User Reviews

George C. Scott plays a sculptor named Kermitt Garrison who once fought to bring to power in his old country, (not sure what country that is with a name like that), a man who has now becomes a ruthless dictator, (always a risk when you resort to violent revolution).

He was commissioned to create a heroic statue of the man when he was deemed to be heroic. Now the very people who fought for him have turned against him and demand that Garrison not finish the project. They've raised money to pay him to complete it. But the curmudgeon insists on completing the statue, claiming that it's a work of art and not political.

That's nonsense on the face of it. A statue of a political figure is inherently political. But there's an obvious solution here: use the money to commission a second statue, depicting the dictator as what he became and put the two of them next to each other. That would be an even greater artistic achievement and tell a better political story.

But obvious solutions can get in the way of a good plot.

***SPOILERS*** The late great Pre "Doctor Strangelove" George C. Scott doing a great imitation of Kirk Douglas in the movie "Lust for Life" is terrific as exiled and world renowned sculptor Kermit Garrison; a man with out a country but not without a dream. I's Garrison who put his life on the line for the world of art that ended with disastrous results. Doing a sculpture of former freedom fighter and now ruthless dictator, take a guess who, of his what seems like a South American or Caribbean country Garrison has been targeted by his fellow in exile countrymen for death.

Refusing to give into threats in the name of art Garrison's high rise apartment building is picketed daily by outraged citizens of his now communist controlled country that makes things very troublesome for the hard pressed NYPD that has to protect Garrison and his pregnant wife Dawn, Lois Smith, around the clock 24 hours a day. As it becomes evident that Garrison won't give into all the threats and intimidation hurled at him to stop his work the head of his former country's government in exile book store owner Verney, Dana Elcar, orders a hit on Garrison. And the hit-man chosen to do the job on him is to be his best friend from back home, the now brutal communist dictatorship, the once poet laureate of that country Joseph Irona, Paul Richards!

***SPOILERS**** Using the cover of the picketing outside his art studio basement Irona opens fire, from a building across the street,on Garrison as he's about to meet his wife Dawn, who's about to give birth at any minute, who was driven there under heavy police protection. In the confusion that followed after the the poor shot Irona got off at least a half dozen shots, that all missed, poor Dawn and he yet unborn son are stampeded to death by the crowd of pickets running for their lives. Now all alone in the world Garrison is even more determined then ever to finish the job that he started and ended up costing him his loved ones, Dawn & the baby, lives. And even the gun toting Irona who later enters his studio gun in hand and more the willing to use it won't stop him.

P.S What Irona his boss Varney and all those pickets who were making Garrison's life miserable don't realize is that art transcends politics. Sure the person who Garrison was making a statue of was a low down and brutal dictator. But what Irona & Co. did,in the deaths of Dawn and her husband's yet unborn son, put them in the same class and category that he was in!