Cat Ballou.

Review #2390: Cat Ballou.

Cast: 

Jane Fonda (Cat Ballou), Lee Marvin (Kid Shelleen and Tim Strawn), Michael Callan (Clay Boone), Dwayne Hickman (Jed), Nat King Cole (one of the shouters), Stubby Kaye (one of the shouters), Tom Nardini (Jackson Two-Bears), John Marley (Frankie Ballou), Reginald Denny (Sir Harry Percival), Jay C. Flippen (Sheriff Cardigan), Arthur Hunnicutt (Butch Cassidy), Bruce Cabot (Sheriff Maledon), Burt Mustin (the accuser), and Paul Gilbert (Train Messenger) Directed by Elliot Silverstein.

Review: 

This was based on a book, you know. Roy Chanslor wrote The Ballad of Cat Ballou in 1956, two years after his other work Johnny Guitar had been made into a movie. There were plans to make a movie from the get-go, with Tony Curtis and Burt Lancaster being tapped to star in the film and it went by the wayside to eventually being produced by Harold Hecht for Columbia Pictures. Two writers are credited for the screenplay with Walter Newman and Frank Pierson, although Lee Marvin would take certain liberties for his main performance. Interestingly, this was the first movie directed by Elliot Silverstein. The Boston native changed his major when studying at Boston College from biology to drama and later went to Yale. He produced and directed plays at Brandeis University. He soon directed episodes for several television shows for over a decade that ranged from The Westerner to The Twilight Zone. It was he who suggested Marvin for the film after Kirk Douglas rejected the role, which probably worked better than trying to go with José Ferrer (Silverstein also came up with casting Nat King Cole and Stubby Kaye as basically a "Greek chorus"). Silverstein directed five further feature movies (probably the most known is A Man Called Horse [1970]), but Silverstein kept directing for television into his late sixties before retiring to work on other ventures, which saw him teach film at USC; he died in 2023 at the age of 96.* The movie was filmed on a relatively quick basis between shooting in Colorado and later Hollywood that apparently took around six weeks. The movie (as released in late June 1965) was a fair hit and was apparently interesting enough to inspire two different television pilots (1970, 1971).

The movie was made as a breezy one to play with the familiar scenarios set out by other past Westerns, as one does for a story that involves trying to recruit a gunfighter to settle a score and the quirks that come with ballads and other such things. It might not the great phenomenon that one might expect six decades on, but there is something that is fun to see in the familiar aspects of looking at a frontier and having the funny bone at least be tickled with the energy of an old shoe. It doesn't wear out its welcome at 96 minutes in resourceful little charms that come out, whether that involves the parts with Cole & Kaye jumping in or a horse having its legs crossed. A good deal of the lingering "hang-ups" one could have with the movie could also be answered with "and yet...". Movie isn't consistent in its joke? And yet it was still fun. Marvin's performance isn't really much a double-act? And yet he still is fun in it for those who adore his everyman qualities. Hell of a time to find out I never had watched a movie with Jane Fonda in it. The daughter of Henry Fonda, she had an interest in the arts at a young age and made her film debut with Tall Story (as directed by her godfather Joshua Logan in 1960); apparently, she got offered the role because the manager for Ann-Margret rejected the offer for her. Evidently, she and Marvin apparently didn't think Cat Ballou was going to turn out particularly good, and yet, here we are. She may be playing the straight one in comparison to a couple of loons and killers around her, but she still does pretty well with what she has to work with, growing into the type of mold that one really would sing ballads about. Go figure that it was this particular movie, this particular Western, that saw Lee Marvin win an Academy Award (on his only nomination, no less).** He could be the villain in stuff like The Big Heat (1953), or a cop with M Squad, or have top billing with The Killers (1964), but this was the movie that apparently made him more of a star. Alcohol or no alcohol, he clearly is having a ball with the character of Shelleen, unwieldly and brimming in the same way one might talk about an old peacock that is delightful to watch. There isn't too much to really say about Lee's portrayal of Strawn besides the casual "heavy" factor that is played from time to time (complete with tin nose), but the movie isn't really about detailed heavies anyway, so it's fine by me. The support around Fonda and Marvin are fine, with Cole (in his last film appearance, as he died in February 1965) and Kaye make for a delightful chorus, carrying the film a bit in observations. The movie is here and there when it comes to things that aren't familiar for viewers of the Western, but ultimately, Cat Ballou is a treat for those who buy into what it is selling, one that has fun with its characters and surroundings for a delightful time.

Overall, I give it 8 out of 10 stars.

*Incidentally, Silverstein was a key figure for the Directors Guild of America in a number of respects, such as making a push for the Director's Cut and also getting a proper workspace for directors such as he.

**Marvin beat the following actors for the award: Richard Burton (The Spy Who Came In from the Cold), Laurence Olivier (Othello), Rod Steiger (The Pawnbroker), and Oskar Werner (Ship of Fools). The movie also had four Academy Award nominations: Newman and Pierson for their screenplay, Charles Nelson for Editing, Frank De Vol for Original Score, and Jerry Livingston & Mack David for Best Song in "The Ballad of Cat Ballou". Also: I wait for the chance to encounter that other Western offbeat movie with Marvin in Paint Your Wagon (1969).