Watch 8 Million Ways to Die For Free

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

It's a movie as timely as it is provocative and amazingly, for much of its running time, it is weirdly funny.

It is neither dumb nor smart enough to be fun, and spends way too much time with its boring human characters.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

A cop, played by Jeff Bridges, shoots an unarmed assailant and is taken off the force. From there, his subsequent alcoholism contributes to the failure of his marriage, and he tries to fix things by going to AA. He meets a woman who leads him into a dark world of a drug dealer.This is one of those films I had always wondered about since I first remember seeing video tapes as a child. My father had a VHS copy that sat in the lounge under the VCR. On the cover was a hero with a gun, two women and a cool sports car, and the palm tree suggesting a Miami Vice-style environment.I remember seeing the video case so many times and making a note to watch it. Fast forward 25 years later and I've finally seen it. It was a really cool opening with a helicopter flight over city skyscrapers which, in a single shot, catches up to a police car moving along a freeway. The music is cool and pure 1980s action.The rest of the film, however, is a bit odd. There was just something not right about it. It turns out that the whole script dialog was improvised, which may explain a big, over-the-top swearing and shouting match that has to be seen to be believed.There's a cool but brief car chase and Jeff Bridges moves through the film with a casualness and ease that seems at odds with what's going on around him.Andy Garcia's character is strange, hard to understand. Sometimes he does weird things. But he's the villain and out to get Jeff Bridges.

the first hour of this movie is watchable; the second half continually degenerates and finally launches into a drug exchange scene that is horrifically scripted, directed and is laughably unrealistic; andy garcia tries his best to channel pacino's "scarface" performance but obviously isn't up to the task; randy brooks looks amateurish by overplaying his role as the tough, black gangster complete with stupid, stereotypical verbal assaults; jeff bridges puts in a solid performance and carries the movie --- he continues to be a poor man's kurt russell or kris kristofferson; however, his implied "conversion" of arquette from tough hooker to well behaved girlfriend is too much to take; almost forgot, what happened to all the money "scudder" found in the "po boys" bag??? hmmm, like a good cop, he probably released it into evidence ... not!! just another giant plot hole

Hal Ashby, cinema's great wounded heart, directs "8 Million Ways To Die". It's a conventional film, but one must remember that at this stage in his career, Ashby had little or no creative control. He was a recovering alcoholic and drug user, and the studio's lack of faith in him resulted in "8 Million Ways to Die" being taken taken away during post production.Of course when the producers took this film away the moment it reached the cutting room, they effectively shot themselves in the foot. Ashby, who cut his teeth as a film editor, is renowned for his perfectionism in the editing room. He's a master editor. And so no surprise that "8 Million" received a limited release and faded from theatres days later.Still, though conventional, "8 Million" is nevertheless a fine film. A cosy neo-noir, it also features a somewhat autobiographical subplot regarding alcohol abuse. Here Jeff Bridges plays your typical noir detective, but like Ashby, his character is a recovering alcoholic. As a result, there's an honesty to a couple of Bridges' dialogue scenes. One conversation, for example, has Jeff talking to a hooker. He talks about his love for his daughter (whom he hasn't seen in years) and his hatred of being a drunk. The hooker replies that she never knew her father because he was a drunkard who never came home. Ashby shoots the scene to imply that Jeff is looking into his future, our hero a wounded old man looking at both his own daughter and the very outcome of his present alcoholism.There are two or three good scenes like this, but for the most part the film's script has been edited down to your standard cops and bad guys movie. One senses that had Ashby been at the editing desk, a more free-form movie would have resulted.Still, the film begins and ends with two very unique scenes. It's introduction, for example, features a long helicopter shot which tracks across an American super-highway, Ashby's camera framing distant automobiles like elevator carts, watching as they rise bizarrely off into the sky. The film ends, meanwhile, with an unusual three-way Mexican stand off. Ashby draws this scene out to painful lengths, everyone yelling and screaming until their demands reach pathetic proportions. We've seen this scene before in countless other action movies, but none of these flicks have done anything quite like this.7.9/10 - Moments of Ashby's personality and sensibilities shine through, but for the most part, this film has been hacked down by the studios into something slight. For Ashby completists only.

OK. this is my first comment on this site so I'll try to make it good.Eight million ways to die is simply an AMAZING movie. since the first time I saw it - i think it was in 91 - I bought the original VHS video and saw it many times again, especially during harsh times. This is The movie to see when you are down, and shows you how a man who has been at the bottom can gather himself, and bring on his best.May be what i write seems to be intellectual stuff but actually the film is a great police movie with a perfect direction, and the message simply comes out of its own after watching it.the cast is brilliant, this movie made me a Jeff Bridges fan, he is the best (4 times award nominee). Alexandra Paul, Andy Garcia, and Randy Brooks are excellent. Rosanna Arquette is a bit "weaker" than the others. she can't really compete with Paul and the male cast. She is a good actress but I am not sure she fits the hooker-junkie type.What more can I say - my favorite movie ever.Ho! yes: an unforgettable soundtrack by James Newton-Howard. one of his earlier works (may be its best !!). The soundtrack together with the opening scene showing the police car from the air is a master-piece.