{"id":10934,"date":"2025-01-28T23:38:59","date_gmt":"2025-01-29T04:38:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=10934"},"modified":"2025-01-28T23:38:59","modified_gmt":"2025-01-29T04:38:59","slug":"any-which-way-you-can","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2025\/01\/28\/any-which-way-you-can\/","title":{"rendered":"Any Which Way You Can"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Any Which Way You Can <\/strong>(1981) \u00a0 \u00a0Warner Bros.\/Action-Comedy \u00a0 \u00a0RT: 116 minutes \u00a0 \u00a0Rated PG (language, rough violence, sexual content, plenty of beer drinking) \u00a0 \u00a0Director: Buddy Van Horn \u00a0 \u00a0Screenplay: Stanford Sherman \u00a0 \u00a0Music: Snuff Garrett (supervisor) and Steve Dorff (conductor) \u00a0 \u00a0Cinematography: David Worth \u00a0 \u00a0Release date: December 17, 1980 (US) \u00a0 \u00a0Cast: Clint Eastwood, Sondra Locke, Geoffrey Lewis, William Smith, Ruth Gordon, Harry Guardino, Barry Corbin, John Quade, Bill McKinney, Michael Cavanaugh, Al Ruscio, Dan Vadis, Anne Ramsey, Logan Ramsey. \u00a0 \u00a0 Box Office: $70.6M (US)<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: *** \u00bd<\/p>\n

\u00a0I actually like\u00a0Any Which Way You Can<\/strong>\u00a0better than its 1978 predecessor Every Which Way But Loose for a few reasons. It has more of a plot. It co-stars William Smith (Conan the Barbarian), one of my favorite old school tough guys, as Philo Beddoe’s opponent in a major East Coast\/West Coast bare-knuckle fight set up by the Mafia.\u00a0Also, it has the distinction of being the first Clint Eastwood movie I saw at the cinema. \u00a0I went on my own to see it one Sunday afternoon in January 1981 and had an absolute blast. I hadn’t laughed this hard (or frequently) since 1979’s The North Avenue Irregulars. It also marked the beginning of my appreciation for Clint. After this one, I never missed a single one of his movies at the theater unless you count the Charlie Parker biopic Bird (1988). In any event, if Clint appeared in a movie, Movie Guy 24\/7 appeared at the theater.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Getting back to my review, the audience knows right away that they’re in for a good time as the movie opens with a Ray Charles\/Clint Eastwood tune called (appropriately enough) “Beers To You”. You read the right, Eastwood himself sings on the movie’s soundtrack. He doesn’t have that bad of a singing voice. That last statement is subject to debate by anyone who’s endured his 1969 musical fiasco Paint Your Wagon co-starring the equally musically dubious Lee Marvin.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Philo Beddoe decides to retire from fighting, but when the Mafia offers him $25,000 to fight the East Coast bare-knuckle champion Jack Wilson (Smith), he agrees to one last bout. He still lives in the San Fernando Valley with his elderly, potty-mouthed mother (Gordon), best friend Orville (Lewis) and pet orangutan Clyde.<\/p>\n

\u00a0One night, he encounters an old friend at the Palomino honky-tonk bar, his former girlfriend Lynn Halsey-Taylor (Locke). Nobody’s forgotten her irrational and selfish actions from the previous film. He doesn\u2019t exactly welcome her back with open arms. She reveals that she’s been singing for free at the Palomino in hopes that she would eventually cross paths with Philo again. He’s the only man that ever treated her right. She wants another chance. When he learns that she’s been staying at the YWCA (she has no money), he invites her to stay at his house. So begins a new romance.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Clyde has learned a new trick since the last time we saw him. He likes to defecate in police cars. He’s also fallen in love with the new female orangutan at the zoo in Bakersfield. Ma is as feisty and foul-mouthed as ever, still complaining about Clyde crapping all over and stealing her beloved Oreos. The Black Widows (the motorcycle gang from the first movie) still hold a grudge against Philo. They still fail at every attempt to take him down much to the dismay of their exasperated (and equally incompetent) leader Cholla (Quade).<\/p>\n

\u00a0After some persuasion by Lynn, Philo changes his mind about fighting in the big match and returns the Mafia’s money. They retaliate by kidnapping Lynn and holding her hostage thus forcing Philo to take part in what’s being called the “Fight of the Century”. A lot of people have big money riding on the fight and they all flock to the quiet town in Wyoming where the two men are supposed to duke it out.<\/p>\n

\u00a0There’s a lot going on in\u00a0Any Which Way You Can<\/strong>. It would grossly unfair to reveal all of it here; I wouldn’t want to spoil the fun. That being said, I’ll move on to the performances in\u00a0the movie. What can I say? They’re not Oscar-worthy performances, but the cast looks like they’re having a good time. Why shouldn’t they be?\u00a0If Clint doesn\u2019t mind all the silliness, neither should the rest of the gang. Locke turns in a slightly better performance this time around, but she still has a long way to go if she ever wants to be considered a serious actress. Gordon is still the human MVP. Clyde is hilarious! Wait till you see his \u201cRight turn!\u201d trick. Smith, he\u2019s just awesome.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Any Which Way You Can<\/strong>\u00a0is just as dumb as its predecessor, but the presence of an actual plot makes it a slightly better movie. Just bear in mind that it’s a redneck comedy which means the viewer shouldn’t expect anything that challenges the intellect. Once again, there’s plenty of cool fighting action, crude humor, slapstick comedy, beer and great country music. This time, look for cameo appearances by Fats Domino, Glen Campbell and Jim Stafford. Smith makes a nice addition to the cast and Clyde gets to monkey around a lot more this time like when he spends the night with the orangutan of his desire in a motel room.<\/p>\n

\u00a0In short, Any Which Way You Can<\/strong> is another silly comedy starring Clint and a primate. But it’s so entertaining you’re willing to forgive the obvious lack of intellectual stimulation in the movie. Once again, just turn off your brain and enjoy!\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Any Which Way You Can (1981) \u00a0 \u00a0Warner Bros.\/Action-Comedy \u00a0 \u00a0RT: 116 minutes \u00a0 \u00a0Rated PG (language, rough violence, sexual content, plenty of beer drinking) \u00a0 \u00a0Director: Buddy Van Horn \u00a0 \u00a0Screenplay: Stanford Sherman \u00a0 \u00a0Music: Snuff Garrett (supervisor) and Steve Dorff (conductor) \u00a0 \u00a0Cinematography: David Worth \u00a0 \u00a0Release date: December 17, 1980 (US) \u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10960,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/Any-Which-Way-You-Can-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10934"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10934\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10962,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10934\/revisions\/10962"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10960"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}