You can trace the quippy fun of Marvel blockbusters straight back to Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid
Image: Photo: Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images Film Features The Popcorn Champs
Paul Newman and Robert Redford
1969 must have been a wild time to be alive. America was fighting with itself over civil rights and Vietnam. Teddy Kennedy crashed his car and killed a woman, thus effectively ending the romantic fantasy of the Kennedy dynasty. An entire generation came together to celebrate itself at Woodstock one week after the Manson Family butchered eight people, turning the hippie dream dark just as it was peaking. The moon landing brought America together to marvel at something, but it also served as a sign that technology had sped up to a degree that plenty of people found hallucinatory. For America, 1969 was a time of crisis, of rupture.
Judging by the movies, America’s myths were in crisis, too. Consider the Western, which had, up until then, been the main way this country conveyed its own legends. One of the year’s big hits was True Grit, a likable and hammy old-school oater. John Wayne, nearly 40 years after becoming a movie star, finally won his first and only Oscar, as the one-eyed grump Rooster Cogburn. Wayne plays a meaner, more crotchety version of his old stock character. But he’s still John Wayne, stolid and swaggering, a comforting vision for a certain breed of American moviegoer.
Elsewhere, though, the John Wayne image was decaying before the world’s eyes. In Midnight Cowboy, 1969’s Best Picture winner and one of the year’s highest-grossing pictures, Jon Voight struts around as a parody of old-school movie cowboys like Roy Rogers. But Voight’s character is in Warhol-era New York, desperately trying to sell sex to anyone who might be interested. Voight’s Joe Buck is one freak among many, and he’s also an idiot—the only person in the movie who doesn’t understand that his frontier act has grown stale. At one point, he defensively splutters that John Wayne isn’t gay.
Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch, only a minor hit in 1969, punctured the John Wayne mythos just as effectively. The Old West desperados of The Wild Bunch are vicious and bloodthirsty killers, happy to gun down an entire town of innocent bystanders if it’ll win them some money. If there’s any moral weight to those characters, it’s only because the lawmen are even worse. In Easy Rider, another 1969 blockbuster, Western outlaws don’t ride horses. Instead, Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper roar across deserts on motorcycles, embittering yokel squares and trafficking cocaine rather than dodging marshals and robbing banks. Jack Nicholson became a star largely because of his supporting role in Easy Rider, and he quickly emerged as a new form of masculine Hollywood ideal: knowing, vicious, horny, free-spirited, in touch with his own inner wild man.
Most of the big hit movies of 1969 were in touch with the emerging drug culture and the anti-authority sensibility that had come to overtake a generation. Movies showed the entire family structure breaking down. Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, a hit comedy, has a pair of married couples naively and innocently toying around with polyamory. The military wasn’t immune, either. In Robert Altman’s MASH, Army doctors subvert their violent, bureaucratic superiors and have a lot of laughs doing it.
Films weren’t shy in their attempts to depict the actual physical effects of drugs. Easy Rider and Midnight Cowboy both have freaked-out acid-trip sequences. Meanwhile, True Grit only had one scene that registers as being only slightly trippy, and that’s presumably an accident: the scene where John Wayne interrogates Easy Rider star and director Dennis Hopper. (Wayne reportedly chased Hopper around the set with a loaded gun.)
But if 1969 was a crossroads year for America’s sense of itself at the movies, then the year’s biggest blockbuster was the one that figured out how to walk the line—to build on the myth of the Old West while adapting that myth into a wild and irreverent present. Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid is the story of two legendary outlaws, and its heroes are dashing, courageous figures. But they’re also clowns. Throughout the movie, Butch and Sundance take the air out of each other, and they revel in their ability to undermine the forces of law and order, just like the doctors in MASH.
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid is a movie that knows it’s a movie. Director George Roy Hill opens the film with scratchy silent footage of Butch and Sundance, linking the film with the long cinematic tradition of the Western, the text reminding you that the people onscreen are “all dead now.” The picture starts out in sepia-toned black-and-white, and it ends that way, too. Like Bonnie And Clyde, the myth-exploding 1967 hit, Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid ends with its heroes dying at the hands of law enforcement. But Bonnie And Clyde shows them actually being blown to bits. In the later movie, we fade out with Butch and Sundance charging out to face a Bolivian army division, frozen in an action pose, allowed to live forever with their guns blazing even if we know they’re about to be torn to shreds.
Butch and Sundance were, in fact, real people. Screenwriter William Goldman, working on his first original script, spent years researching the story, besotted by the idea of bandits who’d become legends twice, first in the U.S. and then in Bolivia. But Goldman, who sold the screenplay for a then-record sum of $400,000, also knew that he was building on the text of the American Western, taking what he liked and ditching the rest. He transformed it into a buddy comedy, with Butch and Sundance needling each other even as they risked their lives for gold and glory. This didn’t sit well with everyone at the time; a young Roger Ebert complained that Goldman’s script is “constantly too cute and never gets up the nerve, by God, to admit it’s a Western.”
Paul Newman’s Butch Cassidy is indeed a funny sort of Western hero. Newman was a huge star at the time, but there’s not too much vanity to the way he plays Butch. Butch is a scheming motormouth, but he’s also an appeaser, always trying to defuse the tense situations that inevitably arise in Westerns. He makes it through most of the movie without killing anyone. And in what might be the film’s best set piece, he wins a knife fight by kicking a guy in the balls.
Butch Cassidy, in other words, gets away with a lot. He can do that because he’s Paul Newman. That knife-fight scene is a tiny masterpiece in comic timing and movie-star charisma. Throughout, Butch seems to be living the outlaw life for the laughs, not because he’s desperate for money. In his train robberies, he clearly enjoys jawing with the railway’s money man. And then there’s the famous interlude where he mugs away on a bicycle to entertain Sundance’s girlfriend while B.J. Thomas’ “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head” plays on the soundtrack. (“Raindrops” turned out to be the first No. 1 single of the ’70s, and it set the tone for a lot of the heavily orchestrated folk-pop that followed. I wrote about it in my Number Ones column earlier this year, and B.J. Thomas wasn’t happy about it.) Butch is happy to hijack and rob, but he hates the idea of a rich guy wasting money to go after him: “If he’d just pay me what he’s spending to make me stop robbing him, I’d stop robbing him! You probably inherited every penny ya got!”
Robert Redford, meanwhile, gets to be at least a little bit of a stoic Old West badass. In the opening scene, he nearly gets into a shootout over a hand of cards, and his antagonist backs down when he realizes that he’s facing the Sundance Kid. Sundance is a feared, respected character and a world-historical gunfighter. Steve McQueen, right up there with Newman as one of the world’s biggest stars, nearly took the part, only backing out when it wasn’t clear he’d get top billing. And McQueen would’ve been great at some of the cold-blooded stuff. But Redford, who became a star in the role and who eventually named his film festival after the character, manages to make Sundance both a formidable figure and a big softie.
The Redford of Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid is one of the best-looking men who has ever existed on an American movie screen, even with that mustache and everything. He’s also, when he has to be, a figure of fun. Arriving at a desolate Bolivian town, Sundance throws a great tantrum. (Butch: “He’ll feel better after he’s robbed a couple of banks.”) And even as he’s facing death, he and Butch are happily making fun of each other, secure in their own mythic status.
The film even pulls a few tricks to keep Redford likable. When Sundance first encounters his girlfriend—Katharine Ross, fresh off of The Graduate—it looks like he’s about to rape her. The outlaws of The Wild Bunch probably would’ve done that. Maybe the ones from Sergio Leone’s Man With No Name trilogy—all three movies had come out in the U.S. in 1967—might’ve, too. But Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid turns that expectation into a joke. Sundance and the woman are really happy lovers, and they’ve just been playing with each other. (This scene has not aged well.)
All throughout the film, Butch and Sundance are confronted with signs of their looming obsolescence. Butch has a great time playing with the bicycle, but the bicycle represents the same progress that will soon end the Old West. A salesman introduces the bike like this: “Meet the future!” And when Butch has to flee to Bolivia, he throws the bike into a ditch: “The future’s yours, ya lousy bicycle!” A crooked sheriff even makes a big speech, trying to force Butch and Sundance to understand that they have become relics: “It’s over! Don’t you get that? Your times is over, and you’re gonna die bloody! All you can do is choose where!” They choose Bolivia, and they die bloody.
Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid is a shaggy movie, one with no traditional plot structure and no real villain. (Other than the dull march of progress, Butch and Sundance’s greatest antagonists are the members of a super-posse of lawmen, and we only see them as distant out-of-focus figures. Butch and Sundance talk about them in the same hushed tones that others presumably use to discuss them.) And yet the film still works, more or less, as a traditional Western. It’s light and jaunty and entertaining in ways that make True Grit look paleolithic. But it’s also full of hats and horses and majestic vistas. The movie doesn’t exist to shatter the facade of the Old West, the way The Wild Bunch and the Sergio Leone Westerns arguably do. But it has fun at the expense of that facade.
Not every aspect of Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid has held up; I, for one, would gladly do without Burt Bacharach’s zippy pseudo-jazz score. But the film works as a monument to movie stardom, and that stardom remains undimmed 50 years later. The tone of Butch Cassidy—the constant onscreen banter undercutting the action scenes—has served as the lingua franca of blockbuster movies ever since, even as action heroes and then superheroes came to replace Old West legends. You can still see that sensibility at work in this year’s highest-grossing movie, Avengers: Endgame—which, come to think of it, features Robert Redford, cheekily breaking the retirement that he’d only announced a few months earlier. That’s an act of irreverence that would’ve done the Sundance Kid proud.
The contender: A few years after Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid, Paul Newman and Robert Redford reunited for The Sting, another George Roy Hill crowd-pleaser. In its time, The Sting won a Best Picture Oscar. But in 1970, Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid, though it had been nominated, lost that Oscar to another massively successful buddy picture: Midnight Cowboy.
Midnight Cowboy stands as a strange relic of a changing Hollywood: an intentionally repellant personal vision that made vast amounts of money and won Oscars even though it was rated X. (The MPAA’s ratings system, which had replaced the restrictive old Production Code, was only a year old at the time.) Midnight Cowboy is a movie without a lot of story, one that’s self-consciously confrontational in its skeezy view of sexuality and in its experimental art-film techniques. But Midnight Cowboy—unlike, say, Easy Rider, much of which is practically unwatchable today—still works as a movie, largely thanks to the brilliantly vivid central performances from Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman, playing two irreparably broken people who touchingly manage to find some comfort and companionship in each other, even if one of them has to horribly murder someone to do it.
Next time: The baby boom generation begins telling its own romantic myths with the sharply sappy love story Love Story.
273 Comments
“This scene has not aged well.”Yes, because no one’s kinky in 2019.Anyway, this movie has one of the all-time great screenplays. So many snappy lines. “Think you used enough dynamite there, Butch?”
Best line in the film!
Anyway, this movie has one of the all-time great screenplays.And somehow the article doesn’t mention the Princess Bride.
Or Year of the Comet.
All three by William Goldman
Someone had given me a paperback when I was pretty young (but a blooming film fan) of the screenplay in book form, and on car rides I would sit in the back and read it so with a kid’s ability to suck up information, I can quote much of the film decades later. The screenplay is pretty impressive looking at it as an adult and holds up wonderfully.
They hinted a a variation of the scene in an episode of Terriers. Definitely played up the kinky aspect there.Bonus: I get to post one of the greatest TV theme songs ever.
There’s a rumor that arguably the best line was cut due to Newman being unable to keep a straight face while saying it. After Redford has his meltdown when they arrive in Bolivia, Newman was supposed to say “And to think there was nothing here five years ago.”
I understand that the AVClub writers are obligated to say crap like that now but I’m not buying it. Her character is an independent free thinking woman who enjoys the occasional rape fantasy.
Breihan’s comment was brief so I don’t know if this was his exact take on it, but… you can be kinky and still think that that scene plays more uncomfortably now than it did in 1969, given that you don’t start out knowing that it’s a fantasy. For me it’s a pretty rough whiplash from “Oh God this is going to be awful” (at least in theory – I knew the story ahead of time, so not so much) to “Oh ha ha, carry on you two.” And I don’t think Hill and Goldman necessarily meant for people to cringe so hard at first. In the ‘60s you could still play the idea of impending rape as… definitely a bad thing, but more like a bank robbery, less like torture and trauma. That was starting to change, but if you look at the older movies the filmmakers had grown up with, it’s pretty insane how much this gets soft-pedaled.
Maybe SHE does, but after I saw that movie it took me many years to warm up to Redford. I cringed ever time I saw him on screen. “It’s just playacting.” No, it isn’t.
What are you basing that on? I saw nothing in the way it was presented that this was something Redford made her do.
It would be kinky if Ross was the one ordering Redford to strip (at gun point if I remember correctly). Otherwise it’s just another cheap pandering joke about rape. See! It can be fun! The woman really wants it!
I think the framing is what’s grating. It’s uncomfortable how the movie sets up a straight-ahead rape scene only to be like “Just kidding, dummy!” It’s maybe the only scene in the movie I don’t love.
It’s weird when lefties, and I’m one, don’t understand consent either. That’s their thing! They were in love.
I like the Bolivian army commander running up as the entire Bolivia army regiment is pinned down, “How many men?” and the guy goes, “Dos.”And he just flips his shit, “DOS? DOS HOMBRES?”
I’m so glad Tom didn’t mention the cliff scene. That means I get to.
Redford’s little “there, I said it” nod is so good. He was brilliant at small body language acting.
“The fall’ll probably kill ya!”
That scene is so well executed that you find yourself believing, despite all evidence on screen, that they are somehow getting away when you get to the final scene.
I think that this scene is what makes the movie stand the test of time. Here’s two movie stars and tough guys and Sundance admits his vulnerabilities.
That’s the scene I always think of. Damn this is a good movie. This article inspired me to rewatch it. Thanks!!!
“Aim for the bushes?”
Oh, shiiiiiiiiiiiit!!!
“The Redford of Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid is one of the best-looking men who has ever existed on an American movie screen,”The other fella wasn’t too bad either…Apart from their looks, both of them had weapons-grade charisma, and that’s what I remember from this movie – they’re just so charming.
Newman was better looking not to mention a better more versatile actor.
Newman was miles away a better actor, but I think it says something about Redford that he wasn’t blown away. I think back to some of his earliest stuff, like his appearance in The Twilight Zone, and he always had the good sense to dim his wattage just enough to draw people in to his characters.
I remember Redford in Twilight Zone knocking at the door and only his voice for better half of the show; he convinces the old lady to open the door, and I was stunned at his good looks!
I’m not saying he’s bad. He would not have gone anywhere if it wasn’t for his looks. Newman could have been a character actor if he did not have his looks. But you really don’t have to be handsome to be a movie star but it helps.
And his salad dressing and spaghetti sauce was much better. You ever see a bottle of Redford’s Own? No?
Apart from their looks, both (Newman and Redford) had weapons-grade charisma, and that’s what I remember from this movie – they’re just so charming.The script in this case certainly helped them shine as well!I have to say, though, that I wonder what the film would have been like had Steve McQueen taken the Sundance role. Would it have worked quite as well? Would McQueen’s Sundance been a little too serious? Not that he couldn’t be funny as well, but like a few other movie “near-misses” with actors who could have taken on a role (Frank Sinatra or Robert Mitchum as Dirty Harry, for instance), the end result was for the best.Two bits of trivia: Steve McQueen was pursued for the lead role in the 1978 Walter Hill directed film The Driver (no relation to the more recent Ryan Gosling film) but he turned the role down and they got Ryan O’Neal to play the role. He…. wasn’t right for it, IMHO. Had McQueen taken the role, I suspect that film would have gone down in history as McQueen’s last great role…Steve McQueen and Paul Newman did manage to share principle roles in a film a few years later, The Towering Inferno. The issue of whose name should be presented as the movie’s “star” continued to be an issue, which was resolved in this way, by having McQueen listed “first” but lower than Paul Newman, who was listed “higher”!
McQueen in The Driver makes a ton of sense but he’d already done Bullet, so I can see why he was reluctant. And the credit thing is hilarious. Some serious dick-swinging there…
McQueen in The Driver makes a ton of sense but he’d already done Bullet, so I can see why he was reluctant. And the credit thing is hilarious. Some serious dick-swinging there… McQueen was semi-retired by the mid-later 1970’s as an actor. Truly his last “big” role was in 1974’s The Towering Inferno, and his roles following this were in films that didn’t make much of a dent.I too can see why he might have been reluctant to play in The Driver, but I nonetheless feel that was one of those really big missed opportunities. I don’t have any particular hatred against Ryan O’Neal (I thought he was hilarious in What’s Up Doc?) but as a strong/silent/deadly type? Nah.By the way, this is the poster for The Towering Inferno. Note they used the credits (first, higher) as in the movie as well. Dick-swinging, indeed!
O.J.!
That is such a great poster! It doesn’t hurt that Iove the movie.
The swinging even extends to the placement of the photo’s. McQueen is slightly below Newman, but he does get the eye-catching bolded ballyho above his image. That poster is a master class in sating hollywood ego’s.Poor Faye Dunaway, her name is nearly below that of Irwin Allen.
Also, and I am only vaguely remembering this from the DVD special features, I believe McQueen was originally offered the part of Butch, with Newman playing Sundance and both were locked in until, as the article points out, a top billing dispute. The dispute went on long enough that the studio actually planned to split up distribution of the film with Newman getting top billing on one coast, and McQueen getting top billing on the other. It’s also interesting to note that it went from MEGA STAR Steve McQueen to relative nobody Redford who was only known for Barefoot in the Park at the time.
I am only vaguely remembering this from the DVD special features, I believe McQueen was originally offered the part of Butch, with Newman playing Sundance and both were locked in until, as the article points out, a top billing dispute. I suppose in the early stages either actor could have played either role, though now we’re (at least those of us who have seen the movie) completely used to the idea of Newman as Butch and Redford as Sundance. It’s also interesting to note that it went from MEGA STAR Steve McQueen to relative nobody Redford who was only known for Barefoot in the Park at the time. While its tempting to “blame” McQueen’s ego for ultimately not playing in the movie, the fact is that both McQueen and Newman seemed to have been in a real pissing match for top star billing in the 1960’s. I recall McQueen’s wife (Perhaps the woman he was married to when he ultimately passed away) saying the actor was almost obsessed with one-upping Newman and proving himself the better/bigger actor.I strongly suspect the same was going on with Newman!And, yeah, its interesting that the movie went from having two HUGE stars to having one HUGE star and an up and coming actor. Granted, Redford became a HUGE star in large part because of this role but, as you noted, when the movie was made he was far from a big name.
I’m tempted to blame McQueen. IIRC, he was a real dick about stuff on the Magnificent Seven too.
The story I heard was Yul Brenner was shorter than him so used to film scenes of ground that had been piled to make him taller, and between each shot McQueen would kick some of that dirt off…
Yeah, that’s the story I was thinking of.
From what I’ve read it was more Newman’s representation not wanting to cave than it was Newman himself. According to Redford, Newman went out of his way in both Butch Cassidy and the Sting to come off a little less cool, and in the case of the Sting, gained a little weight and strived to be less handsome because he wanted to prove his chops as an actor and not just an absurdly good looking man.
<>…who also makes a GREAT salad dressing!
Story of my life.
I never realized this was the stRmaker for him. I was only born in 72, so he’s just always been Hollywood royalty. Thought he was a star in barefoot in the park too. Always liked that movie. All his early movies are Gems. I even like his first, Inside Daisy Clover. And I love when he “turns down the wattage” for serious roles, like in Three Days, or ATPM oor the way we were. I first saw him in The Sting as it was a favourite of my folks. When I see it now, he seems a bit old for his character—it’s funny, hhe was pushing 40 when he became a star. I like his early directorial efforts too and that all his directed films are interesting stories whether they worked for me or not. He wasn’t just a pretty face.
McQueen didn’t have Redford’s charm. He’s great in the right role because he brings such intensity but Redford’s lighter touch was a better fit for Sundance for sure.
There was some levity in his role as the Cooler King in the Great Escape, but that’s the closest I can think of to McQueen being Sundance.
Yeah, I can’t imagine McQueen in that sort of role.
That was also how they presented the Ted Danson/Shelley Long credits on “Cheers.”
It became a standard solution to that problem pretty quickly; Laverne and Shirley did it too.
The whole story about McQueen and the Towering Inferno is great Hollywood stuff. IIRC, the studio wanted McQueen for the architect role, but he didn’t like it. He wanted to play the fire chief (I think Ernest Borgnine was originally up for that), but that was a secondary character. So he insisted that they re-write the script so that the chief got as many lines as the architect, and when they cast the architect, they better cast Paul muthafucking Newman because he was the only actor McQueen thought was good enough to co-star with him.At least that’s how I remember hearing it.
Two bits of trivia: Steve McQueen was pursued for the lead role in the 1978 Walter Hill directed film The DriverIf the chase scenes didn’t live up to “Bullitt”, that’s all anybody’d talk about.
by having McQueen listed “first” but lower than Paul Newman, who was listed “higher”!It’s hilarious that such cool, laid-back, unaffected, antihero heroes were actually bigger divas than Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in real life.
It’s hilarious that such cool, laid-back, unaffected, antihero heroes were actually bigger divas than Bette Davis and Joan Crawford in real life.You’ve said a mouthful!And, absolutely, the idea of these ultra cool types being so invested in who gets top billing is indeed hilarious.
I think it could have worked with McQueen if he played it similarly to his Magnificent Seven character (with a little Great Escape mixed in). That character was obviously a deadly gunslinger, but goofy enough to banter.
I think it could have worked with McQueen if he played it similarly to his Magnificent Seven character (with a little Great Escape mixed in). That character was obviously a deadly gunslinger, but goofy enough to banter.Don’t disagree at all!I think Redford was great in the film but McQueen could have pulled it off too, albeit his own way.Thinking about this, I’ve found myself realizing the McQueen/Newman rivalry through the 60’s made sense. I think of all the roles McQueen played and the roles Newman had, and I find myself thinking they could have been swapped out in most of their films and it would have worked.I can see McQueen in Cool Hand Luke or Hud or, in particular, Harper. I can see Newman working in the place of McQueen in Magnificent Seven or The Thomas Crown Affair or maybe even Bullitt (though that one takes a little more imagination… that is McQueen’s primal role).Just an interesting thought experiment!
Just a random thing that popped into my head since you mentioned the McQueen/Newman rivalry, it’s interesting to me that both of those guys, who filled a VERY similar role in Hollywood, were also hugely into racing cars. What a weirdly specific hobby for two guys who must have competed for a lot of roles.
So many of these roads-not-taken! Speaking of Ryan O’Neal, he’s a decent actor and more physically plausible than Stallone as a heavyweight, but I can’t help thinking that his Rocky would’ve been a heck of a movie-of-the-week rather than part of the modern canon…
I read once that Robert Redford was up for the part in “The Graduate” that went to Dustin Hoffman, but he didn’t get it because he was just too damn handsome for the role.
I can totally see that – the answer to “are you trying to seduce me Mrs Robinson?” would be “duh…”
He’d have already nailed every bored housewife in the neighborhood.
I’ve heard even he thought he wasn’t good casting for the role, because “I never looked like a virgin even when I was one”.
Would that the producers of The Hot Rock had the same insight…
Exactly. Dortmunder is supposed to be an unlucky sad sack (albeit a brilliant one).
The fact that Redford was cast is bad enough, but it was the early 70s — Elliot Gould was RIGHT THERE GOD DAMMIT.
Elliott Gould. In a western set in the late 19th C.
No, for the inexplicably Redford-starring The Hot Rock. But you seem to be implying there were no Jewish cowboys and the historical record is clear that there definitely were — big guys who were great shots and spent money freely.
Oh, for sure, but for the American cinema of the 1960s to show that? I mean, we’re talking about the same studio system (while decaying) that put out “The Green Berets” at the time, after all. I did miss that it was “The Hot Rock” being referred to, obvs, so mea culpa, seriously. (At the same time, casting Redford in the role kinda makes my point here, too.)
I believe the character as described in the novel resembles Redford more, but Nichols and Buck Henry decided to go in a rather different direction.
I read once that Robert Redford was up for the part in “The Graduate”
that went to Dustin Hoffman, but he didn’t get it because he was just
too damn handsome for the role.
If I remember correctly, Mike Nichols had asked Redford if a girl had ever turned him down and Redford replied he didn’t know what he meant. That sounds about right.
I heard he was up for the female lead as well, but was too pretty for it.
From IMDB (so it must be true):
“ screentested with Candice Bergen for the part of Benjamin Braddock, but was finally rejected by Director Mike Nichols.
Nichols did not believe Redford could persuasively project the underdog
qualities necessary to the role. When he told this to Redford, Redford
asked Nichols what he meant. “Well, let’s put it this way”, said
Nichols, “Have you ever struck out with a girl?” “What do you mean?”
asked Redford. “That’s precisely my point”, said Nichols. Redford told
Nichols that he perfectly understood the character of Benjamin, who was a
social misfit. He went on and on about his ability to play the part.
Nichols finally said to him, “Bob, look in the mirror. Can you honestly
imagine a guy like you having difficulty seducing a woman?”
Yeah I heard Mike Nichols tell the story. When Redford came into read for the part Nichols asked if Redford had ever been turned down for a date. Redford replied, “What do you mean?” Nichols said that’s when he knew Redford was wrong for the role. I love Redford (as a matter of fact other than The Way We Were and The Marvel Stuff he has never played a true villain), but I think Dustin did a much better job.
Not just considered for, he was OFFERED the role and turned it down because he didn’t think anyone would buy him in the role. Buck Henry actually had him in mind when he wrote it.
I’ve had this debate with my wife and our friends many times before (which is a little odd, since we’re in our 30s) – I would submit 60s Warren Beatty as the best-looking person in the history Hollywood. My wife is all-in for 60s Paul Newman. Nearly every other person we mention this to says 60s Robert Redford.
this middle-aged hetro male agrees with your wife. And would add Omar Sharif to the ballot.
Omar Sharif is easily the handsomest man in Hollywood who has mistaken real dog poo for the fake stuff.
Newman’s eyes put him over the top for me. Plus Beatty was a bit on the pretty side.
That’s because Redford is the right answer. Beatty couldn’t hold Redford’s jock!
Redford’s pretty much the god Apollo, a platonic ideal of good looks. Beatty’s handsome, but then that shark’s smile of his kind of ruins it (he deploys the contrast well on film, though). Newman’s probably less handsome than either of them, but more than makes up for it by being a much more charismatic actor. The dude’s like Humphrey Bogart, just good-looking.
Next to Redford, Warren Beatty looks more like Ned Beatty.
I concur. And high time we had a lengthy debate about the beauty of two men.
So…y’all are unaware of the existence of 30’s Cary Grant?
Cary Grant is another who looks like someone designed him for attractiveness using a dark science.
I always thought that Brad Pitt was literally distilled in a laboratory from Warren Beatty, Paul Newman, and Robert Redford. Like they just took the best looking icons and performed an unholy alchemy to meld them.
“unlike, say, Easy Rider, much of which is practically unwatchable today”I… just watched it a week ago and do not agree.
Counter-culture movies from the 60s wear me out (I actually find exploitation movies from that era more interesting), but after Breihan described the slapstick scenes in Police Story as “unwatchable” I realized he and I have very different definitions of that word.
Yeah–any idea as to just what’s in there that this author finds “unwatchable” these days?
Yeah I went on a counter-culture marathon with ONCE UPON A TIME IN HOLLYWOOD opening last month. MODEL SHOP and ZABRISKIE POINT were impenetrable compared to EASY RIDER. I can definitely get why that film reached a larger audience.
“At one point, he defensively splutters that John Wayne isn’t gay.”John Wayne was a f*g. He was too, you boys! I installed two-way mirrors in his pad in Brentwood, and he come to the door in a dress.
I’m wracking my brains trying to remember where this bit is from, but coming up empty. But it reminds me of that bit in The Bird Cage where Nathan Lane is trying to act more manly and imitates Wayne’s swagger, and Robin Williams says “I never before realized how much John Wayne walked like a woman.”
It’s from Repo Man. Delivered by the “plate of shrimp” guy.
Depending how you read that scene, the “punchline” (the other characters defending John Wayne on the grounds that plenty of straight men wear dresses) has aged better than the “setup” (lobbing a homophobic slur at John Wayne).
Hey! He has a name!
…..”hey… What’s your name?….”
Why can’t I give more stars!
In the original French it was “C’est John Wayne jeune fille” = “That’s MISS John Wayne.”
Plate of shrimp
A guy I used to work with had a story about a job he had delivering food in New York (I think) and one day he’s delivering to a hotel room when some lackey gestures to the room’s occupant and says “Do you know who this is?” It was late in Wayne’s life and he didn’t recognize him and said so. Wayne was so offended he called his boss and got him fired.
That don’t mean he was a homo, Miller. A lot of straight guys like to watch their buddies fuck. I know I do.
It turns out that Strother Martin got the best quip in that, or any, film.“Morons. I’ve got morons on my team.”
It was a treat to see Martin and Newman together again after Cool Hand Luke, and I’m curious what their relationship was like off-camera.
“What we’ve got here is… failure to communicate.”
“Now, I can be a good guy, or I can be one real mean sum-bitch.”“A man can’t think if his mind ain’t right”.
They’re in Slap Shot together, too. I think they probably liked working together and Strother Martin gets cast as the irritating guy in authority pretty well.
Strother Martin managed to be in True Grit, Butch & Sundance, and The Wild Bunch all in one year. He had a better 1969 than most actors have careers.
He’s definitely in the “THAT GUY Hall-of-Fame”!
My parents loved this movie and it was so much a product of its time; frothy, self-aware but with a too-hip-for-the-room downer of an ending that couldn’t have been more calculated to appeal to boomers. It’s watchable mostly for Paul Newman’s sort of likeable dick performance and Goldman’s well greased if feather light script. It goes down as easy as a spoonful of Cool Whip and is about as nourishing.The movie is definitely one of those turning point films in the wake of “The Graduate” that sought to capitalize on the most standard of Hollywood fare while at the same time turning it lightly, irreverantly on its head. It hasn’t dated well, particularly the Burt Bacharach score and I’ve always been bothered by the way the film treats Katharine Ross as a fuck toy to be shared by the two men (a clumsy nod, perhaps, to “ Jules and Jim”.) I also think the movie spoiled George Roy Hill whose work from here on smacked of unearned smugness (his subsequent adaptation of “Slaughterhouse Five” being the best example).I am certainly in the minority for preferring the Duke’s take on “True Grit”. Wayne is definitely too old and too, well, John Wayne, for the part. Yet he brings an almost giddy, self-aware freshness to his larger-than-life braggadocio that is surprisingly enduring. He also invests Portis’s trademark flamboyant language with more verve and color than Jeff Bridges did with his overly affected, mumbling take. Kim Darby is also wonderful. She’s a bit spot-on for late sixties “generation gap” casting but her spunk sells it. I even prefer the upbeat ending to the dour one in the book. It’s how you want to see Rooster Cogburn for the last time, jumping his horse over a fence and riding off into the sunset to a rousing Elmer Bernstein score. Directors like Henry Hathaway didn’t imbue their work with the kind of personality their modern equivalents like the Cohen brothers do but they sure as hell could nail together a sturdy enough movie. It quickly seemed irrelevant in the wake of Leone and Peckinpah but I think it emerges less dated and more enjoyable in the end.I’ll have to take your word on anything relating to Marvel movies.
Oh, I take the ending entirely the other way–don’t show the deaths so that they can be alive. It’s a movie that’s making myth, not fiction, and I thought it was a nod to that.
Worth noting that the American remake of Breathless (the only movie to make Richard Gere watchable) pulls essentially the same trick, and it works just as well.
He was aight in Chicago
I like it too. I just watched it recently and I don’t see it as a “downer”. We all gotta go sometime and Butch and Sundance at least got to go out fighting and laughing right to the end. And they’re still remembered 100 years later. The “downer” is the scene where they kill the bandits. That’s reality barging in to what had up to then been a fairly breezy comedy.
See, the Hathaway/Wayne True Grit ending has phony uplift to me because of what happens to Glen Campbell — he’s just erased out of the movie because something bad needed to happen to our heroes and he’s the most likely target in that he’s not a plucky young girl and he’s not John Fucking Wayne. The two of them happy as clams at the end didn’t sit well and the death itself rang extremely false to me watching the movie. The Coen version, which adheres much more closely to Portis’ story I believe, does a much better job of balancing peril and who is harmed.
Hailee Steinfeld was better casting to play a child because she actually was one.
I recall the first time I heard that ‘raindrops’ song (no doubt as a child watching the movie on TV) I cringed. It was ‘Captain and Tennille’ level of unctuous.
I can’t stand to listen to the actual song either, but am thankful for the existence of “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head” because its outro is the source of the music Dale Watson uses for his Lone Star beer commercials.
I liked Wayne’s take on Rooster better as well, but my god I can’t believe anyone would prefer Darby’s performance to Haylee Steinfeld’s. Darby was annoying as all fuck and rushed every line. Steinfeld’s delivery was much more thoughtful, while still conveying preciousness and intelligence.
I mean, “STAND UP, TOM CHENEY!” alone…
My take on ‘True Grit’ is the acting and dialog delivery are deliberately off-putting. Kim Darby was that over-enthusiastic teenage girl who grates on your nerves. Pairing her with John Wayne was basically a running gag.
Katherine Ross in that movie was a continuation of the “No Homo” ethic in Hollywood buddy films. She existed only to reinforce heterosexuality.She wasn’t given anything to do but be beautiful, plucky and, distracting.
Yeah, the thing to note about “John Wayne: The Performance” as remembered by pop culture history is that pop culture remembers it half right. It is correct that John Wayne the actor was pretty much the only guy who could do it, it was pretty much all John Wayne could do, and if delivered straight-up, it is pretty much exactly what pop culture history remembers, for good or ill.What’s wrongly-remembered is that John Wayne, the actor, could nevertheless put all kinds of nuance and shading on that “John Wayne: The Performance” role, depending on the script. It’s never that he veers far from the standard performance, but that he recognizes always how the script intends the audience to see that performance, and is able to deliver that intent to the camera. In the lesser, uncritical Westerns, yes, they just wanted a straightforward John Wayne performance, and that’s what John Wayne delivered. But in better scripts, they frequently wanted you to think of that performance as something sad and pathetic (The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance), as an exaggeration of reality that then does, for one brief moment, come to life (True Grit), or even as something unhinged and deplorable (The Searchers).And in each case, John Wayne the performer nailed the required effect. It’s not that John Wayne was a versatile actor; he had basically one stock role. But the thing is, he knew that role really well, and at need, he could put unmatched spins and variations on it. John Wayne’s acting is in some ways analogous to AC/DC’s music: Angus Young has often been criticized as knowing only three chords on his guitar. But even if you grant that criticism, it’s hard to deny that the Angus Young could play the hell out of those three chords. John Wayne’s stock character is a lot the same, and he doesn’t get the credit he deserves as an actor.
Not relevant really, but..I noticed the other day that Patrick Warburton has a lot of Wayne’s cadence, but in a lower register.
Don’t forget [i]Red River[/i], which predates [i]The Searchers[/i] by eight years yet always seems to get overlooked when people talk about the latter’s “John Wayne as irredeemable psycho”portrayal as a major innovation (which, in fairness, it was for his work with John Ford and Hollywood’s overall portrayal of cowboys-and-Indians relations). Heck, even in [i]She Wore a Yellow Ribbon[/i] — about as much a straightforward John Wayne western as there is — Wayne gives us one of the loveliest pieces of screen acting ever.As for the respective [i]True Grit[/i]s, Wayne is certainly a far greater Rooster Cogburn than Jeff Bridges (maybe it’s because I knew the Hathaway film before I read the book, but the Duke’s age and “John Wayne”-ness seemed a perfect fit for the character when I read it), but I don’t know how anyone can argue that the earlier adaptation is the better movie. The Henry Hathaways of the world may have been able to construct sturdy entertainments, but the Coens can do that and a lot more, while Glen Campbell and especially Kim Darby are no Matt Damon and Hailee Steinfeld.
That was my assessment as well: the Coen remake was the better film, and Steinfeld and Damon the better players in their respective roles. Steinfeld, especially, had a masterful debut performance, though that’s partly because Damon’s character was supposed to be dismissed by the audience for much of the film. It was only in the third act that you were supposed to realize oh, this Texas Ranger is supposed to be one of the guys who made the bones for the Texas Rangers as a law-enforcement institution. But Wayne was and is the definitive Rooster Cogburn.
… or was Rooster Cogburn the definitive John Wayne?
Yes, but Matt Damon sucks on guitar.
John Wayne could also steal a scene from a speechifying Jimmy Stewart by simply standing in the background and pouring a cup of coffee. So there’s that, too…
I love this description of how some stars who basically have a standard way of presentation, bring some nuance and variation to each performance of their star persona. I person believe too, that stars who just kind of do the thing they do, leave a lot of space on the canvass for an audience to fill, to project their own nuance. A great character actor may make an incredible character that they disappear into (think Gary Oldman or Philip Seymour Hoffman) but they are also telling you a very complete story about that character, who they are, what they think and feel, their every moment can be under a microscopeand iro icallythe audience is given a more distant passive role with less room for them to weave their own psyches into it and therefore be very engaged and emotionally involved. I think that’s sometimes why people can have a different impression after a movie that they were quite rapt with, observing that it had a trite story, a hunky script, big potholes, and such and such actor was “just playing the same character he always does”, but they loved watching it, and probably buy it and rewatch it.I think Humphrey Bogart is a great example of a star performing his standard persona with tons of minor variations, and who leaves a lot of space for you To be right up there on the screen with him.
All I can say re: Wayne vs. Bridges is that it’s hard not to hear Wayne when you read Rooster’s dialogue in the book. Part of that, of course, is due to the fact that Marguerite Roberts’ screenplay lifted a great deal of the dialogue directly from Portis’ book (as did the Coen’s). There’s nothing wrong with that; Portis writes great dialogue. Wayne and Bridges were similar ages (62 and 60, I think) when they played the part, Wayne just looks older. As an interesting footnote, Campbell and Darby would re-team the following year for another Portis adaptation, “Norwood” (unseen by me). I’d certainly like to see another Portis adaptation some day, preferably “The Dog of the South”.
“I PREFER Westerns made for twenty year olds, than superhero movies made for teenagers, thank you. Sniff. Harumph.”
We watched both of them today and I go back and forth on which is better. I just know that the exchange between Ned and Rooster at the end (“That’s bold talk for an old, one eyed, fat man.” “Fill yer hand, you sunovabitch!”) is one of the greatest ever, and the one in the original between Wayne and Duvall is probably a little bit better.
I just saw this film for the first time earlier this year and really fell in love with it. It manages to capture what’s best about the Golden Age of Hollywood while also showing the influence of the films that were ending that era. And, with all due respect to Mr. Breihan, Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head is an awesome song.
The links embedded in the article are a treat. How often does a humble internet writer get bluntly cursed out by BJ Thomas?For one thing, it means BJ Thomas is alive. Who knew?
BJ performed a concert at the local civic center in my hometown a few years ago and my parents went. “Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head” is alright, but for my money, the Growing Pains theme is his best work.
“unlike, say, Easy Rider, much of which is practically unwatchable today.” On a literal level no film photographed by Laszlo Kovacs is unwatchable. But as one who has watched Easy Rider countless times, I’ll agree it’s far from a great movie. The commune sequence is underwritten and undone by uneven acting and an off-putting lack of chemistry between Luke Askew and Hopper-Fonda. The New Orleans acid sequence surrenders to “trippy” effects and editing that probably looked silly in 1969. And don’t forget the “flash-forward” moments where Billy and Wyatt glimpse their fates while high. That said, the use of rock music to soundtrack the riding sequences was revolutionary and still raises the hairs on my neck. And then there’s Jack Nicholson’s George Hansen, one of the greatest introductions of a major star to a mass audience. The scenes with Hansen, full of humor, camaraderie and actual ideas, completely redeem the film. And while the movie never recovers from his departure, scenes like this still make Easy Rider a worthwhile experience:
“The New Orleans acid sequence surrenders to “trippy” effects and editing that probably looked silly in 1969.”I remember those sequences being carried not by the visual but the weird, creepy noise — the actual rock soundtrack gets the most love, as it should, but the score is great there.
I’d never call it unwatchable, but while it’s a movie everyone should see at least once for the cultural experience I’d have a hard time putting it into regular rotation.
Completely understand. I usually average one viewing every 18 months. But even when Peter Fonda died last week the choices for my “in tribute” viewing were The Wild Angels, The Trip and The Limey.
Easy Rider was one of several bad films of the time that were saved by Jack Nicholson’s line deliveries.
I saw this in 89 at the age of 17. The whole movie was bad, embarrassing indulgent whatever. Except that. That scene was traumatizing for me. Maybe because I hade been beaten half to death with a bat by then(I was punk, the contemporary equivalent of a hippy), but it was so stark and real next to all the lazy stoned film we’d been dragged thru.
For all their quippiness, the Marvel films need a true buddy comedy (disclaimer: I haven’t seen Ragnarok or Ant Man & Wasp, both of which appear to have buddy movie potential).Iron Man 3 would have been great if it had been more of a buddy flick with War Machine. The few minutes we got of Stark and Rhodey bantering near the end was great, and made me wish there were more of it. Anyway, this movie is certainly the granddaddy of them all, setting the template for the likes of Lethal Weapon, the Bad Boys franchise, even Die Hard: With a Vengeance, which smartly added Sam muthafucking Jackson to bounce off of Bruce Willis.
Ragnarok is definitely a buddy comedy. Thor has such great chemistry with everyone; there are scenes of him just shooting the shit with various characters and it’s endlessly entertaining
I think Chris Hemsworth’s greatest gift as an actor is looking like he’s having a great time. I never liked Thor in comics, but Hemsworth plays him as this wonderfully blithe, lovable ball of enthusiasm.
Right? I’d like to think I’d be the same. Acting would be such a fun job
He just does dim so well too!
It does seem like Marvel is going the full buddy action-comedy route with their Falcon and Winter Soldier series on Disney+.
‘Cause winter soldier is so frothy and bantery, right!
Had they actually handled Danny Rand properly in Iron Fist (& Netflix not cancelled the whole partnership), Marvel would have had the perfect buddy comedy with Heroes for Hire. There was a wonderful hint of what could (& should) have been in the tenth episode of season 2 of Luke Cage.
YES! So disappointing when there’s an opportunity that big, that glaring, and it gets totally whiffed.
Was so good in the comics in the 70s
The buddy road trip comedy I wanted to see out of Iron Fist was with Danny and Ward.
Ragnarok was almost pure buddy comedy when it wasn’t focused on the plot. The second buddy changed a lot.
Thor had some pretty good buddy quips and scenes with just about everyone he had a 1 on 1 scene with. It seemed to be the one Thor film where everyone was just having fun in character, even during solemn scenes. I actually don’t think I’ve seen Jeff Goldbum, Chris Hemsworth, Cate Blanchett, and Tessa Thompson smile nearly as much as I have in the behind the scenes set photos and videos for Ragnarok.
Huh, you’re absolutely right. A buddy comedy would be the perfect fit with Marvel quppiness. Something with a lawman-has-to-team-up-with-criminal sort of deal (e.g. 48 Hours) would probably work well in a superhero movie, with the always-outsized stakes of the genre motivating the relationship. Or shake it up a bit and do a female buddy comedy, or perhaps male-female as long as you can effectively keep any romance completely off the table.
happy to gun down an entire town of innocent bystanders if it’ll win them some moneyTo be fair, many of the townsfolk gunned down were killed by the immoral bounty hunters hired by the railroad company to kill The Wild Bunch.
Obviously, these greedy rednecks did not have the best aim.
I expect counting on dumbass rednecks to take care of your business for you would go something like this:
This is a great movie, but fuck if I would ever hire Burt Bacharach to score a western. “Raindrops Keep Fallin’ On My Head” is fine and fits the bicycle scene perfectly, but the “South American Getaway” theme makes me want to claw my goddamn ears off. But I’m more of a Bob Dylan “Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid” soundtrack kind of guy.
Sha dooby doobydooby doo, shabba dooby dooby da dooooo, shabba sha, shabba sha, shabba dooby dooby sha doobydooby sha!
FUUUUUUUUUUUCK!
Yet another thing Meyers gets right in the first Austin Powers. This is how you use Bachrach in a film.
I could hardly be more with you on this. Whenever the discussion turns to the most “dated” elements of the movie, that’s the first thing that springs to mind.
At least growing up in the 1970s, I remember “Raindrops” as one of those songs that we would sing in grade school chorus. It didn’t seem to be a modern song just created for a movie a decade before — it seemed like a traditional song that had been around forever, but looking it up, it really was written for the movie.
A movie about movies and myth-making is exactly the way it was introduced to it in a class about Westerns taught by Richard Slotkin, which I think of fondly enough because it was good and because he wrote the books about America and Westerns. Gunfighter Nation if you’re only going to pick one is one to read.
I can’t believe that I just now realized that Han Solo is basically Space Butch Cassidy.
I think the best Han Solo take I’ve heard recently was that he was that thirty year old guy who seemed awesome while also living in a van with his best friend.
See Corvette Summer released the same year as Star Wars.
Solo was a gunslinger right down to the way he wore his blaster. This shot has always perfectly captured the personality of the character:
For someone my age, the best gunslinger.
And Chewbacca is just Sundance after he really let the mustache go.
Coffee all over the keyboard. Thanks a lot Miller.
You are welcome!
The 70s were all about the hair, let it go, let it flow and all that. Chewbacca could have been a disco star and maybe even Canadian adult cinema.
i just encountered this account on takeout https://kinja.com/quasistellarif that’s not you, just thought you’d like to know.
also, way to be slow on that realization duder.
Thanks. That user has been around just as long if not longer than me, though. The similarity is pure coincidence.
Seems legit–Luke was pretty good on the farm with a blaster on varmints, that’s nearly Sundance, and by halfway through the story, it looked pretty Bolivia for them too.
One of the few perfect movies ever made. Wish Fox (or Criterion) would do a restoration. The current Blu-ray doesn’t do it justice.Pedantic aside: MASH was released in 1970.
I love this movie. A lot. But it _meanders_ like a son of a bitch. Not always to its benefit.
123 go
“Ladies and Gentleman, Topo Gigio!”
Joan Rivers was a staff writer for The Ed Sullivan Show at the time and she hated Topo Gigio with the heat of a thousand burning suns.
Props to you Tom for finding anything wrong with this movie. As far as I’m concerned, everything about it works beautifully. I include the score in that–I love how subversive it is.
Anyone else beside me really appreciate that brass-heavy music style that Burt Bacharach often used? It’s not popular today, but to me, it brings to mind the fact that the late 60s and early 70s weren’t all hippies and rock and roll, despite what some Boomers want us to believe.The best example of his would be the soundtrack to the original Casino Royale, which is by far the best thing about an otherwise mess of a movie.
I’m a big fan. I maintain that the 1967 Casino Royale is the best soundtrack and soundtrack album ever and will fight anyone on that point. After the Fox is golden, too.
As if Burt Bacharach wasn’t enough by itself, the title was performed by Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass. Awesome in so many ways.
The whole soundtrack was. I’m probably in the vast minority in this, but I genuinely think The Look of Love is the low point of the album.And the title song is my ringtone. You know what? I’m going to put it on for my drive home today. You’ve got me in the mood for another listen now.
Can I cheat and listen to the argument for or against “A Hard Days Night”?
There’s an argument against a Hard Day’s Night?
I meant more so against it’s inclusion as a “soundtrack album”, it’s obviously a great album. Id imagine in 2019 people might forget that it is a soundtrack album and think of moreso as just a part of “Beatles Canon”.
That’s pretty much my position. I’ve always thought of it as the album first, movie second so I never put it in contention.
Ah – got you now.
Ditto, a good vinyl copy of the 1967 CR soundtrack is a reference quality listening experience. However, in the realm of bad movies with great soundtracks, Candy is up there as well.
I really like how Mike Myers uses him in the Austin Powers movies. Like those movies, it’s half a sendup of the sort of scores Bacharach wrote, half a celebration of them.
Any ONE of the film’s montage sequences would have been fine. The “Raindrops” scene is probably a little ridiculous but adds to the goofy, innocent charm of the film’s first act. The New York sequence is lovely. The South American musical interlude (actually two of them) doesa pretty good job of moving the action forward. But ALL of them in one film is overkill, especially when we’d rather see more interplay between Newman and Redford. Great movie, but really could have been greater.
Fun fact: James Gunn who wrote and directed probably the quippiest Marvel movies, has written extensively about how much he HATES Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Granted, the man also enjoyed a good pedophile joke, so there’s no accounting for taste.
Looking back in the list of Popcorn Champs so far, it’s interesting that it’s easily the most fun so far, even counting the ending. My Fair Lady is probably the only other one on the list that seems to be highly interested in entertainment and humor, rather than spectacle, attitude, uplift or message. And I agree with Tom B that it’s in the vein of modern superhero movies where the banter plays against the action. But it’s also a throwback to earlier movies like Hope and Crosby movies where the action and plot are just vehicles for putting engaging actors on the screen.
I’ve never thought of this like a Hope/Crosby movie, but it plays similarly to what a “Road To Bolivia” movie would have. Newman’s Butch isn’t cowardly like Hope, but you could see Hope kicking a guy in the crotch to win a fight. And, really, the “story” of the movie just seems to be an excuse to allow us to spend over 2 hours with Butch and Sundance.
I imagine these films were also some of the first that would start what we’d later call “shipping” with the male leads. I remember Pauline Kael’s review of The Sting (she hated it…) where she said the women in the film had no chance because the entire love story was between Newman and Redford.
Wait, that’s what “shipping” means?
Shipping means wanting two characters to be together (usually romantically). It was a term that started more in slash communities (male/male or female/female pairings) and then became world-dominating. (if you were being sarcastic my apologies as I’m an idiot)
From “relationship”ping?
This is one of the few movies where the score nearly ruins it. It would ruin it if the movie wasn’t completely great otherwise.And I hate the “Raindrops” scene with a hateful hate. I always fast-forward through it whenever I watch the movie.
I detest the use of contemporary music in period films. It just feels insulting.
Kelly’s Heroes is even weirder, if only briefly. You see our column of protagonists make their way down the roads of Nazi-occupied France in their jeeps and tanks, wearing olive-green battle fatigues, grim demeanors, and heavy weaponry and suddenly…….the Mike Curb Congregation.The fuckin’ 60s, man.
I was just going for a joke, but now that I think about it, I always thought Oddball’s hippie dippie character also seemed like an anachronism.
What about Bowie’s Cat People theme in Inglourious Basterds?That worked pretty well…
I don’t recall anyone getting horribly murdered in Midnight Cowboy.
It’s implied that the trick from the amusement park that he beat up, might have died.
I watched that movie recently and didn’t get that impression at all, and I too was wondering just who the hell was supposed to have been murdered in “Midnight Cowboy”.
Haven’t seen it in years, but I was sure he murdered that guy.
“I wrote about it in my Number Ones column earlier this year, and B.J. Thomas wasn’t happy about it.)“Now there’s a shitload more I have to read. Thanks a fucking lot.
The “wrote about it” article is actually quite brief, and the “wasn’t happy about it.” part even more so.
Sorry, I meant the whole series of which I was previously unaware, not the one article. At least those articles are much shorter.
OOOooohhhh, the whole series.
I went through the whole backlog a couple of months ago. It took me a couple of weeks, but it was well worth it. Don’t forgot that he puts up a new column every weekday, so you can follow along with the new ones as they go up. He did “50 Ways To Leave Your Lover” today, which means I had Paul Simon stuck in my head all day…
Same here – that’s a series of articles I will need to read now. So much for sleep!
I remember watching this in the theater when I was a kid, but I was only 2 in 1969. I’m thinking they probably brought it back after The Sting was such a big hit. That would track with my memories of when I saw it. I loved it at the time, but I haven’t seen it in years. I’m going to rewatch this weekend, thanks to this article.
I saw it in the theaters too there was a re release in 74
MASH came out in 1970. Early 1970, from what I can gather, but 1970 nonetheless.
“Sundance and the woman are really happy lovers, and they’ve just been playing with each other. (This scene has not aged well.)“Hey Hey. No kink shaming.
People forget just how subversive ‘True Grit’ actually was at the time. The weirdly stunted speech patterns, the deliberately odd acting styles, the unusual set-piece scenes. It was John Wayne doing a ‘new wave’ film. If ‘Butch Cassidy’ was the source for Marvel sensibilities ‘True Grit’ was the source for ‘Fargo’ sensibilities.
I like this comment, especially considering the Coen brothers ended up doing their own version True Grit.
I secretly kind of love the plain vanilla John Wayne of the 60s. McClintock, and that one about the oil fire fighters, and the Green Berets. They’re all just so much right wing, white guy wish fulfillment, right down to the fact that the ex-wife is still in love with him, and his kids always end up apologizing to him.
That sounds exactly the kind of thing Garth Marenghi would write about himself.
I rewatched it relatively recently and, outside of the charm of the male leads and their work, it’s an objectively so-so movie.The quippiness was fresh at the time and right in line with the reconsiderations of heros and a general mood of cynicism is the air of that time.But what seemed fresh then now seems belabored and annoying. And the soundtrack, with the vocalizing of The Swingles, at the time seemed different and interesting. To use a contemporary sound in a historical film. But now? It sounds idiotic and takes you out of the reality happening in the scenes. It’s a good movie to see as a lesson in how film and viewing and audiences changed. It’s a good movie to see Redford and Newman at their most charming.It is not, however, a good movie.
I’m with you on the soundtrack (Except “Raindrops” – I still find that scene charming). But from there, our paths diverge.
Oh, it was a great unintended early music video. But, even so, charming as it was, it matches the oddness of modern sound to historic moment problem that I mentioned before. It’s, like, as a scene apart from the film, it’s a music video. With the film, it’s tonally strange.
Midnight Cowboy had the best ad-lib in movie history. Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman were talking and walking down the street together and stepped off the curb into the street. At that moment, a cab went around the barricade set up to stop traffic and almost hit Dustin Hoffman. Without ever breaking character, Hoffman pounds on the hood of the car and yells “Hey, I’m walkin’ here!” They thought it was so good, they left it in for the final cut. And it had a killer theme song too!
Wheelchair-bound Gary Sinise put that line to good use as well.
Was that in Forrest Gump?
Yep
And the ad lib ended up being better known than anything else in the movie.
what movie? tootise?
When I first heard that that was an ad lib, I thought Hoffman was from New York so I figured “Sure, that makes sense”– but on second thought it makes even more sense that he was from LA. A New Yorker wouldn’t necessarily think that that behavior was noteworthy or entertaining, but I can imagine Hoffman was like “Whoa, people just *walk* here? And they can tell *cars* to fuck off?!”
Hoffman’s said his annoyance was genuine, and he had to catch himself from saying “Hey, I’m acting here!”
our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name……………
open the door, woodcock!
Can anyone chime in on why Easy Rider is unwatchable today? Never seen it. I’ve just had my grandma tell me its story a bunch (!?)
“unlike, say, Easy Rider, much of which is practically unwatchable today”Say what? Granted, it’s not all that. But, as it is one of my favorites of ALL TIME, I take umbridge at your remark sir. And ask you explain your villainous take. (or did you hit on this already, I was reading something about Fonda the other day – I thought here).Hmmm? I’m waiting…
Oh, snape!
Well…I wasn’t waiting for that.Thanks Cap
Also, no mention of classic charades subject Butch and Sundance: The Early Years?
I cannot believe that B.J. Thomas response; it wasn’t even that severe of a column, more of a dismissal than an attack. Ironically, the last thing I remember of B.J. Thomas was his Christian music phase in the late 1970s/early 1980s.
If you thought BJ was mad, you obviously haven’t seen the Bear.
That angry BJ really has teeth.
It only appears that Redford came out of retirement for ENDGAME. They film those massive Marvel movies well in advance and in pieces, so his cameo no doubt was finished well before he retired.
A quibble, but wasn’t MASH released in 1970, rather than 1969?
Premiere was Jan 25 1970
HOLY SH!T Robert Redford looks like Brad Pitt in that gunfight scene. It’s uncanny.
Stop, reverse that.
Try tracing it back to The Thin Man series and the Bond franchise.
The scene you mention were Redford appears to have broken into Katherine Ross’s home and is forcing her to strip at gunpoint, apparently for the purpose of rape, struck me as creepy when I first saw it when I was 11 and now strikes me as the worse sort of boys locker room nastiness.
which, come to think of it, features Robert Redford, cheekily breaking the retirement that he’d only announced a few months earlier.A few months? It was almost 9 months by the point Endgame was released. Also the production for that movie ended well before Redford announced his retirement which means he was likely done filming on it by that time (though I do acknowledge that he might had might have done some work during reshoots after saying he was retired).
Wait, how is Easy Rider “practically unwatchable”?
Didn’t read the article, just came here to say that at first glance I thought the pic was of Red Dead Redemption 2.Carry on.
WHO ARE THOSE GUYS?
I can see how the tension of the Sundance/role play scene hasn’t aged well. Seeing it a second time with the knowledge that they’re essentially doing some very kinky consensual stuff though it plays a lot different.
This movie also had Conrad L. Hall shooting the shit out of it.
I have to say, I’m really glad you mentioned more than in passing how good-looking Redford is. One of the true joys of seeing Hollywood movies is being able to look at beautiful, beautiful faces. A really handsome man was at one time regarded as being not so “masculine”, which is a pretty classic expression of homophobia, and I remember hearing him sometimes referred to dismissively for them, as if his face were a hindrance to his being a “serious” actor – maybe this tendency is less common than it used to be. I know he turned down the Dustin Hoffman role in “The Graduate” (which Buck Henry wrote with him in mind, with Doris Day!) because he didn’t feel anyone would buy him as someone who was insecure with females, or really as insecure about anything. And very possibly he was right – that’s one of the primary themes of “Repulsion”, that no one recognizes how messed up Catherine Deneuve is because she is so beautiful that of course she can’t have any real problems.All that blathering, of course, is just a long prelude to my saying that goddamn, yes, he was so freaking gorgeous. He singlehandedly made that kind of mustache acceptable for quite a few years, though I don’t know of anyone who pulled it off as well as he did.
Obligatory Top 10 Highest Grossing Movies Of 1969 Post: 1 Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid, 20th Century Fox, $102,308,900 2 The Love Bug, Disney, $50,576,808 3 Midnight Cowboy, MGM, $44,785,053 4 Easy Rider, Columbia, $41,728,598 5 Hello, Dolly, 20th Century Fox, $33,208,099 6 Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, Columbia, $31,897,253 7 Paint Your Wagon, Paramount Pictures, $31,678,778 8 True Grit, Paramount Pictures, $31,132,592 9 Cactus Flower, Columbia, $25,889,208 10 Goodbye, Columbus, Paramount Pictures, $22,939,805
“Paint Your Wagon” was yet another buddy western (with singing cowboy, Clint Eastwood).Quite a year for them.
Featuring Lee Marvin. He’s always drunk and violent!
Love Bug was that big a hit? Wow.And what the hell is Cactus Flower?!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cactus_Flower_(film)
I feel like I just read a chapter from an alternative universe – I love Walter but never heard of this. Goldie won an Oscar? Playing the girlfriend of Oscar Madison? Is this the same timeline where Mandela died in prison?
A really good romantic comedy starring Walter Matthau, Ingrid Bergman, and Goldie Hawn, who won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her efforts.
As I post this, I’m watching this gif and listening to Fine Young Cannibals’s “She Drives Me Crazy.”
Also, here’s the previous movies featured in these articles ranked Best To Worst by me: 1. 2001: A Space Odyssey
2. Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid
3. The Graduate
4. West Side Story
5. Spartacus
6. The Longest Day
7. My Fair Lady
8. Cleopatra
9. The Sound Of Music
10. The Bible: In The Beginning…
this movie has one of the all time great
God bless you, sir, for getting paid to raid Wikipedia pages to rehash movies in ways that are in no way relevant or timely. This piece is especially brilliant, because no one ever wrote witty dialog before or after Sundance! You’re going to milk this Avengers cow until it keels over dead and dry…
Or more accurately, in 1969, America was continuing to pick up where colonialism left off, by upholding the false notions of “The Yellow Peril” and “The Domino Theory” and stepping up the systematic destruction of Indochina.
Nice write-up!
It’s hard for me to imagine this movie without Bacharach’s score. It quite literally sets the tone. Maybe it seems too on-the-nose now, but the score runs against the grain of the genre on purpose, jolting the audience out of the tired western mindset. It keeps the film light.
When is the A.V. Club going to address the unacknowledged history of references to Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid that appear throughout Archer?“Swiss Miss”, “White Nights”, and “Heart of Archness” all incorporate dialogue or allusions to the film. There are others.
Yeah, Butch and Sundance don’t die. Period.Not sure why you think they did. 🙂