GOODNIGHT, FUCKERS #830: TOUGH GUYS

 

This is not a question that would probably come up in 2024, but if you were to ask me what my favorite Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas movie is, I would not say Gunfight at the OK Corral, which would probably surprise you. Although I love that movie, my heart belongs to Tough Guys. Two elderly bank robbers get out of prison after decades and decide to pull one last heist: rob the train they got busted robbing their last time out. What good timing! Because that train is about to be retired. And an elderly hitman who took the contract on these two guys comes out of retirement himself to hunt them down. This guy, by the way, is played wonderfully by a myopic Eli Wallach.

I'm a big fan of stories about old people trying to do something they used to do a lot in their youth but can no longer reasonably expect to do. Closely related to this kind of story is the kind where young people underestimate old people who then do something horrible to surprise the fuck out of the youngsters.

But I'm bringing up Tough Guys because there's a real life "tough guy" in the news.

71-year-old Bruce Edward Bell

Bell was arrested for robbing a bank recently. It's pretty impressive, considering how he's 71 years old. He's a lifelong bank robber who has been inside four times previously and did a cumulative 40 years behind bars. He just got out of prison last year, and what does he do?

OK, yeah, he robbed a bank at gunpoint. Sure, that's no laughing matter, except as I read the news story I knew instinctively that this guy isn't a killer. Big surprise, the gun in question turned out to be fake. So it's not as tense a news story as one would think. No one got hurt. The money was recovered. Not that it should matter about that last one. It was a little more than sixty grand, which is easily covered by the FDIC, so not even the corporate scum running the bank would feel the hit if it came to it.

But Bell wasn't all that good at bank robbing. He got away with the money only to be chased down and arrested. Perhaps simply leaving the bank and getting into his car to drive away was a bad exit strategy. But you gotta give him one thing: he's consistent.

I don't imagine they'll be letting him out of prison again. Typically bank robbery is punished with up to 20 years, but I'm sure the fact that this is his fifth time doing this will ensure that he gets stuck with the full 20, no parole. But let's say he survives the sentence. It's not likely, but it's possible. He would be a free man at 91.

You know what I want to know. Maybe I'll be around for that day so I can find out. If I'm still writing GF columns at the age of 65, I'll let you know how it works out . . .