T.R. Baskin (1971)

          Moderately insightful and sensitive but plagued by a tendency toward superficiality, T.R. Baskin is an intimate character study that puts a fresh spin on the old story of a young person experiencing culture shock by moving from a small town to a big city. Rather than portraying its protagonist as a naif overwhelmed by sophisticates, T.R. Baskin presents a preternaturally wise individual disappointed to learn that sharing her life with metropolitan folks isn’t the revelation she expected. Candice Bergen, delivering one of her best early performances, is almost too well cast in the leading role, since she’s so beautiful and worldly that it’s hard to believe she doesn’t thrive among the cosmopolitan set.

          Written and produced by Peter Hyams, who later enjoyed a long career as a genre-cinema auteur, and directed with characteristic grace by Herbert Ross, the movie begins with traveling salesman Jack (Peter Boyle) arriving in Chicago and running into a college acquaintance, Larry (James Caan). Jack asks if his pal knows any ladies who might keep him company, so Larry suggests T.R. Baskin (Bergen). A phone call later, she shows up at Jack’s hotel-room door. Jack believes he’s hit the jackpot until T.R. challenges him verbally, revealing she’s his intellectual superior by a mile. Performance anxiety ensues, so they talk instead of trysting, and their conversation triggers flashbacks detailing T.R.’s early experiences in Chicago. After leaving home for a new life, T.R. took a mindless data-entry job and tried double-dating with a co-worker who was obsessed with landing a wealthy husband. That got boring fast. Eventually, T.R. met Larry, who seemed intellectual and tender at first blush. How their relationship unfolded, and how that course of events led her to Jack’s hotel room, is the heart of the picture and a small statement about the casual cruelty of modern life.

          T.R. Baskin unfurls like an observational novella, with copious dialogue revealing characters’ personalities as a larger sketch of city life emerges through the accumulation of detail. Easily the most interesting aspect of the storytelling is the quippy dialogue that Hyams provides for the title character. “I want to die young and neat,” she says. “I don’t want to die old and sloppy.” Or, more tellingly, “I just wish everybody else didn’t look like they know exactly what they’re doing.” T.R. Baskin is frustrating because Hyams and Ross ignore so many obvious opportunities to dig deeper, but excellent acting fills in some of the blanks. Boyle infuses his role with surprising warmth, and Caan conveys important nuances that can’t be discussed without spoiling the story. Bergen, of course, carries much of the picture on her shoulders, and she’s terrific, complementing her innate comic timing with the soulfulness that precious few of her early roles allowed her to display.

T.R. Baskin: GROOVY

Rabbit, Run (1970)

          Adapted from John Updike’s celebrated 1960 novel about an American everyman whose existential crisis leads him to flee the confines of an unsatisfactory domestic situation, Rabbit, Run is undoubtedly an example of how things get lost in translation when a project leaps from one medium to another. The filmmakers depict the protagonist’s irresponsible behavior without clearly articulating the reasons why he can’t build lasting connections with other people. (One presumes that Updike’s novel was more successful than the film at delineating the leading character’s psyche.) When the movie begins, Harry “Rabbit” Engstrom (James Caan) reaches a breaking point in his marriage to alcoholic Janice (Carrie Snodgress), even though the couple has one child and another is on the way. Following an argument, Harry leaves home and tracks down his former coach, Marty (Jack Albertson), who is now a sad old drunk. Marty introduces Harry to a hooker, Ruth (Anjanette Comer), with whom Harry falls in love. Meanwhile, an overbearing priest, Rev. Eccles (Arthur Hill), encourages Harry to return home. (Meandering subplots involve Harry’s golf games with the priest, as well as Harry’s sexual tension with the priest’s alluring wife.) Betrayals, tragedies, and twists ensue. By the end of it all, Harry’s the same perplexed individual he was at the beginning of the story, even though he’s caused and suffered a lot of pain.

          Caan’s casting is a major detriment. Although he looks the part of a former athlete and unquestionably possess formidable dramatic abilities, his innately macho quality clashes with the role of a sensitive character who is intimidated by life’s petty humiliations. Caan excels at playing men who fight, which means that seeing him portray a man who runs strikes a false chord. In fact, “false” is a suitable adjective for most of this film’s content. From the stilted dialogue to the weird sex scenes (in which footage is optically rocked back and forth while fuzzy guitars and pounding drums reverberate on the soundtrack), nearly all of the stylistic touches that producer/screenwriter Howard B. Kreitsek and director Jack Smight employ are contrived and ineffective. Other than implying that men are entitled to pursue anything they want in life, no matter the circumstances, and that women who fail at motherhood are loathsome, it’s hard to know what the filmmakers meant to say here. Worse, the way they chose to put across their murky thematic statements isn’t especially compelling to watch.

Rabbit, Run: FUNKY

1980 Week: Hide in Plain Sight

          This quiet film dramatizes a traumatic circumstance drawn from real life—in the early days of the FBI's Witness Relocation Program, a Buffalo, New York, factory worker suffered unexpected collateral damage when his children disappeared overnight. At the beginning of the story, Frank Hacklin Jr. (James Caan) has a dodgy relationship with his ex-wife, Ruthie (Barbra Rae), who has become romantically involved with a small-time gangster named Jack Scolese (Robert Viharo). Frank tolerates the situation because Ruhie has custody of the two small children she had with Frank, and he deeply loves his kids. Meanwhile, Frank is just beginning a new romance of his own, with a schoolteacher named Alisa (Jill Eikenberry). After Jackie pulls a brazen robbery and gets caught, revealing how little loyalty Jackie’s mob cronies feel for him, slovenly local cop Sam Marzetta (Kenneth McMillan) and uptight federal agent Jason Reid (Josef Sommer) offer a new identity in exchange for testimony. Jackie takes the government’s deal, marries Ruthie, and decamps to parts unknown with the Hacklin kids.

          Unfortunately, nobody tells Frank what’s happening, so for a time he doesn’t even know whether his children are alive or dead. Over the course of the movie, Frank battles his way through government red tape with the sincere but useless assistance of attorney Sal Carvello (Danny Aiello) and with unwavering support from Alisa, whom Frank marries. The ordeal stretches on for years, culminating with chases across various state lines once Frank becomes desperate.

          Simply because it explores topical subject matter in a soft-spoken style that blends intimacy with righteous indignation, Hide in Plain Sight could easily have been a TV movie. Instead, it not only stars big-screen tough guy Caan but also represents the actor's first and only directorial effort. Caan’s work behind the camera is solid if not necessarily revelatory; one can imagine any number of capable filmmakers taking the material to at least this level of intensity, if not beyond. Therefore, what makes the synthesis of Caan's acting and directing interesting is the degree of restraint that he displays throughout Hide in Plain Sight. For an actor whose style is defined by macho volatility, it's noteworthy that he elected to underplay the bulk of his performance, and that he guided fellow actors toward similar quietude.

          That single directorial choice is what saves Hide in Plain Sight from being a issue-of-the week melodrama, since Caan creates an environment that feels like it’s populated by real people doing real things, with real emotional consequences. Could another filmmaker have hit harder? Sure. But could another filmmaker just as easily have made the narrative feel saccharine and trite? Absolutely. So perhaps Caan was exactly the right guy to make this movie. In any event, the reward for throwing his weight behind a meaningful true story is that Hide in Plain Sight is one of Caan’s most admirable films, a small gem nestled inside his impressive filmography.

Hide in Plain Sight: GROOVY

The Gambler (1974)

          While not a flawless film by any measure, The Gambler is one of the sharpest character studies of the ’70s, combining elegant filmmaking with exquisite writing and an extraordinarily nuanced leading performance. The picture offers a mature examination of addiction, portraying every troubling aspect of deception, manipulation, and risk that addicts manifest in pursuit of their illicit thrills. First-time screenwriter James Toback famously based the script on his own life, so protagonist Axel Freed (played beautifully by James Caan) is a respected college professor from a wealthy family. Driven by self-destructive compulsions, Axel regularly courts danger by making reckless bets with bookmakers. When the story begins, Axel gets in debt for $44,000 after a bad night of cards, and the pain Caan expresses in his face demonstrates that even for someone accustomed to losing, an impossible obligation triggers bone-deep fear. As the story progresses, Axel hustles for cash every way he can, whether that means hitting up family members or placing outrageous new bets.

         This fascinating protagonist’s entire life is a high-wire act, a nuance that Toback’s script explicitly articulates in myriad ways. Whether Axel’s telling a classroom full of students about a self-revealing analogy or explaining his behavior to long-suffering girlfriend Billie (Lauren Hutton), Axel says he’s after self-determination. In the twisted worldview of Toback/Axel, the threat of ultimate failure is the only acceptable proof of ultimate existence—he’s a daredevil of the soul. As such, Axel isn’t a sympathetic character, per se. Quite to the contrary, he’s a scheming son of a bitch whose idea of honor is tied in with revealing that everyone around him is a schemer, just like him. That’s why it’s so painful to see Axel inflict his lifestyle on the few innocents he encounters, such as his mother, Naomi (Jacqueline Brookes). And yet Toback carefully surrounds Axel with people who exist even lower on the moral spectrum, such as jovial loan shark Hips (Paul Sorvino) and vulgar mobster “One” (Vic Tayback).

          Director Karel Reisz, a Czech native making his first Hollywood movie, serves Toback’s script well. Among the film’s many effective (and subtle) directorial flourishes are a trope of slow zooms into Caan’s anguished face at moments of critical decision and the repeated use (via composer Jerry Fielding) of variations on a taut Mahler overture to suggest a life that’s all prelude. (After all, each climax in Axel’s existence is merely a fleeting high soon replaced by insatiable hunger.) Caan is on fire here, playing the cock of the walk in confident scenes (the tic of fixing his hair before important encounters illustrates Axel’s vanity) and quivering with ill-fitting anxiety during moments of emasculation. Vivid supporting players including Brookes, Sorvino, Tayback, Morris Carnovsky, Antonio Fargas, Steven Keats, Stuart Margolin, M. Emmet Walsh, James Woods, and Burt Young echo Caan’s intensity; each player adds a unique texture, whether guttural or sophisticated. Hutton is the weak link, her gap-toothed loveliness making a greater impression than her weak recitations of monologues. And if The Gambler sputters somewhat in its 10-minute final sequence—a love-it-or-hate-it microcosm representing Axel’s risk addiction—then a minor misstep is forgivable after the supreme efficacy of the preceding hour and 40 minutes.

The Gambler: RIGHT ON

Brian’s Song (1971)

          From the time of its release until, arguably, the arrival of Field of Dreams (1989), the iconic TV movie Brian’s Song enjoyed an enviable status as the ultimate male-oriented tearjerker, combining the bittersweet tropes of the melodrama genre with the macho textures of sports cinema. Yet it would be wrong to dismiss Brian’s Song as a cheap exercise in audience manipulation—even though the film is too brief and schematic to dig particularly deep into the lives of its characters, Brian’s Song is a credible drama distinguished by a terrific leading performance and solid supporting turns. In fact, much of the picture’s power stems from the presence of James Caan in the title role, because at the time he made Brian’s Song, Caan was bursting with so much ambition and talent that his imminent ascendance to big-screen stardom was inevitable; all it took was an incendiary supporting performance in The Godfather, released a few months later, to complete Caan’s transformation from up-and-comer to household name.
          Based on pro football player Gale Sayers’ memoir about his friendship with doomed fellow Chicago Bears running back Brian Piccolo, Brian’s Song is a sensitive exploration of camaraderie in the face of hardship. Adapted with restraint and taste by screenwriter William Blinn and director Buzz Kulik, the picture begins with the arrival of Gale (Billy Dee Williams) to a Bears training camp. He’s immediately razzed by fellow newbie Brian (Caan), but the two subsequently bond. Later, Brian provides stalwart support when racists resist African-American Gale’s integration into the team. The budding friendship deepens further once Bears coach George Halas (Jack Warden) breaks a color barrier by making Brian and Gale roommates during trips for away games, and one of the warmest scenes in Brian’s Song revolves around Brian’s inability to make racist remarks even when he’s trying to motivate Gale during the painful recovery from a leg injury.

          Brian’s Song gets heavy during its second half, after Brian is diagnosed with cancer.  Suffice to say that only the most hard-hearted viewer could possibly get through the picture’s final scenes without shedding a tear, because the aim of Brian’s Song isn’t to bludgeon audiences with the pointless tragedy of a young life cut short, but rather to invigorate audiences by celebrating a friendship that outlasted death. Caan hits one right note after another here, blending sensitivity and toughness in a manner that later became his signature. Williams, never the most dexterous performer, benefits from a characterization based on reticence, so when the cracks in his character’s emotional armor finally show, the moments count. Warden, who won an Emmy for his performance, provides the definition of reliable support, grounding the film in the harsh realities of professional sports while also conveying a strong sense of innate decency.

Brian’s Song: RIGHT ON

Chapter Two (1978)

          James Caan might not seem the most likely candidate to star in a romantic comedy powered by wall-to-wall dialogue, but he does just fine in Chapter Two, which superstar writer Neil Simon adapted from his own play about a widower struggling to rebuild his life with a new romantic partner. The picture shares many similarities with the Simon-penned blockbuster The Goodbye Girl (1977), the success of which the makers of Chapter Two undoubtedly hoped to emulate. Like The Goodbye Girl, this movie depicts grown-ups bickering their way through a relationship fraught with unusual challenges, and like The Goodbye Girl, it stars Marsha Mason as a frazzled modern woman trying to balance her desire for a satisfying professional life with her urge to settle into a traditional marriage. It’s when the similarities between the films end that Chapter Two runs into problems.

          Chapter Two cannot match the previous movie’s brevity or complexity, because Chapter Two extends unnecessarily past the two-hour mark and lacks a truly memorable supporting character like The Goodbye Girl’s wise-beyond-her-years kid. More problematically, Chapter Two is bereft of the previous film’s brilliance—The Goodbye Girl represents Simon’s dialogue and storytelling at its best, whereas Chapter Two is merely commendable. As always, however, Simon’s jokes are his saving grace, because even when Chapter Two gets stuck in dull, plot-oriented sequences, the dialogue is brightly entertaining. As for the overall narrative of Chapter Two, it is exceedingly simple. After writer George Schneider (Caan) loses his wife, George’s horndog brother, Leo (Joseph Bologna), arranges a date for George with Jennie MacLaine (Mason), who is friends with Leo’s friend Faye Medwick (Valerie Harper). Then, while George and Jennie fall into a too-fast romance, the married Leo begins an affair with the neurotic Faye.
          Complications, as the saying goes, ensue.

          The main thrust of Chapter Two is George’s grief, and the difficulty he encounters putting aside the memory of his late wife so he can embrace a future with Jennie. Simon handles this material well, though his script could have used some trimming, and Caan enlivens the movie by juxtaposing darker colors with lighthearted banter. Mason is very good, as well, though her character has a bit of a one-note quality; she’s the endlessly patient woman who waits for a good man to conquer his demons. Still, this is slickly executed grown-up entertainment—one must check the credits to confirm that it was Robert Morse, not Goodbye Girl helmer Herbert Ross, who directed the picture—so it’s a watchable movie even if it’s also an unmemorable one. (Available through Columbia Screen Classics via WarnerArchive.com)

Chapter Two: FUNKY

Another Man, Another Chance (1977)

          Impressionistic and offbeat, French filmmaker Claude Lelouch’s romantic drama Another Man, Another Chance is nominally a Western, since most of the story takes place in the American frontier circa the late 1800s, but it’s also an international story with many episodes taking place in France during a time of ferocious class conflicts. Repurposing narrative concepts and themes from Lelouch’s 1966 hit A Man and a Woman—without actually being a remake of the previous film—Another Man, Another Chance tells the parallel stories of two sensitive people whose love affairs end in tragedy.

          David (James Caan) is an American veterinarian whose wife, Mary (Jennifer Warren), has grown tired of living in the wilderness, even though David adores the lonesome lifestyle because he relates better to animals than he does to people. Soon after delivering the couple’s first child, Mary is raped and killed by robbers one sad afternoon, while David’s away on business. Meanwhile, in Paris, impulsive young Frenchwoman Jeanne meets a photographer named Francis (Francis Huster), and falls in love. Wishing for adventure and an escape from the rampant poverty in Paris, Francis and Jeanne relocate to America, eventually settling in a town not far from David’s home.

          By the time David and Jeanne finally meet at the school attended by their children, Jeanne has suffered a loss of her own, so she has become guarded about romance. However, David is determined to build on their mutual attraction, so the story explores the challenges faced by people who are haunted by memories of loved ones.

          Lelouch, who also wrote the picture, uses an idiosyncratic storytelling style. He jumps back and forth in time, so viewers experience the story in the same psychological blur as the characters. This nonlinear approach doesn’t always work—some scenes are confusing—but when it connects, Lelouch expresses subtle nuances of anguish and perception. The filmmaker also employs long, unbroken takes that put viewers right in step with the actions of the characters; for instance, the scene in which David discovers Mary’s fate is a presented as a single tracking shot following Caan through every part of his character’s rambling homestead.

          Some of Lelouch’s indulgences are less effective, like a long race scene toward the end of the movie, and one could quibble that casual vignettes of David and Jeanne bonding with their children outlast their usefulness. But since the story takes place in a less hurried time, Lelouch’s leisurely pacing suits the milieu. Also in the film’s favor is the understated acting, with Caan eschewing his standard macho vibe and Bujold affecting a delicate quality that masks formidable resolve. Another Man, Another Chance is far too flawed to qualify as a great film, but it’s consistently heartfelt and thoughtful, in addition to boasting a rich, dust-choked Western atmosphere. (Available as part of the MGM Limited Collection on Amazon.com)

Another Man, Another Chance: GROOVY

A Bridge Too Far (1977)

          Go figure that a movie about a military operation that was thwarted by excessive ambition would itself be thwarted by excessive ambition. Based on the doomed World War II campaign code-named Operation Market Garden, which was staged in late 1944 by Allied forces eager to maximize the gains of D-Day by ending the European component of the war with a push across Holland into Germany, A Bridge Too Far features one of the most impressive all-star casts of the ’70s, in addition to spectacular production values and a few powerful depictions of heroism and tragedy. Furthermore, the movie deserves ample praise for bucking war-movie convention by dramatizing a campaign that didn’t work. And, indeed, the theme evoked by the poetic title—sometimes, just one X factor stands between glory and ignominy—comes across in several key performances. Yet occasional glimpses of effective storytelling do not equal a completely satisfying movie, and A Bridge Too Far fails on many important levels when analyzed in its entirety.

          The movie is hard to follow, because it tracks too many characters in too many locations, and because, quite frankly, director Richard Attenborough fails to give greater dramatic weight to crucial moments. Everything in A Bridge Too Far is presented with almost exactly the same measure of gravitas, so Attenborough squanders interesting potentialities found throughout the movie’s script, which was penned by two-time Oscar winner William Goldman. Clearly, Attenborough and Goldman were both stymied, to a degree, by the sheer scale of the undertaking; producer Joseph E. Levine made it plain he wanted this movie to equal the 1962 epic The Longest Day, another all-star war picture based on a book by Cornelius Ryan.

          Yet while The Longest Day had the advantages of a triumphant subject (D-Day) and a receptive audience (moviegoers still embraced pro-military themes in the early ’60s), A Bridge Too Far is a far different creature—a story of battlefield hubris made at a time when America was still reeling from the traumas of the Vietnam War. So, even if the movie possessed a clearer narrative, chances are it still would’ve been the wrong movie at the wrong time.

          Having said all that, A Bridge Too Far has many noteworthy elements. The subject matter is fascinating, since Ryan’s book itemized the innumerable strategic errors made by the Allies in planning Operation Market Garden—beyond problems of scale, since the campaign involved things like an air drop of 35,000 paratroopers, the plan was so contingent upon component elements that if any one piece of the plan failed, the whole campaign would collapse. Therefore, the movie is a study of men who represent the margin of error that Operation Market Garden cannot afford—whether they’re Americans, Brits, or Poles, the soldiers in this movie try to achieve the impossible even when it’s plainly evident success is beyond their grasp.

          The most vivid moments involve Sean Connery and Anthony Hopkins as British officers trying to hold the Dutch town of Arnhem for days on end despite a crippling lack of reinforcements and supplies. Robert Redford dominates a key sequence in the third and final hour of the movie, playing an American officer who leads a seemingly suicidal charge across a heavily fortified river in broad daylight. Maximilian Schell makes an elegant impression as a German commander capable of mercy and ruthlessness, while Dirk Bogarde is appropriately infuriating as Schell’s opposite number on the Allied side, a British general who refuses to acknowledge the possibility of failure.

          Unfortunately, many promising characterizations are merely sketches: Actors Michael Caine, Edward Fox, Elliot Gould, Gene Hackman, Hardy Kruger, Laurence Olivier, Ryan O’Neal, and Liv Ullmann each have colorful moments, but all are badly underutilized. And as for James Caan, his entire showy sequence could have been deleted without affecting the story, since his subplot feels like a leftover from a World War II movie actually made during World War II. Ironically, though, his are among the film’s most memorable scenes.

A Bridge Too Far: FUNKY

Rollerball (1975)

          The best science-fiction films of the early ’70s provided sharp social commentary in addition to whiz-bang visuals. For instance, Rollerball is ostensibly an action movie about a futuristic game that combines gladiatorial violence with high-speed athleticism, but it’s also a treatise on the insidiousness of corporate influence and the manner in which vacuous entertainment narcotizes the public.

          Set in what was then the near future, 2018, the picture imagines that the nations of Earth have been replaced by a handful of corporations responsible for providing key services, notably the Energy Corporation of Houston, Texas. The corporations have eliminated famine and war, but they’re also eradicating free will. To keep the masses in check, the Corporations invented Rollerball, a kind of hyper-violent roller derby; players move around a circular track on skates or on motorcycles, bashing each other senseless as they try to jam a metal ball into a scoring slot.

          The game’s biggest star is Houston’s Jonathan E. (James Caan), but his bosses, including Energy titan Bartholemew (John Houseman), perceive Jonathan’s popularity as a threat. “The game was created to demonstrate the futility of individual effort,” Bartholemew muses at one point. Bartholemew and his cronies try to ply Jonathan with money and women, but when he refuses to go quietly, they change game rules in order to allow opponents to kill him during a brutal match between the Houston team and the samurai-styled squad from Tokyo.

          Given this slight plot, it’s impressive that Rollerball remains interesting from start to finish. Director Norman Jewison, midway through one of the most eclectic careers in Hollywood history, does a masterful job of parceling the Rollerball scenes—we get a bloody taste at the beginning, and never return to the rink except when necessary for narrative purposes. Furthermore, once Jewison begins a game sequence, he pounds the audience with relentless cuts and movement that simulate the ferocity of the game itself.

          Scenes taking place outside the rink are menacing and quiet, with Caan displaying sensitivity that contrasts the bloodlust he evinces on the battlefield. Houseman personifies an ugly type of blueblooded superiority, while an eclectic group of character players fill out the rest of the cast. John Beck is intense as Caan’s teammate, Moonpie; Moses Gunn lends gravitas as an anguished coach; and Pamela Hensley provides allure as a kept woman opportunistically moving from one star player to the next. Best of all is one-scene wonder Ralph Richardson, who plays a daffy librarian eager to help Jonathan investigate the evil designs of the corporations.

          This being a sci-fi picture, the visuals are of paramount importance, and cinematographer Douglas Slocombe’s images never disappoint: His haze filters and long lenses give the picture otherworldly coldness. Rollerball’s characterizations aren’t particularly deep—perhaps because writer William Harrison drew from the slight source material of his own short story, “Roller Ball Murder”—but careful direction, solid performances, and vivid action make the picture quite exciting.

Rollerball: GROOVY

Cinderella Liberty (1973)

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

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

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

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

Cinderella Liberty: GROOVY

Freebie and the Bean (1974)

          In addition to being one of the first buddy-cop movies, Freebie and the Bean is so gleefully outrageous that when I revisited the movie at a screening in Hollywood circa 2005, some of the racially provocative gags triggered audible gasps. Whereas most buddy-cop pictures undercut edginess by suggesting heroes are basically decent, Freebie and the Bean achieves a sort of badass integrity by focusing on policemen so dangerously unhinged they shouldn’t be loose on the streets, much less armed with guns and badges.

          Freebie (James Caan) is a racist willing to cause mass destruction while pursuing criminals, and Bean (Alan Arkin) is an uptight Mexican so preoccupied with the possibility of his wife’s infidelity that he suffers volcanic outbursts. These madmen prowl the streets of San Francisco as plainclothes detectives obsessed with nailing nailing local crime boss Red Meyers (Jack Kruschen). Defying authority, destroying public property, and endangering bystanders wherever they go, Freebie and Bean instigate such crazed scenes as a car chase that ends with a sedan zooming off a highway and landing inside a third-floor apartment. (Keep in mind Freebie and the Bean was made in the pre-CGI era, so real people performed the amazing feats; although the blending of actors and stuntmen is clumsy, the physical reality of the wild action ups the energy level.)

          Director Richard Rush, whose gonzo pictures include the drug-culture classic Psych-Out (1968) and the perverse thriller The Stunt Man (1980), orchestrates startlingly offensive verbal confrontations as well as spectacular tableaux of mass demolition. This is total balls-to-the-wall filmmaking, so while Freebie and the Bean is not quality cinema (the story isn’t memorable and nothing feels credible), it’s still highly entertaining. Juicing that watchability is the way both leading actors commit to their performances while generating playfully antagonistic chemistry. Caan is so cocksure and trigger-happy he makes Dirty Harry seem cautious by comparison, while Arkin is so paranoid and volatile he seems ready for an asylum. (Good luck ignoring the fact that Arkin and Valerie Harper, who plays his wife, are absurdly miscast as Mexicans.)

          While the movie’s ultimate legacy is helping to launch the buddy-cop formula that became ubiquitous in the following decade (48 Hrs., Lethal Weapon, etc.), Freebie and the Bean also inspired a short-lived TV adaptation that aired from 1980 to 1981, with Tom Mason playing Freebie and Hector Elizondo playing Bean.

Freebie & the Bean: FUNKY

The Killer Elite (1975)

          Part action picture, part conspiracy thriller, and part revenge epic, The Killer Elite is a mess. As directed by Sam Peckinpah, whose creative decline was rapidly underway at this point, the picture boasts a handful of exciting scenes and several vivid performances, but its intentions are as vague as its storyline. James Caan and Robert Duvall star as a pair of gunmen who work for a private espionage group that’s hired by the CIA for covert operations like securely transporting international political figures who’ve been targeted for assassination by foreign governments. For reasons that are never particularly clear, Hansen (Duvall) shoots Locken (Caan) after a successful operation, betraying his buddy and leaving Locken a near-cripple thanks to wounds to his elbow and knee. The movie then devotes about 30 minutes to methodical scenes showing Locken’s recovery. As soon as Locken’s back in fighting shape, Hansen conveniently surfaces with a contract to kill an Asian dissident (Mako), so Locken recruits a driver (Burt Young) and a sniper (Bo Hopkins) to help protect the dissident and, with any luck, confront Hansen. Also layered into the story are a series of double- and triple-crosses involving Locken’s bosses (Arthur Hill and Gig Young). Oh, and there are ninjas, too. Lots of ninjas.

          None of it makes very much sense, but the journey is still somewhat interesting because Caan is so charismatic and because Peckinpah knows how to shoot action scenes. (Extensive San Francisco location photography is another plus.) When The Killer Elite clicks, it delivers visceral moments like a shootout in a crowded street that expands into a nasty high-speed car chase. When the movie doesn’t click, it delivers spastic sequences like the climactic confrontation, during which Locken’s crew takes on an army of ninjas aboard a decommissioned warship, all of which leads up to a big swordfight between two supporting characters. Whatever. Luckily, the picture knows better than to take itself seriously, so sarcastic humor is woven into nearly every scene. Caan’s buddy-movie shtick with his sidekicks is terrific (Young is consistently amusing and Hopkins is memorably twitchy), and it’s also entertaining to watch Caan’s character get exasperated whenever the dissident spouts Eastern philosophy. “I understand now,” Caan opines bitchily at one point. “He wants to go back and die on his native soil. It’s that salmon-up-the-river shit.”

The Killer Elite: FUNKY

Harry and Walter Go to New York (1976)

          Despite a fantastic cast, the would-be farce Harry and Walter Go to New York falls flat because only a handful of the movie’s myriad one-liners, sight gags, and slapstick routines actually elicit laughter. A failed attempt to blend the Vaudevillian style of silent-era comedy with the elaborate con-man plotting of The Sting (1973), the ineptly written but lavishly produced picture follows a pair of nincompoop 19th-century crooks who fall into the orbit of a world-famous master criminal, then try to rob a bank before the criminal gets there first.
          James Caan and Elliot Gould play Harry and Walter, small-time robbers who get caught picking pockets during one of their low-rent song-and-dance routines. Meanwhile, gentleman thief Adam Worth (Michael Caine) gets tossed into the same jail as our heroes, but Adam’s so rich that he gets a private cell appointed with velvet curtains and silver table settings. Harry and Walter discover—and accidentally destroy—Adam’s prized blueprints for an ambitious bank job, then escape and get enmeshed with activist reporter Lissa Chestnut (Diane Keaton). Through convoluted circumstances, Harry, Walter, and Lissa end up trying to rob the bank the same night as Adam’s gang, leading to silliness like Harry and Walter stalling for time with an improvised musical number.

          As photographed in a nostalgic glow by Laszlo Kovacs, Harry and Walter looks great, and the leads are complemented by a gaggle of ace supporting players, including Val Avery, Ted Cassidy, Charles Durning, Jack Gilford, Carol Kane, Lesley Ann Warren, and Burt Young. Unfortunately, the material just isn’t there. The characters are underdeveloped, the comedic situations don’t percolate, the dialogue doesn’t sparkle, and the narrative conceit that the idiotic Harry and Walter keep stumbling into good fortune feels like a cheat. Still, it’s impossible not to find commendable elements with this much talent involved, and those high points range from the intentionally awful musical passages featuring Caan and Gould to Caine’s peerless delivery of sardonic dialogue. Providing one of the movie’s few real laughs, he dismisses the heroes by explaining that “They’re not oafs—they would require practice to become oafs.”

Harry and Walter Go to New York: FUNKY

Funny Lady (1975)

While Barbra Streisand’s Oscar-winning film debut Funny Girl (1968) originated as a Broadway show, this lavishly produced sequel was created for the screen. Accordingly, the visual razzle-dazzle is amped up considerably from the first picture, but the spectacle overwhelms the paper-thin story. The narrative begins with Broadway comedy/singing star Fanny Brice (Streisand) reeling from the end of her marriage to callous gambler Nicky Arnstein (Omar Sharif, who briefly reprises his role from the first film). It’s the height of the Great Depression, so Fanny’s financial troubles make her susceptible to an overture from overbearing producer/songwriter Billy Rose (James Caan), who wants Fanny to headline his new show. The first half of the picture depicts the development and out-of-town tryouts for the show, titled Crazy Quilt, and director Herbert Ross (who staged the musical numbers for the original movie) borrows heavily from Bob Fosse’s bag of tricks to present opulent numbers with eye-popping costumes and sets. The highlight, at least from a visual perspective, is Ben Vereen’s amazing dance during “Clap Hands! Here Comes Charley”—but that scene does nothing to advance the narrative, which gives a sense of the picture’s unfocused nature. Streisand and Caan make an effective duo, each coming on so strong that they raise each other’s games, and screenwriters Jay Presson Allen and Arnold Schulman give the pair quite a few passages of edgy banter. Yet the preoccupation with surface beauty kills credibility in every scene, because, for instance, the filmmakers devote inordinate amounts of energy to making Streisand look as sexy as possible, even though she’s playing a middle-aged comedienne who was never considered a great beauty. At its worst, the movie goes totally off track with anachronistic glamour-girl numbers like “Great Day,” which looks like a clip from one of Cher’s ’70s TV specials. Streisand also drops the naïve charm of her characterization from the first film, playing Fanny as the sort of emotionally underdeveloped showbiz diva we’ve seen a million times, so it’s impossible to care when she finds herself torn between Billy and Nicky. Funny Lady is gorgeous to behold, and Streisand’s voice is as remarkable as ever, but it never connects as a love story or as a continuation of the beloved original.

Funny Lady: FUNKY

Comes a Horseman (1978)

Director Alan J. Pakula took a massive misstep after helming the Watergate-themed masterpiece All the President’s Men (1976), venturing into the world of cowboy drama for the pretentious and unsatisfying Comes a Horseman. Yet even with its profound shortcomings, the picture is interesting because of the caliber of talent involved, and because it’s fascinating to watch Pakula try to blend his dark, meditative style into the vibrant milieu of the revisionist Western. So even though this director and this genre aren’t even remotely a good match, Comes a Horseman boasts powerful moments thanks to rich atmosphere and strong performances, two qualities that distinguish all of Pakula’s films. Jane Fonda stars as a second-generation cattle farmer under pressure from a powerful rancher (Jason Robards) to sell her struggling operation so he can expand his empire. Into the story comes a horseman, obviously, who’s played by decidedly Eastern tough guy James Caan; casting city slicker Caan as a cowboy is one of the movie’s many bold stylistic experiments. Caan helps Fonda turn her farm around, leading to a violent confrontation with Robards and his operatives, since the villain is an omnivorous monster who won’t take no for an answer. Fonda is perfectly cast and quite convincing as a child of the frontier, Robards is entertaining if a touch cartoonish as a megalomaniacal baddie, and Caan struggles valiantly to blend into a genre that doesn’t suit him any more than it suits Pakula. All three leads, however, are upstaged by former stuntman Richard Farnsworth, who scored the first of his two Oscar nominations for his gruffly authentic performance as a wise old cowpoke named Dodger. He’s such a strong presence that scenes without him feel insufficient. Pakula benefits from moody photography by cinematographer Gordon Willis, and though neither Pakula nor Willis are particularly adept at shooting action—Willis is one of the great atmosphere guys, not a run-and-gun shooter—they create several memorably stark moments, like the film’s apocalyptic finale.

Comes a Horseman: FUNKY

Gone With the West (1975)

          Shot in 1969 (under the title Man Without Mercy) but not released until 1975, this inexplicable Western starring James Caan, Sammy Davis Jr., and Stefanie Powers seems like it was edited as an arts-and-crafts project by the residents of a mental institution after they’d been dosed with LSD. The narrative is discombobulated, the style swings between broad slapstick and bleak violence for no discernible reason, and the score seems comprised of outtakes from a no-budget porno. The “story” involves ex-convict Jud McGraw (Caan) and wronged Native American Little Moon (Powers) teaming up for revenge against the corrupt residents of a small town in the Old West; people in the town killed Jud’s family and raped Little Moon. The movie juxtaposes cutesy vignettes of the heroes conjuring harebrained schemes in the desert, like live-action versions of Warner Bros. cartoon characters, with nonsensical scenes of debauched chaos in the town. Davis shows up periodically as a nattily dressed gunslinger, but if he has any legitimate connection to the storyline, it’s undetectable.
         A typical scene in this fever dream of a movie unfurls as follows: The townies gather in the local saloon to watch a ruthless bare-knuckle brawl, and then a female bystander literally chews the ass off one of the fighters, and then a corpse-laden horse wanders into the saloon, and then Caan and Powers use a catapult to launch boulders at the saloon, and then the townies form a posse to chase the outlaws, and then Caan and Powers somehow kill the entire posse without any injury to themselves. While all of this madness happens, the soundtrack hums with boogie-woogie piano played over a sleazy wakka-wakka disco beat. Oh, and is it worth mentioning that the film periodically cuts to a townie crooning an old spiritual number in a basso profundo that would make Lurch proud? Or that Powers tends to yell “Yahoo!” as her Indian war cry even though her character doesn’t speak English? Or that one sequence includes a rape that takes place in a cockfighting pit—while a cockfight is happening?
          In its incompetent and/or unhinged way, the movie seems to be aiming for satirical yuks until the bloody finale, which features hardy-har-har moments like Caan impaling a dude with a pitchfork and Powers using a kite to strafe the town with dynamite. During the melee, one townie gets killed in an explosion while trying to rescue her dog from a burning building, while another gets squashed when the side of a burning building falls and flattens him. Fun!
          The lunacy concludes when Caan and Powers leave the obliterated town, then look back at the camera. In perfect English, Powers says to her costar, “Hey, you killed everybody but the cameraman,” so Caan shoots his gun toward the camera, and the image tumbles as if the cameraman took a bullet. Super fun!
          Amazingly, Gone With the West gets even weirder if you check out the alternate cut that’s widely available on the market under the title Little Moon and Jud McGraw. That version cuts the original movie to ribbons and brackets the story with the lame framing device of a modern-day couple hearing the story of Little Moon and Jud from a dotty old squaw who scams unsuspecting travelers in the Southwest. So much worse than a run-of-the-mill bad movie, Gone with the West is like a postmodernist experiment designed to see how much incoherence 90 minutes can contain.

Gone With the West: FREAKY

The Godfather (1972) & The Godfather: Part II (1974)

          When Paramount decided to make a film of Mario Puzo’s pulpy novel about a Mafia family, the subject matter was considered déclassé at best, the domain of such grimy quickies as The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre (1967). But the success of the novel (something like 2 million copies sold in the first two years after publication) convinced ambitious Paramount boss Robert Evans to give The Godfather the A-list treatment. After the usual dance of overtures to other filmmakers (Peter Bogdanovich, Sergio Leone), Francis Ford Coppola was hired as director and as Puzo’s cowriter on a script about the ascension of crime boss Michael Corelone. Gobs of plot from the novel were cut (and later repurposed for the first sequel), notably patriarch Vito Corleone’s backstory. Getting the movie cast was an ordeal, especially because Paramount hated Al Pacino for Michael even more than they hated Marlon Brando for Vito. The studio pitched such unlikely alternates as Ryan O’Neal for the son and Danny Thomas for the father.

          Making the film was fractious for all involved, with Coppola and Pacino constantly at risk of termination—the director was targeted for overspending, the actor for underplaying. Yet behind-the-scenes disharmony wasn’t enough to inhibit the creative process, because The Godfather represents a career high for everyone involved. As entertaining as it is intelligent and soulful, the picture comfortably ranks among American cinema’s true masterpieces. Working with famed cinematographer Gordon Willis, nicknamed “The Prince of Darkness” for his moody lighting style, Coppola created a unique look that evoked vintage sepia-toned photographs. Drawing on his own Italian American heritage, Coppola blended his cast into a tight unit, thereby creating a sense of familial connection that counterbalances the film’s violent storyline.

          As for the narrative itself, that should be familiar to all ’70s-cinema fans, so here’s a brief sketch for those who haven’t yet had the pleasure. As aging Mafia boss Vito Corleone struggles to maintain old codes of conduct during the changing times of the World War II era, his three sons follow different paths. Heir apparent Sonny (James Caan) is a hothead who advocates violence, ne’er-do-well Fredo (John Cazale) evinces cowardice, and golden boy Michael (Pacino) avoids the family business until circumstances force him to embrace his destiny. Standing to the side of the action is lawyer Tom Hagen (Robert Duvall), an outsider who’s nearly a fourth son to Vito, and Kay Adams (Diane Keaton), Michael’s WASP fiancée.

          The genius of The Godfather is that internal friction causes as much trouble for the Corleones as external forces, so the film becomes a meditation on betrayal, disappointment, family, honor, and countless other epic themes. The acting is amazing, from the stars to the perfectly selected bit players whom Coppola employs to imbue every scene with gritty flavor. And although it’s essentially Pacino’s movie, no one actor dominates, since The Godfather is an egalitarian ensemble piece. It also features more classic scenes than nearly any other single movie, from the canoli to the horse’s head and beyond. It’s not enough to describe The Godfather as one of the essential films of the ’70s, because The Godfather is one of the essential films of all time.

          Astonishingly, Coppola and co. nearly topped themselves with the sequel. Both ’70s Godfather films won Oscars as Best Picture, a feat that’s unlikely to ever be repeated. In fact, many fans argue that The Godfather, Part II is the rare sequel to surpass its predecessor, though I don’t share that opinion. Make no mistake, The Godfather, Part II is remarkable in both ambition and execution, with artistic and technical aspects either matching or exceeding those of the original film. Moreover, the film’s painful storyline about a battle between brothers cuts as deeply as the first picture’s depiction of a father trying and failing to save his favorite son from a life of crime. So when I offer my opinion that The Godfather, Part II is incrementally inferior to The Godfather, it’s with the caveat that nearly all films, even great ones, are inferior to The Godfather.

          As has been analyzed and celebrated by countless people before me, the big play that Coppola made in The Godfather Part II was telling two stories at once. In present-day scenes, hapless Fredo makes a series of foolish decisions, forcing Michael to exercise his authority over the family in heartbreaking ways. Meanwhile, in operatic flashbacks, Robert De Niro plays the younger version of Brando’s character from the first film. As such, The Godfather, Part II parallels the formation of the Corleone family with its ultimate damnation, brilliantly illustrating how the fateful choices that Vito made as a young man triggered a chain of events continuing through generations. For my taste, the nettlesome flaw of The Godfather, Part II stems from directorial self-indulgence, which would eventually become a major problem in Coppola’s career. As gorgeous and poetic as they are, the De Niro scenes linger a bit too long, since it feels as if Coppola fell in love with every artistic composition and balletic camera move that he and Willis created together. Even the presence of famed acting teacher Lee Strasberg in a crucial supporting role feels a bit precious, as if The Godfather, Part II is overly aware of its own significance as a compendium of extraordinary performance techniques. That said, we should all be so lucky as to suffer from an embarrassment of riches, and the highest points of The Godfather, Part II (“I know it was you, Fredo”) are breathtaking.

          Regarding the subject of the much-maligned cash-grab threequel The Godfather, Part III (1990), I choose to pretend there are only two movies about the Corleone family. FYI, compendium releases bearing titles including The Godfather Saga and The Godfather: A Novel for Television put all the scenes from the first two pictures, alongside previously unseen footage, into chronological order. Yet another version, The Godfather Trilogy: 1901–1980, integrates the third film and its attendant deleted scenes. The running time on that version is a whopping 583 minutes.

The Godfather: OUTTA SIGHT

The Godfather, Part II: OUTTA SIGHT

Silent Movie (1976)

          After discovering his gift for spoofing movie genres with Blazing Saddles and Young Frankenstein, both of which were released in 1974, Mel Brooks lost his way with Silent Movie. By many reports, Brooks’ considerable ego was to blame for the precipitous drop in the quality of his pictures, because he burned an important bridge by alienating actor-writer Gene Wilder, who starred in both 1974 hits, after taking too much credit for Young Frankenstein. So even though Brooks enjoyed long relationships with talented collaborators, including actors like Dom DeLuise and Marty Feldman, as well as behind-the-scenes talents like composer John Morris, it was clear that on a Mel Brooks picture, only the name above the title really mattered. Therefore, in Silent Movie, it’s all about Mel, and not in a good way. Brooks cast himself in the leading role, and his legendary comic gifts aren’t enough to compensate for his shortcomings as an actor. He plays for the cheap seats with every reaction shot, bludgeons the delivery of jokes with bug-eyed obviousness, and can’t muster the varied nuances that Wilder brought to his performances in Brooks films.

          It doesn’t help, of course, that Silent Movie adheres to the gimmick implied by its title: Like an old one-reeler from the Mack Sennett era, the picture uses title cards in place of dialogue, which gives it a stop-and-start rhythm that soon grows wearying. The storyline is amusing-ish, with a film director (Brooks) trying to produce a brand-new silent movie in the modern era, and Silent Movie features cameos by big names who relish making idiots of themselves: Anne Bancroft, James Caan, Liza Minnelli, Paul Newman, Burt Reynolds. (In a clever touch, French mine Marcel Marceau delivers the movie’s only line of spoken dialogue.) Brooks has fun executing exuberant physical comedy in the silent-era style with the assistance of core players DeLuise, Feldman, Sid Caesar, Ron Carey, Harold Gould, and Bernadette Peters, but the film’s slapstick is so endlessly insipid that the fervent efforts of the cast are mostly wasted. It’s hard to actively dislike Silent Movie since it’s trying so hard to be entertaining, but it’s hard to get excited about it, either.

Silent Movie: LAME