BEFORE: I like the way my trip to Massachusetts worked out, since I ended up coming back into New York City on a day when most folks were thinking about getting OUT of the city for the long holiday weekend. But I love it when most folks clear out, and I'm planning to work on Friday and Saturday with very few interruptions - which means I may be able to get a few things done for once. Plus there are fewer people on the subway, walking around, eating in restaurants - it's a wonderful thing.
Sticking with the Western theme, since a lot of these movies take place over vast expanses of territory, or in some cases inexact locations in the West, they were a lot more difficult to work into the cinematic World Tour. But we're getting close to it now. Linking from "Cannibal! The Musical", Trey Parker was also in "Baseketball" with Ernest Borgnine, who of course was also in "The Dirty Dozen" with Lee Marvin (last seen in, umm, "The Dirty Dozen". Funny how that works out.)
THE PLOT: A woman seeking revenge for her murdered father hires a famous gunman, but he's very different from what she expects.
AFTER: This film ended up sharing a few things in common with "Cannibal! The Musical" - both relate the story of a criminally accused main character, mostly through flashback, and both have characters who break into song - here it's a pair of strolling balladeers, but the concept is equally as ridiculous. Also, there have been quite a few references to hanging this week, going back to "The Crucible" - it's an obvious staple of Westerns and other films set in the 1700's/1800's, but to have gallows used as a plot point in 4 out of the last 5 films seems like a very odd coincidence.
This movie has quite a reputation, some even refer to it as one of the greatest Westerns ever, but I'm not inclined to agree - not when compared with, say, "Unforgiven" or "The Magnificent Seven", to name just two. The tone here is a little too comedic, not that any movie should take itself too seriously, but I think a movie should take itself somewhat seriously. This one treats the entire genre almost like a cartoon would, using the same stereotypes that I'd expect to see in a Yosemite Sam cartoon.
The music doesn't help - by that I mean the incidental music and stings, not the balladeers' songs. Almost every action is punctuated by a music cue, letting us know when the villain has arrived on the scene, or when the chase scene has begun - all of which we already know through the visuals. So the help we get from the music is not necessary - instead the sped-up chase music creates a tone more conducive to a "Benny Hill" routine in Western form.
Examining the story, I found quite a few gaps - places where the movie seemed to go from Point A to Point C, without giving any nod to Point B. Cat Ballou's relationship with a wanted man seems to happen in fast-forward - before you know it, they're an item, but what happened to good old courtship? OK, she helped him escape from the law, does that mean they're automatically meant for each other? In the same way, it felt like the movie skipped a step by turning our heroes into thieves - I didn't follow the logic of "Someone's trying to run my father off his land - so let's go rob a train." Huh? I didn't see how one leads to the other.
Lee Marvin's role as the aging, drunk, out-of-practice gunfighter is probably the most fleshed-out, but since the character is drunk for most of the movie, we really only see him at the top of his game for a fraction of the time. Perhaps it rings true for the Old West, but cinematically I didn't find it all that entertaining. He did provide the requisite "training" montage, though - and at least showed something like personal development. But still, he's a walking stereotype - I wonder how much of Gene Wilder's gunslinger character in "Blazing Saddles" was riffing off of him.
Come to think of it, most everything in this film is a stereotype - the European land baron, the crusty old farmer who won't give up his land, the bad guy wearing black, etc. And the problem with dealing only in well-worn stereotypes is that it makes me feel like no new ground was broken here, like the film just recycled bits and pieces of earlier Westerns. Compared to something like, say, the first "Star Wars" film, which did borrow liberally from Westerns, as well as Japanese films, old sci-fi serials and WWII dogfight sequences, but managed to put those elements together in a new way, distributing them into a new setting, and created something timeless.
Also starring Jane Fonda (last seen in "The Electric Horseman"), Michael Callan (last seen in "The Magnificent Seven Ride!"), Dwayne Hickman (last seen in "A Night at the Roxbury"), Nat "King" Cole and Stubby Kaye.
RATING: 4 out of 10 square dances
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