10 to Midnight (1983) "a scummy little sewer of a Neo Noir".

"A scummy little sewer of a Noir"

Directed by J. Lee Thompson, written by William Roberts and J. Lee Thompson, and based on the screenplay Bloody Sunday by J. Lee Thompson.

Cinematography was by Adam Greenberg, Music was by Robert O. Ragland.  

The film stars Charles Bronson (Crime Wave, Once Upon A Time In The West, Rider On the Rain, Death Wish ) as Detective Leo Kessler, Lisa Eilbacher as Laurie Kessler, Andrew Stevens as Paul McAnn, Gene Davis as Warren Stacey, Geoffrey Lewis (Dillinger, I, The Jury, The Way of the Gun) as Dave Dante, Wilford Brimley (The Thing) as Capt. Clem Malone, Robert Lyons as Nathan Zager, Bert Williams as Mr. F. L. Johnson, Jeana Keough as Karen, Iva Lane as Bunny, Ola Ray as Ola, Kelly Palzis as Doreen, Cosie Costa as Dudley. 

Story

Fade into a squad room. Detective Leo Kessler is hunt and peck typing a report, while a degenerate holy roller is recounting how he likes to hack up unrepenting fellow citizens. He asks now will you put me in jail? Leo replies not this week we're all filled up. Leo signals to a patrolman to take the guy away. 

Jerry a reporter arrives and stands silently behind Leo, until leo sensing someone starring at him turns around.

Les: Jerry I'm a mean selfish son-of-a-bitch, I know you want a story, but I want a killer, and what I want comes first.

Title sequence starts and then pauses when it cuts to a campus where Warren Stacey an office equipment repairman watches a blonde named Betty splitting off from her co-worker and walking to a waiting van. 

Gene Davis as Warren Stacey

While Warren watches her get into the van, we get a brief flashback where we see Betty in a red dress getting a cup of coffee. While her back is to Warren, he reaches out and unzips her dress. 

She flips around and tosses her cafe au lait in his face. Warren comes out of the flashback just as Betty shuts the door to the van, and asks if they are "going to the lake again?" 

Cut to Warren is in his shorts, in his bathroom prepping himself for a night out. He likes what he sees, He's got the package the girls go for, but he's got no clue when it comes to women. 

Finally dressed, he pulls out a butterfly knife and twirls it like a gunfighter used to twirl his six-shooter. Here's the films nut job. We get the rest of the title sequence and then we segue to the Aero Theatre in Santa Monica, California. 

Warren watches two young women walk up to a box office to get tickets for the show. He walks over and leans in far enough to bump the ass of the woman wearing white jeans. He then follows them into the theater and sits beside them. He's being purposely obnoxious putting his arm around white jeans and offering them his popcorn. The girls get up and find other seats. 

Once alone, Warren heads to the john and in a toilet stall puts on rubber gloves climbs up using the bowl and tank as steps and he goes out a window on to the roof.

Cut to Warren driving a VW on a gravel forest access road. He's going to the lake side lovers lane where Betty is usually out balling her boyfriend. He gets out of the VW stark naked (it's his M.O.) and he approaches the van watching Betty and her boyfriend playing hide the sausage through the rear window.

Warren then jerks open the door and starts to stab Betty's boyfriend.

Buck naked Betty goes running off screaming into the boonies with Warren running after her. When Warren finds her hiding by a tree, Betty tells him she'll do anything, but of course he stabs her anyway. 

I'll do anything

Cut to Warren moving alongside a brick wall to a iron ladder. He climbs back up to the roof and then follows the roof line to the bathroom window. He flushed the rubber gloves down the toilet and he's back in time to catch the end of the show and once again makes contact with the same two girls he was bothering before. 

The next day the police are on the scene, we see a homicide investigation in progress. Ambulance chasing reporters are shooting questions at police Capt. Clem Malone. Detectives Leo Kessler and Paul McAnn his new partner are squabbling over a piece of discarded chewing gum. 

At the morgue the medical examiner, gives his findings, no forced sexual assault. Its a similar M.O. to another woman's murder. Leo remarks that the murder's knife is obviously a substitution for his penis.

We cut to Warren Stacey doing some repair work on a office typewriter. He's just finishing up when the calls comes in from the police informing the company of Betty's demise.

Jeana Keough as Karen

Back to an unmarked police car interior where we get some background info on McCan, his father is a professor of social psychology at Berkely. They are driving to inform Betty's parents of her death.When McCan pulls onto her parents street Leo realizes that Betty was a good friend of his daughter Laurie. 

Charles Bronson as Leo Kessler

We cut to Leo and McCan interviewing Betty's co worker and roommate Karen. They ask her the names of who she had relations with and she recites those she remembers and then she ads a guy who used to call up on the phone who liked to talk dirty to Betty and occasionally spoke in Spanish. 

We cut to Betty's funeral and see Warren is in attendance. While the services are playing out Warren gets interested in Leo's daughter Laurie who he watches as she is conversing with McCan. She reveals to him that she is a student nurse living in a dorm with other nurses.

After the services Warren overhears Betty's father talking to Leo telling Leo that Betty kept a diary about everything she did. Warren hearing this, heads to Betty and Karen's apartment to look for her diary, While he's trying to pry open a bedroom night table with a carving knife, Karen arrives back from the funeral.

Warren watches her from inside a louvered closet door. Karen gets out of her mourning clothes, slips on a robe, and then begins frying a few eggs in the kitchen. Warren, again stripped naked and wearing gloves sneaks up behind her and shoves the knife into Karen. 

It starts going Noirsville for Warren and Leo, when, after Warren arrives at his apartment he finds Leo and McCan there already waiting for him. It's revealed to us that Karen had already given Betty"s diary to Leo, and that Warren is featured in it as a quote "creep." 

Another clue is a bullfighting poster hanging on Warren's wall. and in his conversation with McCan about it McCan finds out that Warren knows Spanish. All the circumstantial evidence points to Warren and a frustrated Leo breaks bad and plants some blood on Warrens clothes to frame him.

Noirsville

Geoffrey Lewis as Dave Dante

Wilford Brimley as Capt. Clem Malone

This is a Charles Bronson flick so its no surprise the way it's gonna play out. Geoffrey Lewis as Warren's sleazy lawyer is a bonus. Nothing special worth a watch 7/10