The Cowboys (1972)

          Although John Wayne’s actual cinematic swan song was The Shootist (1976), which depicts an aging gunfighter’s quest for death with dignity, the Duke’s earlier film The Cowboys is in many ways a richer closing statement about the themes Wayne spent decades exploring in Western movies. Instead of merely pondering the question of whether a man who lives by the gun must die by the gun—the poignant central theme of The Shootist—The Cowboys explores all the qualities, bad and good, that defined the Duke’s screen persona. His character, Wil Andersen, combines frontier values, heroic self-sacrifice, macho stoicism, and, of course, that most American of qualities: rugged individualism. The fact that Andersen’s journey inadvertently inspires a group of boys to become young men molded in Andersen’s honorable image perfectly echoes the manner in which Wayne’s characters inspired generations of moviegoers. So, whether you love or hate Wayne’s on- and off-screen politics, it’s easy to appreciate the elegance of this picture’s symbiosis between star and story.

          Based on a novel by William Dale Jennings and adapted for the screen by Jennings and the husband-and-wife duo Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr., The Cowboys tells a simple story about noble characters clashing with craven ones. In the beginning of the movie, rancher Andersen preps for a cattle drive until his crew abruptly quits to join the Gold Rush. In short order, Andersen finds himself interviewing an unlikely set of replacements—several schoolboys, some teens and some even younger. When the kids display unexpected determination, he agrees to hire them. However, word of available work also attracts a gaggle of varmints led by Asa Watts (Bruce Dern), whom Andersen quickly identifies as a dangerous type. Andersen refuses to hire Asa’s gang, and then sets off on the drive with the kids as his crew. A series of frontier adventures ensues, during which Andersen gruffly mentors the boys on what it takes to succeed in the cattle biz. Meanwhile, Asa’s nefarious gang trails the cowboys, eventually leading to an infamous showdown between Dern and Wayne—the climax of the duel won’t be spoiled here, but suffice to say one single moment helped cement Dern’s typecasting as a crazed villain.

          Although the storyline of The Cowboys is so schematic as to seem a bit like a fable, the piece works—mightily—because of immaculate craftsmanship and vivacious performances. Director Mark Rydell, himself a thespian, does a gorgeous job of blending different types of acting, so everything from Wayne’s stylization to Dern’s improvisation feels unified; Rydell also draws fine work from young performers including Robert Carradine, who made his screen debut in The Cowboys. (Grown-ups in the fine supporting cast include Roscoe Lee Browne, Colleen Dewhurst, and Slim Pickens.) Cinematographer Robert Surtees captures the rugged beauty of untarnished landscapes, while composer John Williams’ music strikes just the right balance of excitement and wistfulness. And if the movie’s a bit bloated at 131 minutes, so what? Thanks to its careful treatment of resonant themes, The Cowboys is arguably Wayne’s best film of the ’70s.

The Cowboys: RIGHT ON

The Long Goodbye (1973)

          Even by the downbeat standards of the mid-’70s noir boom, The Long Goodbye is dark as hell, notwithstanding the film’s major subcurrent of bone-dry humor. Adapted from the 1953 Raymond Chandler novel featuring iconic fictional detective Philip Marlowe, the movie blends Chandler’s cynical worldview with that of director Robert Altman by updating the storyline to the modern era and inserting additional nihilistic violence. Yet The Long Goodbye is essentially a character study disguised as a murder mystery, because, as always, Altman is far more interested in the eccentricities of human behavior than in the mundane rhythms of straightforward plotting. And, indeed, the storyline is murky, albeit intentionally so; presumably, the idea was to make viewers feel as mystified about whodunit (and why) as Marlowe himself.

          In broad strokes, the storyline begins when Marlowe’s pal Terry Lennox (portrayed by former pro baseball player Jim Bouton) has the detective drive him from L.A. to Tijuana for unknown reasons. Returning home to L.A., Marlowe learns that Lennox’s wife is dead. Lennox is the principal suspect, so Marlowe gets busted as an accessory—until a report surfaces from Mexico that Lennox committed suicide. Meanwhile, Marlowe gets pulled into two other mysteries with unexpected connections to the Lennox situation. Marlowe’s asked to track down a missing author, and he’s harassed by a psychotic gangster who believes Marlowe knows the whereabouts of a suitcase full of loot.

          While The Long Goodbye unfolds in an extremely linear style compared to other Altman films of the period—this isn’t one of his big-canvas ensemble pictures—the director’s roaming eye serves the material well. After developing Marlowe as a loser who can’t even keep his housecat satisfied because he fails to buy the right cat food (an unsatisfied cat—how’s that for an impotence metaphor?), Altman drops Marlowe into a world of wealth and privilege by setting most of the detecting scenes inside the exclusive Malibu Colony. With his cheap suit and vintage car, Marlowe’s a walking anachronism as he rubs shoulders with rich narcissists like the runaway author, thundering alcoholic Roger Wade (Sterling Hayden), and Wade’s desperately lonely wife, Eileen (Nina Van Pallandt).

          Furthermore, Marlowe can only watch, helpless, as the gangster, Marty Augustine (played wonderfully by actor/director Mark Rydell), abuses his people—such as in a shocking scene involving Marty and his mistress. Altman illustrates that Marlowe’s pretty good at discovering facts simply through shoe-leather tenacity, but that he’s powerless to effect positive change in a world overrun by fucked-up people determined to hurt each other. The best moments of the movie are scalding, notably Hayden’s riveting scenes as a formidable man hobbled by liquor. And the scenes representing pure invention on the part of screenwriter Leigh Brackett, including the Augustine bits, are vicious. (Brackett, it should be noted, was one of the writers on the classic 1946 Marlowe mystery The Big Sleep, with Humphrey Bogart.)

          Gould is ingenious casting, because his sad-sack expressions and wise-ass remarks clearly define Marlowe as an outsider who’s been screwed over by life—thus subverting audience expectations of a super-capable sleuth—and Altman surrounds Gould with an eclectic supporting cast. (Watch for a cameo by David Carradine and an uncredited bit part by a pre-stardom Arnold Schwarzenegger.) Aided by the great cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond, who literally probes the darkness of Los Angeles with grainy wide shots peering far into shadowy tableaux, Altman transforms Chandler’s book into a ballad of alienation.

The Long Goodbye: RIGHT ON

The Rose (1979)

          Beautiful in moments, harrowing in others, and soulful despite a derivative origin and a preponderance of clichés, The Rose is best remembered as the vehicle that drove singer/actress Bette Midler to international superstardom. In addition to providing Midler with her biggest hit song to date (the film’s poetic title track), The Rose earned the entertainer her first Oscar nomination. Combined with several other Oscar nods and a sold box-0ffice performance, this amount of success represented an unlikely turn of events for a project that seemed destined to fail. Originally developed as a biopic of the late, great rock singer Janis Joplin, the project was fictionalized when negotiations for the use of Joplin’s likeness and music came to naught; furthermore, the producers failed to hire eccentric British director Ken Russell, who had scored a major hit with the rock musical Tommy (1975) and therefore seemed the safe bet for this sort of material.

          Yet these setbacks turned out to be fortuitous, since moving away from Joplin’s life story allowed the screenwriters to create a self-contained mythos for their protagonist, and losing Russell led the producers to Mark Rydell, whose sensitive direction grounds the movie in a way Russell never would have attempted. None of this is to say The Rose is a great movie—quite the contrary, it’s rather average in terms of narrative content, since the storyline essentially throws various rock & roll signifiers into a Cuisinart. However, the picture has coherence thanks to Midler’s impassioned performance, Rydell’s unwavering focus on the tragedy of a performer’s downward spiral, and Vilmos Zsigmond’s elegant cinematography. So, even though The Rose is a simultaneously tarted-up and watered-down version of Joplin’s journey, it’s emotionally arresting.

          The actual plot is simple—as raunchy blues/rock singer Mary Rose Foster becomes famous, the pressure to deliver consistent success drives her toward drinking, drugs, and philandering. By the time she’s a superstar known simply as “The Rose,” her fragile self-image has crumbled, so she rushes toward self-destructive oblivion. The ineffectual men sharing her life include Houston Dyer (Frederick Forrest), a sweet boyfriend whose affections aren’t enough to pull Mary Rose back from the brink, and Rudge Campbell (Alan Bates), a domineering manager whose ambition and greed outstrip his concern for Mary Rose’s welfare.
          The Rose takes its seediness seriously, so Midler is often presented as unattractively as possible, both in terms of her slovenly physical appearance and her screeching tirades during binges. Midler makes these unseemly aspects watchable with the commitment of her acting, though just barely so—were it not for Midler’s innate likability, which shines through even at the worst of times, Mary Rose would be a completely unsympathetic character. After all, one can’t help but ask why Mary Rose doesn’t simply quit when things get awful. Alas, The Rose doesn’t go that deep, so we’re left with a finely textured surface—which is probably enough, at least for a single viewing.
          As for the music, it’s a mixed bag, even though Midler’s vocal performances are astounding from start to finish. The best hard rockers are covers of “real” songs (“Fire Down Below,” “Stay With Me,” “When a Man Loves a Woman”), but the ersatz numbers composed for the movie work fine. And if the title song is a bit too gentle for a Joplin-esque singer’s set list, that’s easy to overlook since Midler’s rendition has so much feeling.

The Rose: GROOVY

Cinderella Liberty (1973)

          In Cinderella Liberty, James Caan works his sensitive side by playing John Baggs Jr., a sailor who gets stuck in the Pacific Northwest when the Navy misplaces his records. Stranded on dry land and eager for a good time, John hits a raunchy bar and wins the favors of a hooker named Maggie Paul (Marsha Mason) in a pool game. Returning to her place for a tryst, John is startled to meet her preteen son, a streetwise mixed-race kid named Doug (Kirk Calloway). As John’s unwanted shore leave extends from days to weeks, he finds himself drawn back to Maggie and her child, realizing he’s more interested in setting down roots than he thought.

          Adapted by Darryl Ponicsan from his own novel, Cinderella Liberty tells the bittersweet story of an unlikely love affair, and though there’s no getting around the hooker-with-a-heart-of-gold cliché at the center of the story, Ponicsan and director Mark Rydell ensure that sentimentality is almost completely excluded from the story. The lead character is depicted as an interesting contradiction, because on the one hand he’s a moralist who detests foul language, but on the other hand he’s comfortable brawling and carousing. Meanwhile, Maggie is a woman so accustomed to disappointment that she’s accepted her demeaning lot. They inspire each other to want more from life, so when tragedy strikes their fragile surrogate family, we discover how much each is willing to fight for what they’ve built together.

          At 117 minutes, Cinderella Liberty is a bit windy for a straightforward romantic drama, and the colorful subplot about Baggs’ love/hate relationship with a former supervisor (Eli Wallach) feels unnecessary until a surprising payoff at the end of the picture. However, Rydell’s sensitive direction, lush photography by ’70s-cinema god Vilmos Zsigmond, and richly textured performances make the picture compelling and substantial. As for the leading players, Caan finds an interesting groove, portraying an introspective man occasionally drawn out of his shell by heated emotions, and Mason is bawdy and sad and vulnerable, delivering such expressive work that Cinderella Liberty earned her the first of her four Oscar nominations as Best Actress.

          The picture also provides a worthwhile complement to The Last Detail, another 1973 movie about sailors getting into trouble on the mainland—because The Last Detail was, not coincidentally, adapted from an earlier novel by Cinderella Liberty scribe Ponicsan.

Cinderella Liberty: GROOVY