The Outlaw Josey Wales.

Review #2554: The Outlaw Josey Wales.

Cast: 

Clint Eastwood (Josey Wales), Chief Dan George (Lone Watie), Sondra Locke (Laura Lee Turner), Bill McKinney (Captain Terrill), John Vernon (Fletcher), Paula Trueman (Grandma Sarah Turner), Sam Bottoms (Jamie), Geraldine Keams (Little Moonlight), Woodrow Parfrey (Percy Long), Joyce Jameson (Rose), Sheb Wooley (Travis Cobb), Royal Dano (Ten Spot), Matt Clark (Kelly), John Verros (Chato), Will Sampson (Ten Bears), William O'Connell (Sim Carstairs), Madeleine Taylor Holmes (Grannie Hawkins), John Quade (Ciril E. Forebaugh), Frank Schofield (Senator James Henry Lane), Buck Kartalian (Shopkeeper), Len Lesser (Abe), and Doug McGrath (Lige)

Directed by Clint Eastwood (#1252 - Space Cowboys, #1310 - Million Dollar Baby, #1476 - Pale Rider, #1501 - Unforgiven, #1550 - Gran Torino, #1638 - Bird, #1757 - Sudden Impact, #1831 - High Plains Drifter, #2487 - The Rookie)

Review: 

"When people stop me in the street, it tends to be about Josey Wales. They seem to like that one. I rented it recently, it still holds up."

As we approach the Semiquincentennial of America, I suppose it only makes sense to cover a film that came across in the dawn of the Bicentennial fifty years ago. The movie was based on a book called The Rebel Outlaw: Josey Wales (titled Gone to Texas in later editions), which was published in 1973 with the writer being listed as Forrest Carter. He had sent the book unsolicited to Eastwood's office with a letter talking about "Eastwood's kind eyes", and go figure, producer Robert Daley felt it looked like a good idea to approach it to Eastwood, who soon agreed to work with optioning Carter's book. When Philip Kaufman looked at the book for the first time, he thought, well, that it was written by a "crude fascist". He co-wrote the screenplay with Sonia Chernus, which included the characters of Terrill and Fletcher that was not previously included in the book. It didn't help with filming, as disagreements with Eastwood in the shooting led to Kaufman's firing in favor of Eastwood, which he once said was "the worst moment of my life"*. It was his fifth film as a director, after the release of The Eiger Sanction (1975). The resulting film made over eight times its $3 million budget back with audiences when released (premiering in late June for a festival before going into release in July and August). As for Carter, he actually was born Asa Earl Carter, an Alabama-born segregationist who for whatever reason decided to try and rebrand himself as a writer with Cherokee background that lived in Abilene, Texas. Sure, there were rumbling questions about who Carter really as early as 1975 (only a few years prior, he ran a failed campaign for governor of Alabama), but Carter kept the facade on long enough to have written three further books, one of which was The Education of Little Tree (which was adapted into a film in 1997). He died at the age of 53, which apparently came after choking on his own vomit after a fight with his son. Plans to do a movie based on his second novel with the Wales character in The Vengeance Trail of Josey Wales (1976) did not come to pass with Eastwood involved. In 1986, Michael Parks directed and starred in The Return of Josey Wales, which dealt with confronting corrupt lawmen in Mexico.

Sure, you might wonder how it goes to make a movie about an ex-Confederate guerilla (incidentally, Jesse James was one of them), particularly with a person that believed that the "values of a civilization never died so long as they’re kept alive in legend.” Simply put, there are people who really thought there was a lost cause to a group of losers who never won a war, never deserved a monument to being traitors, and never did anything meaningful for the United States of America besides dying, because goddamn it, you should know the war was fought over slavery before you leave high school*. But, and this is the important part, it is such a worthwhile movie to see a tale of a man at war with himself that becomes whole again (besides, some people called Dirty Harry "fascist", it didn't stop them from making four more of those movies), or at least much as possible when the iron in his words is akin to the iron of a pistol. All he wants to do is move on and pick up what was broken in him from the war and move on. As Eastwood once said, man becomes his most creative in war, so you can only do so much to clean the blood stain from the tapestry. It isn't even that much of a revenge tale, because McKinney (and to a lesser extent in adversarial nature, Vernon) is not present in the movie as much as, say, George is for the 135-minute runtime, as if to suggest that it matters to see the frontier for what it really is beyond the cliches matters more than if one is going to rattle the sabre right into a man's heart, which, well, yes. It's a violent movie that also has plenty of offbeat moments, such as the moment where one says that hell is coming to breakfast. Everything collides for a reckoning of the soul, whether that's Eastwood and his ambivalence, George and his straightforward nature or otherwise. New order, old order, we thrive on the myths and tales we tell for ourselves, regardless of where they may spring from. As a whole, The Outlaw Josey Wales freewheels history and the usual conventions of the Western for a pretty solid result in offbeat entertainment that is expertly filmed and executed by Eastwood and company for a movie that reckons with community and what really matters to live or die on the frontier.

Overall, I give it 9 out of 10 stars.

Song of the day!

*If one goes by this interview, Kaufman has never seen the film: Philip Kaufman: The Hollywood Interview | The Hollywood Interview

*If I remember correctly, my dad had a license plate cover of the Confederate battle flag. And yet, I turned out the way I did. 

Apocalypse Now.

Review #1460: Apocalypse Now.

Cast: 
Marlon Brando (Colonel Walter E. Kurtz), Martin Sheen (Captain Benjamin L. Willard), Robert Duvall (Lieutenant Colonel Bill Kilgore), Frederic Forrest (Jay 'Chef' Hicks), Sam Bottoms (Lance B. Johnson), Laurence Fishburne (Tyrone 'Clean' Miller), Albert Hall (Chief Phillips), Harrison Ford (Colonel Lucas), Dennis Hopper (Photojournalist), G.D. Spradlin (General R. Corman), Jerry Ziesmer (Jerry, Civilian), and Scott Glenn (Lieutenant Richard M. Colby) Directed by Francis Ford Coppola (#592 - Dementia 13 and #1139 - Supernova)

Review: 
"We were in the jungle, there were too many of us, we had access to too much money, too much equipment, and little by little we went insane"

The 1970s were a tremendous decade for Francis Ford Coppola, so it only makes sense to cover the last film of that era, one characterized by the highs and lows of the "New Hollywood" movement.
He had a hand in six films for the decade: Patton (1970, co-wrote the screenplay), The Godfather (1972, director and co-writer), The Conversation (1974, as writer, producer, and director), The Great Gatsby (1974, screenplay), and The Godfather Part II (1974, co-writer, director, producer), and this film. Coppola was born in Detroit but raised in Queens, New York as the son of music composer Carmine Coppola (who would work with his son on a couple of his films). He graduated from both Hofstra University and the UCLA Film School (the former in theater arts and the latter in film), with one notable influence on Coppola being Dorothy Arzner, a former film director who was on the staff at the time. Coppola's career in film started in 1962 with three films: The Bellboy and the Playgirls, Tonight for Sure, and Battle Beyond the Sun (the first and latter were English edits), with his next feature being the cult classic Dementia 13 (1963). He spent the next few years doing a few scripts and further directorial efforts (such as the hit You're a Big Boy Now) before the aforementioned luck in the 1970s, where he won a total of five Academy Awards on fourteen nominations.

This was inspired by Joseph Conrad's novella Heart of Darkness, written in 1899 under the inspiration of his travels on a river steamer sailing up the Congo River (both focus on a character named Kurtz). The screenplay was written by John Milius and Coppola, with narration by Michael Herr (a war correspondent most known for his book Dispatches that detailed his experiences in Vietnam). The initial director in mind to do the film was George Lucas. He worked for years with Milius to develop the project while busy with other scripts, and he had wanted to do it after THX 1138 (1971) with the intent to shoot in both California and South Vietnam on a modest budget of $2 million with 16mm cameras and real soldiers, although this did not come to pass. Coppola was eventually drawn to the script and initially aimed to produce the film before eventually pressing on to do it himself, which he had described as a "comedy and a terrifying psychological horror story". It would take years to ultimately plan and shoot the film, since it was originally set to be a four month shoot in the Philippines for release in 1977. There were of course a few obstacles that made this impossible. The original choice for the Willard character was Harvey Keitel (since others like Steve McQueen did not want to leave America for a significant amount of time), but Coppola soon found that Keitel was not quite right for the role, which led to Sheen being brought in. Describing the amount of production quirks almost sounds like a routine of dark humor. A typhoon wrecked a majority of the sets not long after production started. Sheen had a heart attack that took him off filming for a month (with his brother Joe filling in as a double and voice over at times). Brando showed up to the set severely overweight and hadn't read the script or the book. The film premiered in May 1979 at the Cannes Film Festival while not fully finished at three hours (where Coppola famously stated that his film was not about Vietnam but rather was Vietnam). Nowadays there are multiple editions to possibly view, such as the original 153 minute version, Apocalypse Now Redux (2001, which re-inserted deleted footage that runs at 196 minutes), and Apocalypse Now Final Cut (2017, which was trimmed to 183 minutes).

For a film that runs at a significant length and with such production quirks, it is amazing how well the film works as a look upon the dark parts of a man's soul when it comes to the horrors of war with such tenacity and depth to make for one of the most seminal films of its era and for epic war films as a whole. It is an experience like no other in ways that other films could only dream to do in terms of haunting timelessness, because it is something that can linger in our mind now more than ever. For a man who had his quarrels with Coppola and takes his time to show up in full detail, Brando generates a tremendous performance of stature, a poet warrior's voice from the dark that is intently fascinating to view in those moments for the clear-minded-but-darkened-soul that doesn't have to say much (Coppola edited down a rambling monologue by Brando to only a few minutes) to generate awe. Sheen follows along with great ambiguity, a passive presence that we have absolutely no trouble in following along with in a path of weariness as a changed man of war, right from the very first scene where he punches a mirror with his bare hand. Duvall makes for quite a fanatical presence in such a quick amount of time, a man that we can smell the napalm with in clear detail. The others in the cast prove worthy to travel along with, including a young Fishburne and a dazed Bottoms to go with the eccentrically on-point Hopper and bit highlights for Spradlin and Ziesmer. This is not a film that tests one's patience as much as it is one that probes into your patience, filled with a tremendous look by Vittorio Storaro in cinematography that makes a devastating classic worth checking out as a portrait of what can drive a man to certain actions in war under the guise of morality that leaves its audience fully stunned and ultimately satisfied for having watched it.

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.

The Last Picture Show.

Review #1000: The Last Picture Show.

Cast: 
Timothy Bottoms (Sonny Crawford), Jeff Bridges (Duane Jackson), Cybill Shepherd (Jacy Farrow), Ben Johnson (Sam the Lion), Cloris Leachman (Ruth Popper), Ellen Burstyn (Lois Farrow), Eileen Brennan (Genevieve), Clu Gulager (Abilene), Sam Bottoms (Billy), Randy Quaid (Lester Marlow), Gary Brockette (Bobby Sheen), Sharon Taggart (Charlene Duggs), Barc Doyle (Joe Bob Blanton), Bill Thurman (Coach Mr. Popper), Jessie Lee Fulton (Miss Mosey), Joe Heathcock (Town Sheriff), John Hillerman (English Teacher), and Frank Marshall (Tommy Logan) Directed by Peter Bogdanovich.

Review: 
Here it is. The big one. I hope to satisfy you folks with the review of this film, which I had been longing to do for quite some time, so what better way than now? It also happens to be a film set and shot in my home state of Texas. Enjoy the show.

It sometimes feels hard to explain the benefits or the highlights of the town you live in, especially if you live in a small city. What does it have that another city doesn't have? Is there much to having civic pride? Based on the 1966 novel of the same name by Larry McMurtry, The Last Picture Show is an interesting look into what makes up a dying little town such as this, and the characters that live in it. Bottoms and Bridges are a fairly effective duo, each having an interesting quality to them that stands out, such as Bottoms' eyes and Bridges' charm, and they both do tremendous jobs that stick out in a cavalcade of stand-out performances. Shepherd (in her debut role) does a spirited job, managing to be interesting along with alluring. Near the halfway point of the film, Johnson's character reminisces about the time spent in a prairie, and the way that he talks about old memories seem like something you could hear from someone in your neck of the woods if you gave a listen. He doesn't have too many lines (in fact he is in the film for nine minutes), but it is the way that he expresses them that makes him an enduring figure in the film, as if he was the soul of the town. Leachman also pulls a capable job, particularly during the climax. The rest of the cast stick out in their own little ways. This film was nominated for six Academy Awards, with Johnson and Leachman winning for supporting roles. These are characters worth watching because these are characters that we can see with fair honesty. They don't suddenly become comic characters for no reason, nor do they become melodramatic, and that serves to be a key highlight and something worth striving for in film today. Is it a bleak film? At times it is, but it also manages to be moving along with enduring, and Bogdanovich is the one responsible for making a movie as put together and complete as this one is.

The city's flatness and empty nature is perfectly captured by the cinematography by Robert Surtees, in part because of how he arranges the shots; the fact that it is shot in black-and-white (decided by Bogdanovich through a conversation with Orson Welles) also helps in showing this town (and its people) with a certain aesthetic that proves fitting for the movie. Everything from the music (with songs from artists such as Hank Williams) to even the clip of the "last picture show" (from the ending of Red River) is planned out in an effective manner. The film proved to be a success upon release, and a Special Edition Director's cut was released in 1992 that added seven minutes to the run-time (making it 127 minutes) that adds a bit to the film's stature. It's a coming-of-age film, but it also is an honest movie that never seems to break its mood nor its intentions. This is a movie worth watching in part because of how it captures the essence of the time it portrays along with its town that seem fresh even after over 40 years since its release.

I just wanted to give a word of thanks to any and all viewers of Movie Night over the past one thousand reviews. It has been a pleasure doing so many reviews in nearly seven years, and I will be the first to say that they have improved in quality over time - but having at least a few people read them (and share appreciation on occasion) feels nice. I do not know what is in store for the next batch of reviews, but I hope that you will enjoy them. Thank you. 

Overall, I give it 10 out of 10 stars.

Attached is a compilation of various celebratory landmarks over the past few years, from the 50th all the way to now. Enjoy: