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Post by hitchcockthelegend on May 30, 2019 1:10:39 GMT
It was completely by accident that on Monday I watched two films from 1971 that ended up as a perfect double bill. One was Vanishing Point, which I'll review in time for the weekly thread at the weekend, the other was Peter Fonda's directing debut, The Hired Hand. I'm hoping some of you may have seen it, and maybe just maybe I can get some others to seek it out if I have sold it right in what type of film it is.
Reconnection Or Loyalty?
The Hired Hand is directed by Peter Fonda and written by Alan Sharp. It stars Fonda, Warren Oates and Verna Bloom. Music is by Bruce Langhorne and cinematography by Vilmos Zsigmond.
Harry Collings (Fonda) and his partner Arch Harris (Oates) have been out in the Western wilderness for too long. Harry finally calls it a day and sets about returning to his estranged wife and child of seven years...
Beguiling, utterly beguiling, now here is a Western movie of such simple formula, yet still it's able to be a mighty treasure. This was Fonda's debut directorial effort, and since he would only go on to direct two more feature films, it's clear it wasn't the medium for him personally. But his love for his debut work speaks volumes, for he knows he got it right, and maybe he ultimately realised he was not going to top The Hired Hand for personal satisfaction reasons?
Pic is like some elegiac fairytale, nuanced to the hilt and dictating the pace on its own terms. Narratively the simplicity comes down to if one man can reconnect with his long estranged family? Then the spanner in the works comes by way of a test of loyalty, front and center that's basically it. There's a superb strand that shows and tells us that a woman needs loving, both physically and mentally, this as the man's world rages around her, but the thrust is three lost and lonely people at the crossroads in this dusty part of the West.
Pic is a technical delight. Zsigmond's (McCabe & Mrs. Miller/Deliverance) photography is sumptuous, rich in naturalistic tones, the moments of beauty captured actually belie the barren landscape these characters inhabit. Langhorne's musical score is tight to everything that's smart about the production, very contemplative and even haunting at times. The editing by Frank Mazzola is impressively impressionistic, and the writing from Sharp (Ulzana's Raid/Night Moves) is astute and uninsulting for period realism.
Fonda turns in a wonderfully subtle performance, instilling Collings with a weary resignation of a life he let slip away. As for Fonda the director, he lets his co stars have a fine day in the sun. Oates - as his fans already know - was a magnificent character actor who deserved better status back in the day. Thankfully his legacy lives on and his work is now viewed with keen appreciative interest, The Hired Hand gives a glimpse of just how reflective he could be. Bloom, smartly devoid of make-up and hairdo oddness to keep it real in the West, has Hannah Collings as heartfelt and stoic in equal measure - she is terrific.
There are small bursts of violence, there has to be for the story to come full circle and reveal its hand at the closure, but this is in no way an action piece. You can understand to an extent why the film was met with disdain upon release, cut and ultimately buried by Universal. This was the first film Fonda made after Easy Rider had made waves in the industry, so expectation for what was expected of The Hired Hand were obviously muddled. Early critical notices were harsh, where's the shoot-outs and high energy horse pursuits they cried, and so this beautiful film got lost for years. Thank the movie lords for home format releases then, for now it can be seen in all its delicate glory. 9/10
            
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Post by pimpinainteasy on May 30, 2019 12:46:39 GMT
i have seen it. i really enjoyed it, even though i dont remember much of it. loved the slow motion action scenes. you should check out 92 IN THE SHADE - which is another great film with PETER FONDA and WARREN OATES.
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Post by koskiewicz on May 30, 2019 14:59:52 GMT
Hired Hand, along with Culpepper Cattle Company are two very under rated and favorite westerns of mine.
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Post by hitchcockthelegend on May 30, 2019 18:23:29 GMT
i have seen it. i really enjoyed it, even though i dont remember much of it. loved the slow motion action scenes. you should check out 92 IN THE SHADE - which is another great film with PETER FONDA and WARREN OATES. Noted for the reccie Pimps 
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Post by hitchcockthelegend on May 30, 2019 18:31:17 GMT
Hired Hand, along with Culpepper Cattle Company are two very under rated and favorite westerns of mine. Yes I'll further support The Culpepper Cattle Co.
When Little Mary Became A Man.
The Culpepper Cattle Co. is a splinter of the Western genre that was tagged as revisionist. Often the makers of such Oaters went for a more grizzled look at the West, even demythologising the Hollywood Westerns that had proved so popular for decades. Directed by Dick Richards, The Culpepper Cattle Co. is one such picture.
Young Ben Mockridge (Gary Grimes) wants to be a cowboy, to work on the drives and hone his gun play skills. When trail drive boss Frank Culpepper (Billy Green Bush) is in town, Ben begs him for work and is thrilled to be hired as the cook's Little Mary. What he isn't so thrilled about is actually what it's really like out there on a drive...
And so it comes to pass, young Ben is at the bottom of the cowboy ladder and Richards and his writing team ensure there is no glamour to be found. The drive is beset with thievery and rustling, killings, stampedes, inner fighting and very hard work for very little pay. The men on the trail all look the same, they dress the same, they smell the same, they are all worked hard and understand the same weary banter.
What camaraderie there is is kept to a minimum, they are a team in a working sense, but their loyalty only comes to the fore when they are tasked with fighting and killing' enemies. The bars are not all bright and sparkly, with a well suited man playing a piano, no these are dingy holes with dirty glasses. No bordello babes either, just a hapless lassie loaned out for services by a barkeep who has in his own mind some tenuous right to have her in his keep.
This is purposely downbeat, with the photography by Lawrence Edward Williams and Ralph Woolsey emphasising this fact by stripping back the colours for authenticity. While Jerry Goldsmith and Ralph Woolsey's musical score is deftly restrained, perfectly so. The story moves to its final conclusion, a confrontation that excites and depresses equally so, for even in the whirl of bullets and thundering hooves, the realisation dawns on Ben, and us, that nothing changes the life of the cowboys out there on the drives. It's live, work and die. Cowboyin is something you do when you can't do nothing else - Indeed! 9/10
We can probably add Bad Company (1972) to the equation as well, certainly in terms of deglamourizing the Wild West mythos. www.imdb.com/review/rw4269648/?ref_=tt_urv 8/10
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Post by manfromplanetx on May 30, 2019 23:56:06 GMT
Thanks for the tip-off legend Never heard of The Hired Hand ?, inspired by your intro "Melancholic Majesty" I am looking forward to watching next week having found a copy of the Directors Cut release nearby...
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Post by hitchcockthelegend on May 31, 2019 2:06:21 GMT
Thanks for the tip-off legend Never heard of The Hired Hand ?, inspired by your intro "Melancholic Majesty" I am looking forward to watching next week having found a copy of the Directors Cut release nearby... Splendid, I do hope you like it mate 
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Post by teleadm on May 31, 2019 16:26:10 GMT
Thanks for suggesting the movie! I have nothing to add but a pic of the Swedish poster:  Yellow background translated: Sometimes there is no other place to return to than home... no other woman to return to than the one you left (very roughly) Title rough translation: A Man Returned |
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Post by hitchcockthelegend on Jun 2, 2019 11:08:38 GMT
Thanks for suggesting the movie! I have nothing to add but a pic of the Swedish poster: Yellow background translated: Sometimes there is no other place to return to than home... no other woman to return to than the one you left (very roughly) Title rough translation: A Man ReturnedPleasure, and thank you for the pic!
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Post by manfromplanetx on Jun 23, 2019 1:42:18 GMT
Hi there legend ... thanks for the rec watched last week here are some thoughts, a dissenting opinion....
Peter Fonda here as actor is mostly vacant and inexpressive, and his directing style could be described simply as minimalist pictorialism.
His counterculture Western is a film with not much to say. A hackneyed story begins with three squeaky clean cowboys, okay they may have just washed in the river but those shirts are too crisp, those complexions too soft to be taken too seriously.
A story so overwhelmed by self-indulgent psychedelic montages, pretentious sunsets, silhouettes, and other colourful atmospheric' visuals, after-all they do take up nearly a third of the movie.
Warren Oates looks as if he should be somewhere else and for the first half hour seems to be improvising looking over at Fonda as if to say what next ?. Eventually two passages of heartfelt dialogue from Verna Bloom which surprise and seem out of place become the substance of the film.
All mood and atmosphere which is set off by the inspired cinematography, so very 1971, those early 70s English language films a genre in their own right, we have a film down-under Morning of the Earth (71) a counterculture surfing film which has much the same creative photographic fusions.
The solemnity of the drama hardly raises a smile throughout, however we sure had some good laughs down here.
I must confess in the context of our classic viewing this was only the fourth American film watched in 17 months of nightly classic viewing.
I do admire Monte Hellman's off-beat mid 60s westerns his minimalist Two Lane Black Top also from 71 and did enjoy The Hired Hand for the 70s cinematic curio that it is...
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Post by hitchcockthelegend on Jun 23, 2019 11:24:54 GMT
Hi there legend ... thanks for the rec watched last week here are some thoughts, a dissenting opinion.... Peter Fonda here as actor is mostly vacant and inexpressive, and his directing style could be described simply as minimalist pictorialism. His counterculture Western is a film with not much to say. A hackneyed story begins with three squeaky clean cowboys, okay they may have just washed in the river but those shirts are too crisp, those complexions too soft to be taken too seriously. A story so overwhelmed by self-indulgent psychedelic montages, pretentious sunsets, silhouettes, and other colourful atmospheric' visuals, after-all they do take up nearly a third of the movie. Warren Oates looks as if he should be somewhere else and for the first half hour seems to be improvising looking over at Fonda as if to say what next ?. Eventually two passages of heartfelt dialogue from Verna Bloom which surprise and seem out of place become the substance of the film. All mood and atmosphere which is set off by the inspired cinematography, so very 1971, those early 70s English language films a genre in their own right, we have a film down-under Morning of the Earth (71) a counterculture surfing film which has much the same creative photographic fusions. The solemnity of the drama hardly raises a smile throughout, however we sure had some good laughs down here. I must confess in the context of our classic viewing this was only the fourth American film watched in 17 months of nightly classic viewing. I do admire Monte Hellman's off-beat mid 60s westerns his minimalist Two Lane Black Top also from 71 and did enjoy The Hired Hand for the 70s cinematic curio that it is... Damn dissenter!  Hi Big X. Thanks for the considered response, shame it didn't work for you. What's wrong with minimalist pictorialism? You should probably avoid stuff like Meek's Cutoff for sure, that's probably the most minimalist Western I have ever seen, but the crux there, and with The Hired Hand, is how the West was as opposed to the ebullience served up in so many genre pieces past and present. Of course I love the ebullient Oaters as well, but it's nice to have the more realistic portrays from time to time. The West wasn't so much as wild, most often it was laborious and languid, cowboying was seriously hard work and a far cry from being glamorous. The two Hellman Oaters you refer to themselves are sombre pieces, particularly Ride in the Whirlwind(1966) - www.imdb.com/review/rw2759374/?ref_=tt_urvYou have reminded me that I do have Hellman's China 9, Liberty 37 somewhere, so I'll have to give that a whirl.
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