It Rained All Night the Day I Left (1980) Poster

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5/10
Poor at the start, but improves
davegrenfell21 September 2006
Warning: Spoilers
This seems to be a pretty poor movie to begin with, but develops well. Very surprising, because it is filmed in the middle of nowhere, at minimal price.

Tony Curtis and Lou Gossett are gun runners, who go to work for Sally K when their guns are stolen. John Vernon, who is,as usual, brilliant, is her rival for the local water supply, and also the man who she thinks wants to marry her. In fact he's after her daughter, and there's a nicely comic sequence involving him and Curtis where Sally's rampaging around with a gun.

The characters are all fairly nasty, especially Curtis, who with his wisecracking acting don't give a sh*t style is really rather frighteningly convincing as a mercenary. What lets it down a little is him starting to empathize with the natives. Sally's husband, a former Nazi, was shot by someone, and she's locking up the local water until the natives tell her who.

Eventually, the government repossesses everyone's land, kicks them all out, and the natives gain control of the water supplies, with the help of the guns stolen from Curtis and Gossett. There's a bit more than that, but not much. So again, the title makes more sense than at first it appears. Feels like a weak episode of the A Team.

Has one moment of good cinema, when John Vernon turns on the tap in Sally's house, fires his gun as a signal to his men, and the water slowly stops running, indicating they've seized control of the supply. But that's all.
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2/10
Movie drought
moonspinner556 July 2017
Filmed in Tel Aviv, alleged comedy concerns wealthy ranch owner Sally Kellerman locking up access to the water well on her land until the villagers confess who murdered her husband; Tony Curtis and Louis Gossett Jr. are American mercenaries who try talking her out of it before the government gets involved (Curtis also likes Kellerman's 19-year-old daughter while Gossett gets a yen for the lady boss). Canadian-French-Israeli co-production has good performances by the three principals, also from John Vernon as Sally's would-be suitor, but the witless screenplay doesn't allow any of them to show off and have fun. Kellerman has a long, breathy speech at dinner that serves no purpose, while Curtis' courting of young Lisa Langlois hits a dead end. * from ****
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