KILLERS THREE - "This Ain't No Picnic" (1968)

I love discovering movies that were completely off my radar, and tonight's Saturday Night Special is one of those indeed! "Killers Three" is another one of those "Gun Crazy" "Bonnie And Clyde" type of movies, but this one's just a little bit different, and this Spanish poster is freakin' classic!!

The title of the film is "Killers Three," and that is a real misnomer fer shure, but one thing that is a fact, and that is this movie is a real sixties cultural iconic treasure trove!

This loving couple is Robert (THE SAVAGE SEVEN, THE MAN FROM O.R.G.Y, BEWARE! THE BLOB) Walker Jr. as poor boy Johnny Warder, and his lovely wife Carol as played by Diane (PEYTON PLACE, WILD IN THE STREETS, JOHNNY GOT HIS GUN) Varsi!

"Killers Three" is a movie about moonshiners.............

..........And the guys watching them, and as a matter of fact, a guvment agent just like this is probably looking through your window right now too!

Here he is, Mr. American Bandstand himself, a 39 year old Dick Clark as Roger C. Kirk! When I think 'actor', Dick Clark is not the first person that comes to mind, but he turns in quite a credible performance here! Dick Clark also produced "Killers Three!"  Roger is coming to visit his old Army buddy Johnny, and he's brought a present for him and his wife, an "Ant Farm!"

Roger is a little slow, and a little shy but Maureen (HOT ROD GANG, THUNDER ALLEY, A MAN CALLED DAGGER) Arthur as Elvira Sweeney gets him to break out of his shell a little bit!

Lucky for Roger, Elvira doesn't have any inhibitions at all!!

Roger has a bit of a drinking problem!

Still kickin' ass today, here's Bakersfield country music icon Merle Haggard as Carol Warder's Sheriff brother Charlie! Merle also sings a running documentary of all the events in the movie! Here's just a little taste!

Well, it's once again time for the annual Ramseur N.C. Centennial Picnic and Country Dance with entertainment brought to you by Merle's band The Strangers!

And fronting the band is the amazing Bonnie Owens, a woman so fascinating she won the heart of, and was at one time married to both Buck Owens AND Merle Haggard! Now that's a Queen of Country Music for you!

Without a doubt, these people know how to party!

Talk about an all-star affair, in the background there on the left, I'm sure that's Barack Obama, and Maggie from "The Walking Dead" dancing together!

So here's what's happening, while the big dance is going on outside of town, Johnny and Roger have this plan to use the dance as a diversion while they're in town robbing the safe of the local payroll office! They disappear from the festivities to disable all the cars by cutting spark plug wires etc, but Elvira comes looking for Roger, so for lack of a better excuse for what they are doing, Johnny explains to Elvira that him and Roger got a little bit closer than just buddies when they were in the service, and that they needed some time alone together! Needless to say, she's a little more than incensed by the whole affair and storms off!!

The safe was a little bit bigger than Roger had anticipated, so he didn't really know how much of his nitro/oatmeal mix to use on the door! Turns out it was a bit too much!

Everything was fine until something went horribly wrong! Now people are dead, and there's no turning back!

Carol's only crime was that she was madly in love with her man Johnny, but now she, along with Johnny and Roger are all wanted for murder!

The trio is on the run and hungry, so they stop in a local dive to get some chow, and who should walk in but Carol's brother Charlie! Well, Charlie's one Helluva nice guy, and he tells Johnny and Carol, that for at least 10 minutes, he's going to just go on and pretend like he never saw them, opening up an opportunity for them to escape!

Unfortunately, Roger was out of the room and didn't get the message, so an unprecedented event happens, and the King of 60's pop music promotion shoots and kills one of the biggest stars of the 60's country music scene! I find it culturally ironic!

Well, it doesn't take much imagination to figure out this movie's not going to have a happy ending!

They can try as they may, like with this poster, to make this look like a gruesome story about bloodthirsty killers, but the reality is that it's about a couple of nice naive young people who make a couple of bad decisions, and end up paying the ultimate price for it!  So, there you go! "Killers Three" is an obscure little movie worth seeking out, and you won't have to look far if you have a Netflix streaming account!