There is no question that this film is dated, New York is much nicer than before. But the chase scene involving ex-cop Sean Boyd (James Brolin) vs psychotic Gus Soltic (Cliff Gorman), who kidnapped his daughter Kathy out of error (He thought she was rich), vs corrupt cop Sgt. Otis Barnes (Dan Hedeya), makes the film work. Barnes is without question the worst of the worst, he not only wanted to get Boyd for testifying against him, but wanted to let Soltic get away with his daughter. Spoilers: I liked it when this guy got torn apart in the zoo. Maria (Julie Carmen) really works well as the love interest. He meets her on the (6) train, and she helps him navigate around through the South Bronx, and at the zoo, she also stands up to gang bangers who complain about Boyd being with "Our Women." The best character is Lt. Torelli (Richard Castellano), who starts out very suspicious of Boyd, then starts to take his side, and along with Maria become the only allies that Boyd has. I liked the film a lot, but the dating requires a deduction of 2 stars. 8/10.

A great yet undeservedly obscure entry in the New York as Urban Wasteland cinema genre of the 70's and 80's. Put this one in there along with "Fort Apache: The Bronx," "Taxi Driver," the "Death Wish" series, "Escape From New York," Roberta Findlay's "Tenement," and "The Warriors." Recognizing that from the perspective of 2010, our collective image of New York City is no longer like this, after over two decades of sprucing the place up, you young'uns who don't have any memory of that period can get a good snapshot of the rampant fear and paranoia of those days in this film. It gives that same added emotional frisson you would get watching a fictional World War II movie that was made during the War itself, realizing how seriously both the filmmakers and the audiences at that time would have looked upon this fictional presentation as a representation of reality, knowing that lives were still on the line and the whole crappy situation was very much in full effect.The film's intentions are made clear as within five minutes into the movie, we get terrorism, a woman trying to kill maurading rats with a broom handle, and a hot dog vendor telling the hero, Jim Brolin, "Did you know that 10,000 people left New York last month?" The Psycho of the Hour, the "Juggler" of the title, a racist and a scumbag, kidnaps a little girl and holds her for ransom. Her father is a rich real-estate developer, who Psycho Pants blames for destroying his South Bronx neighborhood by "letting the N*****s and the S****s move in" and destroy all the buildings. Or, so he thinks.But dummy has kidnapped the wrong girl: she's really the daughter of James Brolin, an ex-cop with an anger management problem and a total lack of fear. Now in order to track down the Psycho, Brolin is unleashed on an apocalyptic Manhattan landscape, where he careens around like a pinball in a pinball machine (contemporary reference there), crashing trucks, stealing police cars, getting in fights with peep show booth bouncers and Puerto Rican gang members, and beating the tar out of all of them. Brolin also gets hold of a psycho cop on his tail, played with eye-bulging glee by Dan "Noon O Clock Shadow" Hedaya, and pushes Hedaya into a pen of vicious, snarling attack dogs, who then proceed to bite him a new one! Yowch! Meanwhile, character actor great Richard S. Castellano is the lead cop on the case(s), who doesn't have contact with Brolin's character, but is sort of watching him from afar. It's all building up to the final conflict between Brolin and the psychotic kidnapper in an underground bunker full of steam pipes. Yeah, just like every other movie ever made (Terminator 2, Commando, Robocop...I could go on, but I won't).This is REALLY sleazy and action-packed for a major studio release and I loved it! Plus you get to see some great footage of Manhattan in its grimy prime and the devastated South Bronx landscape.Sure, the plot is over-the-top and ridiculous; Brolin attacks almost everyone he comes into contact with, including his ex-wife, and he's supposed to be the Good Guy; his daughter is not the most appealing character; and the Police are all portrayed as barely competent idiots. I didn't care. I still enjoyed this movie immensely.That title does bite the big one, though.

This movie has it all if you love raw b-movie action. Brolin plays an ex-cop turned trucker who's on a personal manhunt to catch the maniac that kidnapped his daughter on her birthday. This sets Brolin's character on a chase across NYC from the subways to strip clubs to dog pounds and beyond.This movie was a legend back in the day for my friends and I. We caught it on late night cable, but never managed to grab the full name of the film or the stars. What we did catch was the INCREDIBLE chase scene that takes the characters from cars to buses to trains to on foot as they crisscross Manhattan. Yeah, Bullitt and The French Connection are good and all, but the Night of the Juggler chase scene makes the action in those films seem average, if not unambitious.This movie is sort of like the pinnacle of 70s/80s street-style film making. It has the intense, raw camera work of Bruce Lee or Chuck Norris flicks, paired with a vision of New York City akin to Wild Style (and maybe even just a hint of the Warriors). The characters here are a bizarre amalgam of clichés that still excite despite being retreads in many ways.The bottom line - score this movie if you can! Far as I know, VHS was the final destination for this film in terms of home video. I bought my copy off of the Internet years ago and the tape was so old that it was broken. But I was determined to watch this flick (because it's so good!), so I cracked the case opened and and spent hours repairing the tape myself. It's just that awesome.

As gritty, dirty, grungy urban thrillers go, The Night Of The Juggler manages to be a pretty unpleasant experience, and that's NOT a recommendation. Car chases, fist fights, sleazy porno joints, gangland violence and a maniac cop are all thrown into the mix but to little avail. Director Robert Butler expends all his energy on the seedy elements but forgets to create sympathetic characters and situations, resulting in one long wallow in cinematic filth. At least the pacing is fairly relentless, though that alone is hardly reason enough to watch.Ex-cop Sean Boyd (James Brolin) witnesses his daughter's abduction by unhinged weirdo Gus Soltic (Cliff Gorman). After giving chase but losing them in the busy streets of New York, Boyd has to reluctantly seek the aid of the NYPD in tracking down his little girl. Finding that the cops are pretty unhelpful, Boyd goes on a destructive rampage through the impoverished streets in search of his daughter. Along the way he upsets mad cop Sgt Otis Barnes (Dan Hedaya), who pursues him with a shotgun and causes more mayhem than the average criminal might consider pertinent in a day's work. Eventually Boyd discovers that his kid was not the intended target of the kidnapper – it was actually a millionaire businessman's daughter that the deranged villain meant to snatch. Still, with his daughter in the hands of the maniac he relentlessly hunts for clues as to her whereabouts and eventually tracks down the abductor and his victim to an underground lair beneath a ruined tower block, where a bloody final confrontation takes place.Brolin goes through the film wearing a fixed snarl and solving all his problems and frustrations by beating the hell out of everyone who stands in his way. Amazingly, he's the good guy in all this, but if you were to wander into the film late you might not realise that, such is the nature of his destructive and volatile character. Gorman is hopeless as the kidnapper, in a role that provokes more unintentional laughter than fear. Hedaya creates the most memorable character, playing the maniac cop - who becomes a hindrance rather than a help to our hero - with over-the-top glee. The lensing by Victor J. Kemper makes New York appear squalid and unappealing in the extreme – now that might be fine in a film like Taxi Driver, where the squalor and filth was dwelled upon very deliberately and added to the disintegration of the De Niro character, but in Night Of The Juggler the setting isn't supported by the bubble-gum plot, and succeeds only in making the film look ugly. There's plenty of foul language and car wrecking going on here, if that's your kind of thing, but on the whole Night Of The Juggler is an unconvincing urban thriller that will have most viewers reaching for the "off" button.