Mother, Jugs & Speed

Mother, Jugs & Speed is set in Los Angeles, where private ambulance crews compete for patients. A city contract has turned the work into a race: the first crew to reach a call and deliver the patient is the one that gets paid. The struggling F+B company, run by Harry Fishbine, relies on its veteran driver Mother, switchboard operator and paramedic Jugs, and Speed, a suspended police officer. Their rivals at Unity will do whatever it takes to beat them to the scene, and the F+B crew's own conduct is often as precarious as the emergencies they answer.

Peter Yates directed the film, the fifth of thirteen he made in chronological order, following The Friends of Eddie Coyle and preceding The Deep. Tom Mankiewicz wrote it, and he and Yates produced it for 20th Century Fox. Raquel Welch plays Jugs, Bill Cosby plays Mother, and Harvey Keitel plays Speed, with Allen Garfield, L.Q. Jones and Bruce Davison among the twenty-two credited cast members. The film runs 95 minutes and mixes comedy with drama.

Made for about 3 million dollars, it took roughly 7 million worldwide, a modest return. On IMDb it holds 5.9 out of 10 from around 3,600 votes, while on TMDB it stands at 5.4 from a small number of votes, suggesting a limited recent audience.