Directed by Larry Bishop. Starring Jeff Goldblum, Richard Dreyfuss, Ellen Barkin, Gabriel Byrne, Gregory Hines, Kyle MacLachlan, Diane Lane, Henry Silva, Michael J. Pollard, Angie Everhart, Burt Reynolds, Paul Anka, Billy Idol, Rob Reiner, Richard Pryor, Christopher Jones and Larry Bishop.

THE WORLD IS WRONG…about MAD DOG TIME aka TRIGGER HAPPY
by Andras Jones

Look up the directorial debut from Larry Bishop and you’ll find most American critics hated the film when it came out in 1996. They were wrong and, as of this writing, audiences have yet to catch up with this totally unique parallel universe gangster film. We, at The World Is Wrong podcast, aim to correct this.

The cast alone merits our attention. Jeff Golblum, Richard Dreyfuss, Ellen Barkin, Gabriel Byrne, Gregory Hines, Kyle MacLachlan, Diane Lane, Henry Silva, Michael J. Pollard, Angie Everhart, Burt Reynolds, Paul Anka, Billy Idol, Rob Reiner, Richard Pryor, Joey Bishop & Christopher Jones. Most of these already well-established stars are given the opportunity to play against type in some fascinating ways. Goldblum gets to play the sexy soft talking gangster gunfighter carrying on with both of “those Everly sisters”; Grace Everly (Diane Lane) & Rita Everly (Ellen Barkin). Barkin’s soon to be ex-husband in real life, Gabriel Byrne, is unleashed to abandon the tough guy brooding and masticate some of Bishop’s slippery slick & tricky dialogue for comic effect. It seems like almost everyone gets a great death scene or a moment of what-the-F-ness to shine.

In the epic interview he participated in for our premier episode Bishop, who grew up as a baby rat in the 1950’s (the son of rat packer, Joey Bishop) says that his directorial inspiration for this films was Dean Martin. Martin never directed a picture, but if he had it might be something like Mad Dog Time. It has that sense of, as Elmore Leonard used to say, not giving it too much. An easy charm masking a dark and active mind. Sometimes the film almost feels more like a song than a movie. Another influence Bishop cites for Trigger Happy (the film’s original title) is the work of Arthur Schopenhauer, particularly The World As Will And Representation. And if that seems like a pretentious stretch, once you’ve listened to Bishop draw the connections, it’s almost annoyingly obvious.

The best part of Bishop’s interview on The World Is Wrong podcast is listening to him talk about Christopher Jones, who has a small but pivotal role in the film. Jones and Bishop and Richard Pryor were in the 60’s classic “Wild In The Streets” and for a moment at the end of the 60’s Christopher Jones was as zeitgeisty a movie star as there was. Listening to Bishop talk with such pride about landing Jones for this part in the mid-90’s, when the actor hadn’t appeared in anything since the early 70’s, is a reminder of Jones’s greatness for that generation of actors. Even better is listening to Bishop talk about other major stars like Sean Penn and Mickey Rourke, and a young Quentin Tarantino, who were similarly in awe of Christopher Jones’s mystique.

It’s safe to say there is no other film like this double named beast of a picture, and that’s not due to fantastic scenes of graphic violence or big plot twists. It’s in the script and the performances and the attitude. Whether in the scenes of gunfights conducted by men in suits seated behind fancy desks in the basement of “Grace’s DNA” nightclub; the almost pornographic intensity Barkin and Goldblum bring to scenes where they are fully clothed and standing on opposite sides of the room; or the stoic Henry Silva laughing hysterically, you will see things in this film you just can’t see anywhere else.

This is the film Roger Ebert claimed was not “an improvement on a blank screen”. I’m sorry Roger. I am a fan of “Beyond The Valley Of The Dolls” and I get that you are dead and beloved but you are WRONG. Gregory Hines’s death scene (with Christopher Jones & Kyle MacLachlan) is worth the price of admission all on its own. And since it’s almost impossible to buy or stream this movie anywhere, your best bet is to find an illegal copy and start pestering MGM to make it available on some streaming platform.

In August of 2021 (one year after this inaugural post) one of the best film podcasts, The Projection Booth, had Andras & Bryan on as guests to discuss “Mad Dog Time” aka “Trigger Happy”. You can listen to it HERE. This episode also features Larry Bishop and set designer Dana Lipton.