The Nickel Ride (1974) User Reviews

Late-noir crime story drips with 70s angst but needs tighter hand at the reins

[bmacv · 6/10 · 23 February 2003]

With its murky, monochrome photography and jangly, percussive score, The Nickel Ride could be mistaken as a film from no other decade than the 1970s. That was when the feel and the technique of movies were breaking away from the `well-made' mold enforced by studios over the previous 40 years. Some directors pioneered those changes, helping to freshen film from staled conventions by finding looser, more oblique ways to tell a story; others jumped on the bandwagon, unsure of where it was headed or quite how to get there. Robert Altman was such a pioneer; Robert Mulligan, who directed The Nickel Ride, wasn't.

Like The Friends of Eddie Coyle of two years earlier (for which David Grusin also, as here, wrote the music),The Nickel Ride inhabits the talking-big-but-living-low world of organized crime at its lower strata. Also like Eddie Coyle, it takes as its subject the last-ditch schemes and final days of a loser. Jason Miller plays a small-time operator who has his fingers in a lot of shady pies: fixing fights, middle-manning hot merchandise, even hawking bail bonds. He seems to have a past as a grifter on the carny circuit, where he met his `cracker' wife (Linda Haynes), a hoochie-coochie dancer.

Miller has secured an old commercial site with bays into which trucks can disgorge their hijacked merchandise; he hopes it will become an irresistible depot for stowing contraband. But he keeps getting the runaround from his superior, John Hillerman. Next emerges a `Cadillac cowboy' (Bo Hopkins) who Miller comes to believe has been engaged to kill him. But he falls back on the swagger and bluster that have turned him into a local hero, postures that cut little ice in the ever more impersonal and cutthroat world of crime gone corporate....

Mulligan opts to let his story just sort of happen; unfortunately, we viewers need a little more help. Sorting out the many characters and their relationships becomes a chore, and often, thanks to the abrupt cuts, we don't know where we are or why we're there. And though a large part of the movie's strength is its raffish urban milieu, even that stays unspecific (I thought it took place in lower Manhattan, but it's set and shot in Los Angeles). The Nickel Ride is an existential downer of a mid-70s crime thriller, like Eddie Coyle and Hickey and Boggs. But, unlike The Nickel Ride, that last title (directed by Robert Culp, in his sole directorial outing) brightened its bleak vision with sharper moviemaking skills.

the shadows swallow your reflection

[SteveSkafte · 7/10 · 19 April 2012]

"The Nickel Ride" is all about mood. There's a nearly-constant feeling a dread in the air. From the first scene, you get the terrifying sensation that something bad is going to happen, and that anything to the contrary is a fleeting illusion. Cooper (played by Jason Miller) is supposedly a guy who everyone likes, but it soon becomes clear that no one respects him. Maybe it's because he stopped fighting a long time ago, back when his apathy buried his anger. There's a sense of hope in him, though, but that just makes him a target. He's in a line of work that perceives anything but the iron fist as a sign of weakness - and it's these desperate days that the opening scene drops us into. Out of a nearly-waking dream, like a mirror of Miller's first film "The Exorcist", he sees something coming that's more a thing of impeding doom than that of direct prophecy.

It's a somewhat atypical film for director Robert Mulligan. He was more one for straightforward dramas, rarely tackling a subdued loner-driven narrative like this. This is also an early original script for Eric Roth, who is certainly treading much more uncomplicated ground than on his later stories. He's written something that can be carried completely by performances. "The Nickel Ride" doesn't reach very far, so it's not totally capable of the sort of staying power that keeps other 1970s classics in our minds. But the powerful uneasy feeling and the performance of Jason Miller makes it something special. This is a curious, angry, scared little alleycat of a film.

The Key Man

[bkoganbing · 7/10 · 31 December 2011]

If anyone thinks the criminal life is any kind of glamorous watching The Nickel Ride will disabuse anyone of such notions. Anyone who particularly wants to enter the life of crime.

Jason Miller stars in The Nickel Ride and he's known as the key man because of the ring of keys that are 24/7 in his possession. The keys unlock several abandoned warehouses that organized crime uses to stash whatever they've stolen in various heists until it can be fenced.

The syndicate is running out of said space and Miller is supposed to close a deal involving a whole block of these warehouses for such purposes. But for whatever reason Miller can't close the deal and his bosses such as John Hillerman are getting impatient.

Probably Miller ought to just retire, but organized crime has only one kind of retirement package and that he doesn't want.

Miller's predicament is something Richard Widmark's in Night And The City. He's not the ego-maniacal hustler that Widmark was in that classic, but he's made too many commitments he can't deliver. One was that a certain fighter he knows throw a bout where syndicate money is riding. Miller doesn't and a good friend of his, the manager of said fighter Lou Frizzel is killed. A harbinger of his own future that Miller doesn't like.

The Nickel Ride is a gritty and realistic film, as downbeat as Night In The City or The Asphalt Jungle, close but not quite in their league. One should also take note of a good performance by Bo Hopkins as the button man imported from Tulsa to do Miller in.

The Nickel Ride for some reason disappeared for years after its initial showing in theaters. Glad to see its finally out on DVD.

Slow Character Study with Fine Touches

[dansview · 7/10 · 6 May 2017]

I don't know if Jasom Miller was acting, or just being himself. His priest in The Exorcist seemed like a variation on the same character he plays here. So perhaps that's Miller's persona. He may just have an extremely intense way about him in real life that fits certain movie characters. Or he may have used technique. Either way, his intensity is always compelling.

I think the 70s was the last era when Downtown L.A. had neighborhood bars frequented by white working class men and people knew each other. In fact the film makers were trying to portray that transition here.

My favorite aspect of the film and many others from that era, was the slowness. Because you get to see that for most people, the daily routine of life is fairly mundane. There is nothing glamorous about this protagonist's daily existence.

All jobs require paper work or daily rounds, and solving problems. All romantic relationships involve eating and sleeping, and putting up with your partner's quirks.

If this is the first time Bo Hopkins appeared in a film as a cocky cowboy criminal, than I can see why it would be interesting. He pulls the same routine in some other films shortly after this one, so it gets old. But this may be the original appearance of that character. It's effective here, because his accent and clothes are so different from everyone else's.

I agree with the other reviewers that this Linda Haynes actress was good for the role. She had a weird accent and quirky looks, and seemed just the type that a guy like "Cooper" would pick up in his world.

I really liked Cooper's back story of having been a "Carny," and the girl's background as a dancer in Vegas. But I can't figure out the age dilemma. Apparently Miller was only 35 during the filming, yet he plays a guy who is basically a dinosaur in the crime world. It's said that he got started as a "kid" 19 years ago, but certainly he wasn't 16. I picture this character pushing 50, and I think Miller himself looked much older than 35. Is his birth date on IMDb an error?

If you have patience and appreciate dark character studies, you'll like this one. But don't lose focus as the plot develops, or you will not understand what our guy does for a living.

I don't know much about camera work or music, but both seemed classically 70s in their effect. Meaning real to the bone and stylish. It worked for me.

Definitely worth more than a nickel

[JohnSeal · 7/10 · 2 October 2010]

Late actor Jason Miller is best remembered (on the rare occasions he IS remembered) for his exemplary performance as Father Karras in William Friedkin's The Exorcist, but he deserves better. Gritty drama The Nickel Ride features him in perhaps the finest performance of his career as Cooper, a low-level LA hoodlum whose hold on his assigned section of town is being threatened by the arrival of new punk Turner (Bo Hopkins). It's a surprisingly complex tale of one man's slow realization that he may no longer be at the top of his game, and features very impressive widescreen cinematography by Jordan Cronenweth. Look for Magnum P.I. regular John Hillerman (you know, the dapper guy with the neat little moustache) as Cooper's boss Carl.

Very slow but I am glad I watched it .....

[PimpinAinttEasy · 7/10 · 24 November 2017]

A painfully slow noir (?) flick. Jason Miller (The Exorcist) plays an aging insomniac gangster who lays in bed staring into space. He manages local warehouses where the mob stores their stuff. We are treated to scenes from his daily life. His relationship with his wife played by the beautiful Linda Hayes. A birthday party at a local bar. And then we learn that he is out of favor with his boss and that they could be trying to ease him out of the business. It's all very vague. We are not supposed to understand all of it. There was a problem with the sound on the print that I watched. I couldn't really understand what was going on all the time. It is set in a really ugly town with many seedy bars and joints.

The Nickel Ride reminded me of Michael Mann's Thief with its themes of the domestication of a gangster and the horror of middle age. The brooding Jason Miller is terrific. Its a shame that he was working in the wrong decade when Hollywood had so many great actors.

Victor French is great in a supporting role as miller's friend. I'm glad I watched it. I don't know if i'll watch it again.

(6.5/10)

vastly underrated neo-noir in 70s Los Angeles

[chrisdfilm · 9/10 · 28 March 2005]

This is a really superb neo-noir and simultaneously realistic look at downtown Los Angeles in the beginning of the seventies. Jason Miller is perfectly cast as Cooper, the morose ex-carny-roustabout-turned-lower-echelon-crime figure. He functions as a semi-independent mob overseer of the storage and fencing of stolen merchandise for an eclectic variety of underworld thieves that cut across all racial divides. The crux of the story involves Cooper trying to close a deal on the purchase of a whole block of abandoned rail warehouses in the derelict 5th and Alameda area of downtown L.A. If he can't pull it off, it may mean the end of not only his career but his life. Director Robert Mulligan is an extremely uneven director having helmed decent pictures like TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD, THE SPIRAL ROAD, UP THE DOWN STAIRCASE and BABY, THE RAIN MUST FALL as well as sleepers like THE OTHER. But he's also had his share of clunkers like SUMMER OF '42. However, THE NICKEL RIDE is his masterpiece. Many of things that others seem to find fault with in the film is exactly what makes the picture so unpretentious and sublime. You really have to pay attention to the dialogue and interaction of characters to get the back story and relationships. Something that most viewers are either unable or unwilling to do. They want everything handed to them on a silver platter. The beauty of this film lies not only in the exceptional, low-key, non-showy performances from every single actor involved, but also the visceral evocation of the dying-on-the-vine area of downtown L.A. -- whole blocks of which have not changed much since the making of this film. Equally brilliant is the almost imperceptible building of suspense through the gradual ratcheting-up of understandable paranoia in Cooper's character. By the time of the climax the unseen aura of impending doom -- a feeling which is so borderline we're not sure if Cooper is right-on or is imagining the whole thing -- is really disturbing. There are a couple of violent shock sequences in the last third of the picture that really pack a wallop because of the orchestration of elements. As mentioned by someone else here at IMDb, THE NICKEL RIDE does take the same low-key genre approach as similar neo-noir FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE and HICKEY AND BOGGS -- and it stacks up very favorably alongside them, easily equaling their masterpiece status. Highly recommended. However, the movie was such a flop on initial release I doubt Fox will ever release it on DVD. But keep your eyes peeled because they do run it occasionally letterboxed on the Fox Movie cable channel.

Trying to ride out the storm

[sol1218 · 7/10 · 25 March 2005]

(Spoiler Alert) If it wasn't for Jason Miller's smoldering performance as the troubled paranoid and eventually doomed L.A mobster Cooper the movie "The Nickel Ride" would just die on the screen as soon as the opening credits stopped rolling.

Playing a low-level hood involved in the storage of stolen mob merchandise, at a warehouse complex that he runs in the city, Cooper is no longer of any use to his new mob bosses. Cooper's bosses now feel that his old ways of doing things is just not cutting it in this modern era of organized crime.

After 19 years on the job and being the best at it Coop's days are numbered as the syndicated is now planning to have him retired permanently. With his immediate boss Carl, John Hllerman, feeding him this line of bull about how he's falling behind in his work and now his mob boss want an even bigger piece of his cut from his storage and selling business. Carl comes to an agreement with Cooper on his payoff to the head mobsters to be increased from $8,500.00 to just under $20,000.00.

Things just don't seem to be going right for Cooper senses that somehow he's being set up for a "Hit" and all this talk about him not coming through for his mob bosses is really a diversion to keep him from realizing that. They don't really care how his operation, or block, is going they just want him to have Cooper drop his guard in order to have him whacked and then replaced.

Cooper get a message, of sorts, when his friend Paulie, Lou Frizzeli, who manages boxer Tonozzi, Mark Gordon, ends up murdered because he couldn't get his boxer to throw a fight that the mob bet heavy on for Tonozzi to lose. Feeling he still has his "touch" with the mob bosses Cooper did his best to call the "Hit" on Paulie off. When he got the bad news about Paulie from the hoodlum who "Hit" him Bobby, Richard Evens, Cooper getting him alone on an elevator almost kills him! This convinced his bosses from Carl on up that he's not suitable in their new reconstructed business and has to go.

Being introduced by Carl to his out-of-town driver Turner, Bo Hopkins, who's always in Cooper's face and obnoxious to the point where Cooper has nightmares about him being the "hit-man" sent by the new mob bosses to do him in. Cooper tries to get in touch with an old associate of his Elias, Bart Burns,to meet him outside of the city at his country home in a desperate attempt to stave off the "Hit" that he feels that's coming. In the end Cooper sees that all his fear and paranoia had some truth to it with Elias never showing up. With Cooper and his girlfriend Shara, Linda Haynes, now alone in the woods Turner, in Cooper's mind, seems to be behind every tree and ready to finish him as well as Shara off.

Surreal and dark thriller that has a number of fine twists and turns in it but it's obvious from the start that the dye was cast and Cooper was to become history by the time the movie ends. There were a number of off-beat moments in the film that didn't seem to make much sense with a dream sequence involving Turner at Cooper's country home that to me came across like an alternate ending that was left in the movie by its director by mistake.

The actual ending in the film with Turner and Cooper at his office in L.A was also very hard to accept since it made the sly and methodical Turner come across unbelievably unprofessional as a professional hit-man.

Convoluted mess...

[darrin · 5/10 · 8 August 2017]

Astounded at the rave reviews for this confusing crime yarn. There was no semblance of a storyline. Vague character study and plot. The filmmakers created a generic storyline around a shipment of merchandise. While this film managed to keep my interest toward the middle, I still have no idea what the direct storyline was about. A middle-aged hoodlum with an office? LOL!

An excellent movie to discover

[jcplanells3 · 10/10 · 24 January 2006]

Unfortunately for this film, only a few people saw it, it seems, and few appreciated it, but it is one of the most impressive films of Mulligan, specially the last scene, with Jason Miller sitting outside his office, the keys in his hands, and dead, because he has nowhere to go, and with his friend talking to him, not knowing yet that he is not alive. It is a gangsters movie in a different way that gangsters movies are: it is the end on an era, the fall of a little man in the gang, beloved by his friends, but ignored by his chiefs, that had ordered his death. One thinks that this "camera piece" was in advance of its time, and it is a pity that more people everywhere ignores one of the masterpieces of Mulligan.

This is a rare example of the mob-procedural subgenre, and should be issued as a DVD.

[daviditam2 · 19 March 2008]

This is a rare example of the mob-procedural subgenre, and should be issued as a DVD. Castro Theatre in SF screened a print -- which I surmise was somewhat faded and over-purpled/sepiaed -- 18 March 2008 with Friends of Eddie Coyle (which I thought the better of the two). Audience of over 200 applauded warmly, especially Jason Miller's very fine acting. I did not have the trouble some following the plot that commenters reported, or with knowing what was paranoia (once it played out), what was actually happening. Also, Los Angeles sprawl-downtown was instantly recognizable. I also appreciated Linda Haynes' work as cootchie-dancer.

Good little movie.

[Hey_Sweden · 7/10 · 2 February 2012]

"The Nickel Ride" is a good and intriguing low key crime drama and rather overlooked on the resume of producer / director Robert Mulligan of "To Kill a Mockingbird" fame. Jason Miller of "The Exorcist" is Cooper, a "key man" who operates the warehouses that the mob uses to house their stolen goods. As he is in the process of negotiating for more space, his boss Carl (John Hillerman) starts looking at him as being too much of a risk and opts to have him watched. Now, this movie isn't for those people who may become tired of a story where there's a lot of talk and not much action. In fact, having a lot of action isn't really the point of "The Nickel Ride" which is more about functioning as a character study. In fact, it does just fine in showing the nuts and bolts of a low level criminal's daily existence, as he interacts with various other types. Cooper is just one of a few characters who are veterans of the crime game; he doesn't feel particularly comfortable about outliving his usefulness, realizes that he just doesn't have enough pull to help out his friends, and tries to deal with what he feels is his inevitable fate, the subject of which his boss avoids. He's also a fairly detached individual, even among his friends and associates, except with his loving girlfriend, played by the immensely appealing Linda Haynes ("Rolling Thunder", "Human Experiments"). The script is humorous and intelligent; the movie isn't without some laughs and doesn't give in to utter predictability either. Now, it's not without flaws; as has been pointed out, it's hard to believe a professional hit-man would screw up as badly as we see towards the end of the story. But anchoring everything is Miller's heartfelt, quietly intense portrayal, as well as solid turns from Haynes, Hillerman, Victor French as Paddie, the ever amusing Bo Hopkins as southern fried, persistent shadow man Turner, Richard Evans as Bobby, Bart Burns as Elias, Lou Frizzell as Paulie, and Lee de Broux as Harry. Dave Grusin's music is good without being intrusive. To tell the truth, it helps the movie attain an almost documentary like approach to its narrative; "The Nickel RIde" is matter of fact, never overly sentimental, and gets very much to the point. While not anything really great, per se, it's still a well acted and efficiently directed movie, with the sort of downbeat ending common to cinema of the 1970's, and certainly deserves to be better known than it is. Seven out of 10.

Jason Miller Deserved Better

[TheFearmakers · 4/10 · 23 April 2024]

In THE NICKEL RIDE, wherein a convoluted set-up is experienced through random wandering conversations with blue collar workers, building managers, street dwellers, and a boxer asked to take a fall, the main actor, an ever-intense Jason Miller, who played the buried lead in THE EXORCIST, is in some big trouble, and there's a feeling of walking into a movie after missing the first twenty minutes...

Throughout this dialogue-driven Neo Neor with a fantastic title in THE NICKEL RIDE, be careful when reading the plot summary... An intriguing tale about a criminal wearing a skeleton key around his neck, controlling what's called "The Block," a literal boulevard of warehouses where mobsters keep their, you know, goods...

One particular new client is hesitant to join-in and Miller's ultra-serious boss, played by a 70's eclectic character-actor (in CHINATOWN the same year) who would gain fame a decade later as Tom Selleck's uppity caretaker, Higgins, on MAGNUM P. I., John Hillerman has, for mysterious reasons, no logical reason not to trust the likable neighborhood chief, Miller's Cooper...

At least not the person we got to know thus far, showing absolutely no flaws whilst completely beloved by the neighborhood... and that's exactly what we seemed to have missed, including the important aspect of how this man's calculating job works in the first place, taking us through a rushed introduction with a continuing score sounding like surreal nightmare carnival music (composer Dave Grusin fared a lot better with the similar-in-plot neo-noir THE FRIENDS OF EDDIE COYLE)...

And with a gorgeous, future ROLLING THUNDER ingenue Linda Haynes as Sarah, stubbornly hanging around to our put-upon hero's chagrin; like Charles Bronson in that same year's more entertaining and action-packed MR. MAJESTYK, the two leads venture to a hidden woodsy cabin (albeit for much different reasons), unsuccessfully hiding away from one of the most intentionally annoying hit-men in cinema history...

That being the otherwise superb Bo Hopkins as a talkative yet subtle hillbilly assassin, a cross between MIDNIGHT COWBOY and COLUMBO, whose best scene occurs during a dream, which really works in how Miller wakes up from it -- eerie and edgy in one of director Robert Mulligan's best shot scenes...

And, after escaping from Hopkins following a semi-suspenseful yet overlong exterior melodrama, Hillerman, in the midst of a noisy big-wig city party crashed by his mellow yet extremely perturbed and vengeful employee, explains the situation (as best he can but not enough to clear up the convoluted plot-line) to Cooper: and of course that snarky albatross, Hopkins, still needs to be taken out, for eternity...

So, overall, with such an incredible cast on board (including a potentially good but ultimately wasted Victor French), THE NICKEL RIDE is a real shame since Jason Miller, a swarthy "student" of the James Dean meets Marlon Brando style of brooding Method Actor spontaneity... and who brought a uniquely urban intensity, reaching beyond the horror genre in William Friedkin's THE EXORCIST... is stuck here without a coherent plot to attempt displaying what he has (or could have had) to offer audiences after his previous years' big demonic break.

Honor Among Thieves

[njp2011 · 16 May 2015]

Not so much a review as an observation. Cooper's position seems to be as much a function of his outmoded sense of honor as any other reason. His boss speaks to the corporate nature of the "higher ups" who want results while Coop seems to have a sense of obligation to the small fry who look up to him. He "carries" thieves whose goods are clogging his warehouses when he should be taking their goods and selling them off opening space for those clamoring to get in. He refuses to force a two-bit fighter who is all but washed up to take a dive and throw his career because of a friendship with his manager. His beat down of his bosses enforcer is in defense of the "little guys" who hang on in his territory by their fingernails. Their love and respect is shown in the birthday party. This notion of Coop being driven by an out of place sense of honor is what gives the denouement its sense of inevitability. He cant change. He knows it and he knows where it will lead - certainly most clearly after his "dream."

Not great but glad I finally saw this.

[TOMASBBloodhound · 7/10 · 3 April 2019]

This low-key film is almost more of a character study than a thriller, but some scenes are brimming over with tension. Jason Miller plays a guy named Cooper who has an interesting job, to say the least. He manages warehouses in downtown Los Angeles where the mafia store stolen goods. In addition to this, Cooper seems to have other Mafioso-type jobs such as fixing fights. He is under a lot of pressure to close the deal on acquiring a new block of warehousing, but the word is quickly getting around that Cooper doesn't have the gravitas to do his job anymore. Those above and below him are starting to show him less and less respect. His young wife is often griping at him, too. When a hotshot cowboy from out of town begins showing up everywhere he goes, Cooper suspects the worst. His suspicions are unfortunately right.

There is a lot to like here. The acting, by all character actors, is excellent. Except I couldn't buy Hillerman as a mobster. Even in a non-Italian mob movie he just seems too WASPish. I enjoyed the aging downtown settings of L.A. that are now definitely skid row if they are even still standing today. Miller is an acting stud. Do you believe after all the movies I've seen and even reviewed on this site, I've never seen The Exorcist? I'm sure he's great in that too. The movie is of course dated but no so bad that it distracts from the story.

My main criticisms would be with the story, or lack thereof. I wanted to know more about these characters. I wanted to know more about the secrets stored in those warehouses. That whole chunk of the movie taking place at the canyon seemed out of place. Like almost from another movie. I would have spent more time in the grime and guts of their urban world. And did the purpose of the Turner character have to be so obvious? What if he could have helped Cooper out? It would have been a nice surprise. The fix was just too in here. Cooper really had nobody who could have bailed him out. I wonder who the next guy was to get those keys. 7 of 10 stars.

The Hound.

Death of the Key Man

[mgtbltp · 9/10 · 22 January 2016]

LA Smog Noir, circa 1974

Cooper "Coop", is a small but successful cog in the LA underworld. He on top of his world, He is a fence, receiving stolen goods which he stores in the various warehouses around 5th Street in downtown LA. He is known as the "Key Man" for the large ring of keys he always carries. Business is booming, and there is a serious shortage of storage space.

The film begins at night, a tractor-trailer backs up to a loading dock. The hijackers pile out and a hood in a seersucker suit and straw hat beats on the sliding steel door of a warehouse as the rest of the crew unload the goods. The watchman opens up the door and tells the hood in the seersucker there is no room.

Cooper has been cobbling a deal to get "the block" a very large brick warehouse complex, 400,000 square feet, with rail spurs, comprising nineteen addresses, that sits on a full city block down in the 5th and Alameda district. It will be "like Grand Central Station". The word is out that the old street boss is losing control, if he doesn't deliver this block, 5th Street goes down the toilet and he'll go with it. The deal is in limbo because crooked LAPD official Elias and his downtown cronies are dragging ****, wanting more juice. Cooper's immediate boss Carl is putting pressure on him to get it done. Carl's bosses are a new breed, razor cuts, bookkeepers and lawyers who don't understand the streets.

Carl also has Coop lean on boxing manager Paulie. He wants, to have boxer Tonozzi, who has been making a bit of a comeback, take one last dive in his next bout. When Tonozzi doesn't deliver, Carl thinks Coop is slipping. Coop tells Paulie to leave town but Carl's goons get to him first. Carl also hires a goofy looking enforcer named Turner, a quasi hippy-ish, off-putting hayseed imported from Texas who wears a cowboy hat and boots with denim bell bottom jeans and a jacket embroidered with flowers on the front and a marijuana leaf on the back.

Coop has been on the job for 19 years, an ex carney, con man who worked his way West to LA then up the crime ladder. He has a live in gal pal Sarah who was working as a keno gal in Vegas when he found her, but in one sequence she demonstrates some bumps and grinds to Coop and his long time friend Paddie, the owner of the local bar. Coop's become a respected and loved 5th street neighborhood fixture, his friends and the patrons of Paddie's even throw him a surprise birthday party. This respect and love proves his undoing, the new breed of crook wants to rule on fear and brutality and Coop is coming to the end of his nickel ride.

Jason Miller is practically a double for Charles McGraw without the gravelly voice, there are some great believable performances here from Victor French (who you won't recognize) he comes off as an interesting mix of Art Carney and Walter Matthau, and from Linda Haynes the small town born, ex Vegas showgirl. The side story of Coop and Sarah and their affection for each other is well done. John Hillerman is the "Hollywood-ish" mob under-boss, and Bo Hopkins is outlandish as the politely creepy "Cadillac Cowboy" hit man. This film builds slowly in tension much like Night And The City (1950) does.

The noir-ish cinematography is excellent, emphasizing gritty, smoggy, downtown LA, an LA that's slowly succumbing to high rises and parking lots, but it also is juxtaposed by nicely composed 2.35 : 1 widescreen closeups and also throws in a sequence reminiscent of the Big Bear Lake segment featured in the Van Heflin-Robert Ryan Noir Act Of Violence (1948) The subtle soundtrack nicely compliments the storyline. 8-9/10.

A Gritty second-feature at a Drive-Inn

[canuckteach · 8/10 · 20 August 2016]

Long ago (in a galaxy far away), I saw this film as a second feature at a Drive Inn (couldn't tell you what the main feature was). We were tired, but we stuck around to see this whole film to the very end. Here I am today, in the midst of watching a film noir of the 50's, still thinking about Nickel Ride. It has a noir feel to it, right down to 'not a happy ending'.

Jason Miller ('Cooper') plays a small-time hood who manages a series of 'empty' warehouses for the 'mob'. He is known as the 'key-man', for the ring of keys (to the warehouses) he totes, and for his ability to make deals on property so that stolen goods can be stored and 'fenced' later. In the neighbourhood, he is friendly and well-regarded as a 'man about town' who looks out for the little guy. After we learn of a crisis in securing new warehouse property, the scene switches, and his associates on the street throw him a party. Now, you have to pay attention.

If you have a clipboard and a pencil, make a mark, once the 'party' begins, every time someone says or does something that shows that Cooper is in trouble. He is losing his 'grip'. Over forty years later, I recall that a small-time hood walks up to Cooper's cake and sticks his finger in the icing, in front of everybody, just to humiliate Cooper. Who would do such a thing, and why? It tells you what Cooper's mob bosses are saying about him, behind his back. Keep making marks - see how many you get before the 'Nickel Ride' is over.

Jan/21 .. wanted to add: another reviewer questioned why the 'mob' would send a middle-weight Turner (Bo Hopkins) to deal with a veteran like Cooper. I pondered that: the truth is, Turner IS expendable. The mob doesn't care if he's sloppy & ends up getting hurt. Cooper does not think highly of him & neither does anyone else. Another subtle element in this screenplay.

This is a slow unfolding of events, allegorically showing what can happen if you try to hang on too long. As the Eagles say, 'The wolf is always at the door...'

Too Late but still underrated

[s_vogelzang · 9/10 · 13 January 2019]

This title should have been made 20 years earlier. This feels like a 50's crime noir. The story starts really slow, and keeps you waiting right until the end. Despite being not as action packed as most modern or even similar aged titles, it will appeal to a certain audience. If you are into crime noir this is right up your alley. I certainly understand why it did not get much attention trough the years, but it should not be written of as badly made. Just picture it in black and white and 20 years earlier. It makes perfect sense. The star player is still stuck in the past, and is unable to chance to modern times. Modern being 1974. Of course there are plenty of other better titles, but not a bad watch for a rainy afternoon.

Excellent and underrated 70's crime noir sleeper

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 6 January 2012]

Small-time criminal Cooper (a terrifically intense, restrained, and riveting performance by Jason Miller) manages several warehouses in Los Angeles that the mob uses to store their stolen goods. Known as "the key man" for the key chain he always has on him that can unlock all the warehouses, Cooper is assigned by the local syndicate to negotiate a deal for a new warehouse because the mob has run out of storage space. However, Cooper's superior Carl (a splendidly smooth and dapper turn by John Hillerman) gets nervous and decides to have cocky cowboy button man Turner (marvelously played with swaggering bravado and rip-snorting vitality by Bo Hopkins) keep an eye on Cooper. Director Robert Mulligan, working from a vivid and involving script by Eric Roth, astutely nails the nerve-wracking pressure of eking out a living through illegal means, makes fine use of the gritty urban locations, presents a neat array of colorful, interesting, and totally believable characters, effectively creates and sustains a grim tone throughout, and depicts a harsh and realistic criminal underworld in an admirably stark and unsentimental manner. Miller completely pegs the pain and anguish of a weary and aging bottom man on the totem pole who's in over his head and saddled with more responsibility than he can easily handle; he receives bang-up support from Linda Haynes as Cooper's loyal and concerned ex-dancer girlfriend Sarah, Victor French as hearty and gregarious bar owner Paddie, Richard Evans as obnoxious flunky Bobby, Bart Burns as slippery middle man Elias, and Lou Frizzel as amiable lug Paulie. Jordan Cronenworth's crisp and lively widescreen cinematography offers a wealth of stunning visuals and gives the picture an extra kinetic buzz. Dave Grusin's spare moody score likewise does the brooding trick. The downbeat ending packs a devastating punch. A real sleeper.