The Road to Salina (1970)

          This sultry European melodrama/thriller exists somewhere between classic film noir and the psychosexual explorations of Nicolas Roeg and David Lynch. Like classic film noir, The Road to Salina concerns an everyman who drifts into trouble because of an irresistible woman. And like many deliberately perverse movies perpetrated by Roeg and Lynch, The Road to Salina plays wicked games with chronology and morality. Also adding to the film’s allure is an offbeat cast and a potent musical score. In fact, the score has undoubtedly led many curious viewers to this picture, because Quentin Tarantino repurposed some music from The Road to Salina for Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004). Yet unlike grungier offerings to which QT often leads his acolytes, The Road to Salina has a somewhat elegant quality even though the subject matter is sordid.

          Per the noir playbook, the movie opens in media res, with a young man fleeing a remote location while a middle-aged woman screams for him to stay. The young man makes his way to a police station, reveals to the authorities (but not the audience) that something awful has happened, then reluctantly agrees to head back where it all went down. The remainder of the movie comprises the young man’s return trip, intercut with flashbacks while he explains past events to a cop. Via the flashbacks, we learn that Jonas (Robert Walker Jr.), an American drifting through Mexico, happened upon a gas station operated by Mara (Rita Hayworth). Mara mistook Jonas for her long-missing son. Upon determining that his hostess seemed harmlessly delusional, Jonas decided to indulge her fantasy for a few days. Then a neighbor named Warren (Ed Begley) showed up and he, too, mistook Jonas for Mara’s missing son. Things got really weird when Mara’s sexy daughter, Billie (Mimsy Farmer), became the third person to believe Jonas was someone else. This juncture shifts the movie into Roeg/Lynch territory, because Jonas learns that Billie was unusually intimate with her brother. It should come as no surprise to hint that Jonas’ strange erotic idyll eventually takes some dark turns.

          Given the twisted interpersonal dynamics of The Road to Salina, it’s a wonder the movie never becomes confusing. Director/co-writer George Lautner keeps the plotting as simple as possible, allowing viewers to marinate in bizarre moments—and to gradually unravel the film’s many mysteries. This streamlined narrative approach gives Lautner room for extended carnal vignettes, which Farmer and Walker perform without inhibition. Both actors essay familiar types well; Farmer’s dangerous impetuousness strikes believable sparks against Walker’s dopey recklessness. Meanwhile, the impact of watching faded screen icon Hayworth in a poignant role compensates for the shortcomings of her passable performance—the sense of a woman failing to reconcile comforting fantasies with intolerable reality is palpable. The Road to Salina is not for every taste, to be sure. The pacing can be leisurely, the plot requires suspension of disbelief, and the ending doesn’t quite achieve the impact it should. Nonetheless, there’s a lot to admire here in terms of boldness, heat, and style, so it’s heartening that the film eventually found a second life after briefly passing through American theaters back in the day.

The Road to Salina: GROOVY