops who believe he's drunk. After he's released, Johnny enters the back of an Italian restaurant looking for a meal. He's soon recognised by the owner, a member of the mob called Mario Racconi. Mario offers Johnny a job which he declines, he instead tries to find gainful employment. He eventually starts work at a gas station where the owner has him scrubbing floors and cleaning toilets, when the owner tries to rip-off Johnny, he beats him and ends up getting arrested again. Johnny now has no choice than to accept Mario Racconi's offer to work for him, just as the Racconi family get involved in a war with the Da Vince family, who want to start selling dope on the streets.Fred "The Hammer" Williamson stars as Johnny Barrows, he also made his directorial debut with this film. Williamson is always entertaining and charismatic, but his character here is not like most of the characters he played. Johnny is essentially a good man that doesn't want to go out and kill, for revenge or otherwise. An honest job, a house and a bit of land is all he wants. It isn't until Johnny is knocked back again and again that he decides to help out the Racconi family, double barrel shotguns in hand. I thought Williamson excellently performed the role of a man who finds himself doing what he doesn't want to do, it's definitely one of his most subtle roles. Roddy McDowall who is probably best remembered for his roles as Cornelius in Planet Of The Apes and Peter Vincent in Fright Night, puts in a pretty decent performance as the youngest Da Vince son. Stuart Whitman was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in The Mark made in 1961, he is very good here as Mario Racconi. R.G. Armstrong is decent as Richard, the mean owner of the gas station where Johnny temporarily works. TV actress Jenny Sherman made her film debut as Nancy, Mario Racconi's girl. She's quite good and very pretty, her character is the main reason Johnny decides to help Racconi. Williamson's M*A*S*H co-star Elliott Gould has a small cameo which he did for Williamson as a favour, he shot his scene completely improvised and in just half an hour.Mean Johnny Barrows is always listed as a blaxploitation film, not that many people seem to have seen it. Apart from the fact that Williamson is a black man taking on bad white men, there's virtually no exploitation to be found. There's no nudity, very little violence, the over the top dialogue is missing, even the funky music is toned right down. With Williamson directing, there's quite a lot of lingering close up shots of himself, which is fine as he knew he was one cool mother and was looking good. It starts off very slowly but I certainly wasn't ever bored, but the film only really has a few standout scenes. The Elliott Gould scene with him playing a really colourful homeless man is great, the other really decent scene is the double barrel shotgun shoot out. Several actors are unsuited to the roles they're playing which makes certain scenes quite funny, and a scene near the end where Williamson fights a hitman is absolutely hilarious with both hissing like snakes and making stereotypical kung fu poses. The film also ends in a very strange way. There's some great moments in Mean Johnny Barrows, there's also about as many silly moments as well which stops the film from reaching the same sort of level as Shaft, Truck Turner, The Mack and many other of the very best blaxploitation films from the '70s.The dvd from Elstree Hill Entertainment is poor, it's the film and absolutely nothing else. The picture quality is a cheap pan & scan job, it's cropped at all sides. There isn't that much print damage, the whole thing is just very soft and out of focus, the picture has been blown up and it's obvious. There aren't even any subtitles. Code Red released a version in the US a few years ago that was remastered using the original negative, it's in its correct aspect ratio, has a commentary by Fred Williamson, a twenty minute interview with Williamson and a few other extras. It's also uncut and runs at 95 minutes, whereas the Elstree version runs at 85 minutes. I know that PAL runs 4% faster than NTSC, but that doesn't make up anywhere near 10 minutes so this version is definitely a shorter cut. The Elstree dvd is very cheap, the Code Red dvd quickly went out of print and the one used copy on Amazon is selling at around £70 which I will not pay. If you ever come across the US Code Red dvd at a decent price, then that would obviously be the version to get. If you just want to see and own the film with no extras and poor but watchable picture quality, this is an okay version that will do the job.

it's ok, if you like these kind of films, which I do...The movie is a bad copy, and I would liketo see a better copy, but the music is good,which is important with Blacksploitation

great film good quality vhs on dvd ,love black cinema

Mean Johnny Barrows is a thoughtfull drama mixed with action and some humor about how society discards it's war veterans once they return home it is not your typical action packed adventure instead it focuses on strugggles the main character faces and the disregard he is treated with. Fred williamson is great in the title role and handles the directing of the film with an impressive skill for a first time director.Give this film a chance dispite the poster giving the impression of a slam bang action packed it is anything but just go in with an open mind and you will be pleasantly surprised.

My first experience with Code Red was with their poor DVD release of Sweet Sixteen. In my opinion Code Red has once again failed with the release of "Mean Johnny Barrows" on DVD. This so called Director's cut suffers from a less than stellar print even though Code Red states it was remastered from the original 35mm print. The films contrast and colors fluctuate back and forth throughout the movie and at times many of the scenes appear washed out. There are moments when noticeable debris and speckling as well as a white line can be seen in the print. The best part about this film was the video commentary from the star and director himself Fred "the Hammer" Williamson included on the disc.Dishonorably discharged and decorated Silver Star Vietnam veteran "Johnny Barrows" returns back home from the war and is welcomed almost immediately by a couple street thugs looking to score. Beaten by the thugs and left in an alley, he is picked up by the police and brought to jail. A sympathetic cop recognizes the one time local football & war hero and immediately releases him. Back on the streets with no money and no place to stay "Barrows" roams the streets looking for work. Welcome home Johnny!For a low budget movie there are some very notable actors aside from Williamson in key roles, but that's where it ends. For the most part the acting turned in by Roddy McDowall and Stuart Whitman comes off as very stiff and as for the "Hammer" I've seen much better from him in other movies. As for the cameo by Elliott Gould it's absolutely ridiculous, his part adds nothing to the movie at all. I don't know if Gould was desperate for work or Williamson felt the need for some comic relief, it just didn't work for me.Mean Johnny Barrows is a very slow paced film with too many scenes of the main character wandering the streets looking for work, while trying to find meaning. The action sequences are few and far between and the special effects if you can call them special are extremely low budget. The major fight scene at the end of the movie is a complete letdown and poorly choreographed. Another thing that really made this film hard to watch for me was the music score. Other than the opening song the rest of the music seemed out of place and it didn't seem to fit. The cover of the DVD suggests that the film is Brutal! Blasting! Blazing! It's anything but.