The Lady in Red *** (1979, Pamela Sue Martin, Robert Conrad, Louise Fletcher) – Classic Movie Review 10,930

‘Her father said she was a tramp. Her customers said she was fantastic.’

Director Lewis Teague’s 1979 film The Lady in Red [Guns, Sin and Bathtub Gin] is a good, cultish low-budget ($400,000) action crime drama from the Roger Corman stable, with interesting credits, which followed a series of earlier gangster pics from his New World Pictures company.

John Sayles’s script tells the tale of the cheap mistress and gun-toting moll Polly Franklin (Pamela Sue Martin) of infamous 30s gangster John Dillinger (Robert Conrad).

Sex and shoot-outs keep Teague’s film lively and loud, but it also has style and wit. Sayles makes the famous tale come up looking freshly told, helped no doubt by not feeling constrained by the facts. TV star Pamela Sue Martin (who played Fallon Carrington on Dynasty) is appealing, unexpectedly cast Conrad is effective, Louise Fletcher enjoys herself as a brothel madam, Christopher Lloyd plays Frognose, and Robert Forster has a telling uncredited cameo as Turk.

Teague and Sayles re-teamed in 1980 for Alligator, which stars Robert Forster.

Also in the cast are Robert Hogan, Glenn Withrow, Dick Miller and Alan Vint, Mary Woronov, Chip Fields, Buck Young, Phillip R Allen and Ilene Kristen.

Roger Corman is executive producer (uncredited) and Julie Corman is producer.

Robert Conrad, star of TV’s The Wild Wild West, died at 84 in February 2020.

The Lady in Red [Guns, Sin and Bathtub Gin re-release title] is directed by Lewis Teague, runs 93 minutes, is made by New World Pictures and Biograph Associates, is released by New World Pictures (1979) (US) and Barber International (1980) (UK), is written by John Sayles, is shot in Metrocolor by Daniel Lacambre, is produced by Julie Corman and Roger Corman (executive producer, uncredited), is scored by James Horner and is designed by Jac McAnelly.

© Derek Winnert 2021 Classic Movie Review 10,930

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