Watch Bone For Free

Simply A Masterpiece

When a movie has you begging for it to end not even half way through it's pure crap. We've all seen this movie and this characters millions of times, nothing new in it. Don't waste your time.

This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

The basic story of Bone is simple: a rich couple deals with a home invasion. But this movie has Larry Cohen at the helm, so it's going to be anything but basic. The man who is there to take them for everything soon learns that the couple is anything but rich. And they're anything but happy. Bernadette (Joyce Van Patten, St. Elmo's Fire, Grown Ups) and Bill (Andrew Duggan, In Like Flint, It Lives Again) are a seemingly rich Beverly Hills couple. Bill's a used car salesman who feels that he's the only one working hard, symbolized by his wife refusing to even getting up to answer the phone while he cleans the pool. Then, a rat gets stuck in the drain. That's what brings Bone (Yaphet Kotto, Alien, Live and Let Die) into their lives.Mistaking him for an exterminator, they ask him to pull the rat out. He does and instead of hiding it from them, he confronts them with it. He then takes them hostage as he goes through their home looking for money.It turns out that the couple has little in liquid assets and is deeply in debt. Their son may be in Vietnam or he may be in jail. And it turns out Bill has a secret bank account that Bernadette knows nothing about. Bone commands him to clean out that account and bring him the money in an hour or he'll rape and kill his wife.Bill ends up taking his time as he realizes how little he loves his wife. He drinks with a lady (Brett Sommers from TV's Match Game) that explains how her husband died from too many dental x-rays. Soon, he's been seduced by a young girl (Elaine May's daughter Jeannie Berlin, The Heartbreak Kid, Inherent Vice) who steals from the system, attracted to her offbeat ways and youthful spirit.He comes home without the money. But meanwhile, after learning how to make eggs - she doesn't cook anymore - Bernadette and Bone have gotten drunk and ended up on the couch together. He explains to her how raping white women and the black mystique used to take him so far, but today, black and white love is commonplace. What started as him continually saying he was going to rape her has turned and she begins to seduce him, kissing him and "doing all the work." He talks about how black men have troubles now making love and she tells him that it's not just black men.After they bond, Bernadette tries to convince Bone to help her murder Bill for his insurance. They ride the bus to the end of the line, then chase Bill to the beach. He tries to win them over with a used car pitch to keep him alive, Bernadette smothers and kills him. Bone realizes that he wants nothing to do with this life and leaves.On Cohen's website, the characters in this film are broken down by how they relate to the world: Bill is The Establishment who may be open to change. Bernadette is liberation and feminism that has been held down. The X-Ray Lady is the real Establishment, the old guard ready to die off. The Girl is the hippy love generation already giving way to the darkness of the 70's. Then there's Bone - facing racism but willing to play with it to get what he wants, as he says, "I'm just a big bad buck, ready to do what's expected of him." He even talks about how he's held onto the past, enjoying his part of the world of racism because it was easier and there was a role. Now, in this new world, he doesn't know who to be.The character work in this film is superb. Witness the scene where the girl explains to Bill how she was raped as a child and that's why she's attracted to old men like him. Even when he tries to connect with her by telling her about the Street & Smith pulps her bought as a kid, she still tries to connect him to the rapist who took her virginity as she begins to make love to him.If I didn't say it yet, Yaphet Kotto is amazing in this movie. His performance is quite literally a tour de force. He's always great in everything he's in, but in this film, he's transcendent. I also love that he borrowed Cohen's red sweater for a scene late in the movie and never returned it.Amazingly, this was Cohen's first film. It's assured and poised, straddling the line between art film and exploitation.

"I'm a big black buck just doin' what's expected of him!""Bone" is one of the stranger films of the 1970s and is one I am not 100% sure I liked...but at least it was original! It begins with a couple rich folks, Bill and Bernadette (Andrew Duggan and Joyce Van Patten) relaxing by the pool. Soon a black man, Bone (Yaphet Kotto), arrives and the couple assume he's an exterminator or handyman coming to clear the rat out of the pool. Instead, after taking care of the rat, he sticks around...and threatens to rob them and rape the missus unless her husband returns from the bank with a ransom. The husband goes to the bank but changes his mind and goes off on some very strange adventures with a lady screaming about x- rays as well as a bizarro woman who wants to replicate her rape as a child...with Bill! As for Bernadette, despite Bone acting all rapey, it soon becomes apparent he isn't going to rape her and she is disappointed. Yes, I know this is very politically incorrect and some feminists would be offended by this notion. Soon, she realizes her husband is NOT bringing back ransom money...and the story gets even weirder. The finale is strange....and not 100% satisfying.This film was written, produced and directed by Larry Cohen--a guy known for blackspoitation films like "Hell Up in Harlem" and "Black Caesar" (both excellent movies, actually). I would NOT consider this blacksploitation at all...but it does bring up a lot of race issues and the white folks are nasty hypocrites like you might see in a blacksploitation flick. In fact, the film is more a commentary about the banality of the upper class and their lack of ethics, values and souls. A very weird film...and one that bears re- watching simply because it's hard to determine exactly what Cohen is trying to say!!By the way, you might be surprised to see quite a bit of Joyce Van Patten in this film. Despite her image as a 'nice girl' in films and being the sister of Dick Van Patten, here she shows some nudity and the film definitely has some very adult themes.

Larry Cohen's directorial debut is an intriguing, psychologically arresting film which plays with the mind unlike any of his other works. While he later concentrated on monsters - and humour - in films such as THE STUFF and Q THE WINGED SERPENT, HOUSEWIFE is a film based on the complex lives and relationships of three main characters - the married couple and the rapist.The interaction between the three is certainly intriguing and the gradual way in which the wife comes to love the rapist more than her husband is handled in a slow, deliberate manner. That said, there are still a number of horrific things taking place - a surreal, obscene phone call from non other than a policeman, a dead rat in a swimming pool, a car yard full of corpses.The acting is generally good all round, from the torn husband who is seduced by a young girl, to the housewife, who ranges from scared to aggressive and even murderous. Yaphet Kotto is superb as a gentle rapist. The issue of race is explored (the film cashes in on the blaxploitation era) in a genuinely interesting way. The theme of sexual intrigue runs throughout the film and much is made of it, yet it is not handled in an awkward way. If you're looking for a weird, surreal story where tables are turned and outcomes are genuinely unexpected, then HOUSEWIFE is for you.

Oh man, this film is good. Beautifully acted, the entire cast seemed to understand their place in the movie perfectly. Some very strong social observations are made within as well, making Cohen's script work on multiple levels. The way everything has a surreal feeling to it, it almost feels like a dream the whole way through. And where did Yaphet Kotto come from, and where did he go in the end? Very mysterious, but it all fits into the dream, possibly the dream of the son in Vietnam? I haven't been so excited about a comedy in awhile, this film needs to be seen. Rating: 35/40