Reviews (18)

Strange and wonderful world of McGuane brought to the screen
What makes this film brilliant, besides Jack Nicholson in a terrific role, and Marlon Brando really showing his incredible acting range, is a wonderful, funny, bizarre, and engaging script by Thomas McGuane. McGuane is arguably the best living novelist America has (The Bushwhacked Piano, Ninety-two in the Shade, Panama, Keep the Change, et al) and his ear for dialogue is sharp, satirical and in full force in the Missouri Breaks. He lives in Montana and has an incredible love for the land mixed with a disdain for those who exploit it, which is exemplified in this western to end all westerns. As far as what Leonard Maltin says . . .well, let's consider the source, shall we?

shakespeare on the breaks
This title belongs on DVD. That has to get said first. I'm not sure that Missouri Breaks really falls into the category of anti-western; it isn't undermining any of the accepted notions of manifest destiny or cultural superiority that make an anti-western like Little Big Man. It's more like a great western novel adeptly turned to film. Harry Dean Stanton and Randy Quaid give rock solid supporting performances and help lend realism to the characterizations which Nicholson caps with his performance. All this solid character/period piece acting allows Marlon Brando to launch an outer space crazy minded performance that somehow really works in this flik, better than his outer space performance in Apocalypse Now. The feeling of placement into a historical time period is intense, and unlike many such fashion shows of recent western period filming, this one is dirty and true, we're not gawking at the authenticity of the clothes folks are wearing, but at how we've been transported to the Breaks of the late 1800's. Amazing work all around. See this film.

One of the best "anti-westerns" of the '60s and '70s.
'The Missouri Breaks' caps a short list of "anti-western" films that marked the death of the classic western as an American Icon. Writer Thomas McGuane skillfully weaves the counter-cultural mores of his own generation into the fabric of this non-conformist screenplay in which the "good guys" are the cattle rustlers and the "bad guys" are the law (or what passes for law in the west). Jack Nicholson (as a rustler) and a very scary Marlon Brando as a looney bounty hunter head up this cast, which reads like a rogue's gallery of great character actors such as Frederick Forrest, Harry Dean Stanton and Warren Oates. Many mainstream American critics panned this film, largely because of its refusal to fit within well-defined story arcs, yet foreign critics praised it for its rawness and superb acting. If you're a fan of films that stretch the limits of their genre, then 'The Missouri Breaks' is a must-see Western.

Not another one like this EVER
This movie has the best character actors doing the most bizarre tour-de-force performances in cinema history. Just like Boagart could only have played Rick in "Casablanca," no other actor could have played the gunslinger that Marlon Brando protrays in this movie, and it is his talent to control the screen that makes this movie unforgettable.

In the same context, Jack Nicholson with his wry humor and controlling demeanor on screen, is the only adversarial character strong enough to hold his own on the screen with Brando.

What is the matter with the studios that they do not release this movie to DVD ... it is more than a classic, and when seen once, never forgotten and rarely compared with any other cinema celuloid done to date.

I give it 6-stars, in that nothing can touch this movie in any category.

Highly underrated film
I can't believe this movie has been so trashed & overlooked over the years. Like Mickey One & Left-Handed Gun, it's one of Arthur Penn's more offbeat & original films. Marlon Brando gives a highly inventive performance & demonstrates once more that he is one of the great comic performers of the screen (as he did more conventionally in Teahouse of the August Moon). To see Jack Nicholson (who is also excellent) with Brando is a terrific treat. Glad I found this on Laserdisc. Definitely should be given top treatment on DVD. ... Read more

Amazon.com essential video

Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft had been playing their respective roles as Helen Keller and her teacher, Annie Sullivan, on Broadway for some time before director Arthur Penn (The Left-Handed Gun) built a mesmerizingly beautiful film around their layers-deep performances. Duke is astonishing as the deaf, blind, mute Keller, who awakens to an awareness of language under Sullivan's determined guidance. Bancroft is fascinating and focused. Penn wisely kept his adaptation unencumbered by cinematic indulgence. The black-and-white film is sparse and charged with the immediacy of the drama. The script is by William Gibson, who also wrote the original play. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (31)

Great Classic Movie!
I enjoyed watching this movie because it is entertaining and I never got bored throughout the movie. I am deaf and I really enjoy the fingerspelling scenes, plus Annie Sullivan did wonders for Hellen by portraying her as a hard worker to help Hellen get a life from a soundless, sightless world. Both Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft did a great job on their parts. This is a good movie, both funny and heart-wrenching, and it is worth it to watch!

The deaf speaks...
I'm usually very critical of movies. A movie that really blows me away is rare, but I have never been more blown away in my entire life than by this film - I am deaf, I say this because it is relevant to the subject. I grew up in the same school as deaf/blind children. I assure you, the performance of Patty Duke is INCREDIBLE - totally credulous. Anne Bancroft is overwhelming as Annie O'Sullivan, the schoolteacher. There is not a bad performance in this entire movie. It is emotional and gut-wrenching without the smallest drop of schmaltz or saccharine - something that is very rare in a movie with the subject matter of a disabled child. In fact, it is almost painful and brutal to watch at times, but I am grateful to the director for cutting no punches. The cinematography and black-and-white film are perfectly in tune with the performances and subject matter. So often the easy way is taken out when transferring a stage play to screen - just look at "And Then There Were None" aka "Ten Little Indians" for an example - but here, the ending is presented after a gruelling drama - I honestly think that the ending of this film is a true cinematic moment - it is unsentimental and yet... the emotions, the sheer power, the strength and climax of it all - the realisation. My entire nervous system vibrated for half a hour after watching this film, and still does so whenever I think of it - It is BRILLIANT. Disturbing, disquieting, ferocious, frightening, funny (yes, funny), tender, loving, HATING, calmness and storms. I could say so much about this film - write so many essays upon its different aspects - but I have neither time, nor you the patience, so I shall end with these words: Watch it!

Fantastic Movie!
I saw The Miracle Worker on TCM and it is a fantastic movie. It is based on the stage play which is based on the true story of Helen Keller who was left deaf, blind and mute since an illness she contacted when she a baby and thought of by doctors as being retarded and that nothing could be done to help her so with really no way of communicating with anyone she was a very frustrated young girl and was kind of let by her parents to run wild and doctors and even some family members thought she should be sent away to an asylum but all that changes when Annie Sullivan comes to help Helen and teach her how to communicate and survive so she is not sent away. Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke were both wonderful as Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller and I highly recommend this movie and I just may someday buy the widescreen DVD. Sometime in the late 1970s Patty Duke starred in a television remake in which she played Annie Sullivan and Melissa Gilbert played Helen Keller and though the original is best the remake was also good. FYI: Fans of the 1980s sitcom Benson might be interested to know that Inga Swenson who played Helen's mother in this original Miracle worker Movie played Mrs. Kraus the housekeeper in Benson.

Beautiful Performances
Beautiful performances by Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke in a film about overcoming devastating childhood disabilities. The musical score is also very moving. Just a comment about the well-known dining room scene which took several days to shoot. It is very powerful, but if you are attentive to detail, there are some inconsistencies in continuity. But this is the fault of the director and editor, not the actress.
There are many wonderful moments in this film. The last 10 minutes of the movie are deeply touching. It gets to me every time.

Home visit
This is such a wonderful story.Helen Keller as a child,Patty Duke Gives such a performance and Anne Bancroft is splended.From child to adulthood Helen Keller Life history is amazing.We all have to have some sympathy for anyone that has a handicap as she did but how many would seek the education,dedication to help others as she did, courage to visit other countries.She met Presidents(had her picture taken with them)Leaders of other countries welcomed her. This past summer I visited her home in Tuscombia Al.There are plays in June and July. I didn't go to one though(It was Hot).The bleachers are in the back yard,I hear the plays are wonderful.It protrays her as the movie does.You can visit the House and explore each room.I must say I was shocked to see the house,because it looked so big in the movie,and the house next door where Anne took her.The well,buggy,maids house in back. If you haven't been there,Type this up on your net. Alabama History on Line Email:dpendlot@Archives. state.Al USA.They will send you pamplets and information about everything. Have fun,Marie ... Read more

Reviews (31)

Great Classic Movie!
I enjoyed watching this movie because it is entertaining and I never got bored throughout the movie. I am deaf and I really enjoy the fingerspelling scenes, plus Annie Sullivan did wonders for Hellen by portraying her as a hard worker to help Hellen get a life from a soundless, sightless world. Both Patty Duke and Anne Bancroft did a great job on their parts. This is a good movie, both funny and heart-wrenching, and it is worth it to watch!

The deaf speaks...
I'm usually very critical of movies. A movie that really blows me away is rare, but I have never been more blown away in my entire life than by this film - I am deaf, I say this because it is relevant to the subject. I grew up in the same school as deaf/blind children. I assure you, the performance of Patty Duke is INCREDIBLE - totally credulous. Anne Bancroft is overwhelming as Annie O'Sullivan, the schoolteacher. There is not a bad performance in this entire movie. It is emotional and gut-wrenching without the smallest drop of schmaltz or saccharine - something that is very rare in a movie with the subject matter of a disabled child. In fact, it is almost painful and brutal to watch at times, but I am grateful to the director for cutting no punches. The cinematography and black-and-white film are perfectly in tune with the performances and subject matter. So often the easy way is taken out when transferring a stage play to screen - just look at "And Then There Were None" aka "Ten Little Indians" for an example - but here, the ending is presented after a gruelling drama - I honestly think that the ending of this film is a true cinematic moment - it is unsentimental and yet... the emotions, the sheer power, the strength and climax of it all - the realisation. My entire nervous system vibrated for half a hour after watching this film, and still does so whenever I think of it - It is BRILLIANT. Disturbing, disquieting, ferocious, frightening, funny (yes, funny), tender, loving, HATING, calmness and storms. I could say so much about this film - write so many essays upon its different aspects - but I have neither time, nor you the patience, so I shall end with these words: Watch it!

Fantastic Movie!
I saw The Miracle Worker on TCM and it is a fantastic movie. It is based on the stage play which is based on the true story of Helen Keller who was left deaf, blind and mute since an illness she contacted when she a baby and thought of by doctors as being retarded and that nothing could be done to help her so with really no way of communicating with anyone she was a very frustrated young girl and was kind of let by her parents to run wild and doctors and even some family members thought she should be sent away to an asylum but all that changes when Annie Sullivan comes to help Helen and teach her how to communicate and survive so she is not sent away. Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke were both wonderful as Annie Sullivan and Helen Keller and I highly recommend this movie and I just may someday buy the widescreen DVD. Sometime in the late 1970s Patty Duke starred in a television remake in which she played Annie Sullivan and Melissa Gilbert played Helen Keller and though the original is best the remake was also good. FYI: Fans of the 1980s sitcom Benson might be interested to know that Inga Swenson who played Helen's mother in this original Miracle worker Movie played Mrs. Kraus the housekeeper in Benson.

Beautiful Performances
Beautiful performances by Anne Bancroft and Patty Duke in a film about overcoming devastating childhood disabilities. The musical score is also very moving. Just a comment about the well-known dining room scene which took several days to shoot. It is very powerful, but if you are attentive to detail, there are some inconsistencies in continuity. But this is the fault of the director and editor, not the actress.
There are many wonderful moments in this film. The last 10 minutes of the movie are deeply touching. It gets to me every time.

Home visit
This is such a wonderful story.Helen Keller as a child,Patty Duke Gives such a performance and Anne Bancroft is splended.From child to adulthood Helen Keller Life history is amazing.We all have to have some sympathy for anyone that has a handicap as she did but how many would seek the education,dedication to help others as she did, courage to visit other countries.She met Presidents(had her picture taken with them)Leaders of other countries welcomed her. This past summer I visited her home in Tuscombia Al.There are plays in June and July. I didn't go to one though(It was Hot).The bleachers are in the back yard,I hear the plays are wonderful.It protrays her as the movie does.You can visit the House and explore each room.I must say I was shocked to see the house,because it looked so big in the movie,and the house next door where Anne took her.The well,buggy,maids house in back. If you haven't been there,Type this up on your net. Alabama History on Line Email:dpendlot@Archives. state.Al USA.They will send you pamplets and information about everything. Have fun,Marie ... Read more

Amazon.com essential video

Jack Crabb is the only white survivor of the Battle of Little Big Horn and the centenarian shares his story in this picaresque fable of the Old West. In Arthur Penn's adaptation of Thomas Berger's novel, Dustin Hoffman plays Jack from teen years into old age in a bravura performance. And Jack's story is a fantastic one: captured by Indians as a boy, reared as an Indian, shuttling back and forth between the white and Indian worlds. In the process, he befriends everyone from Wild Bill Hickock to George Armstrong Custer and is a gunslinger, a snake-oil salesman, and an Army scout. This is a solid blend of comedy and tragedy, with a strong statement to make about America's treatment of Native Americans without sermonizing. A terrific cast includes Faye Dunaway, Martin Balsam, and Richard Mulligan. But this show is all Hoffman's. --Marshall Fine ... Read more

Reviews (46)

Digging Bear's Review
A masterpiece of American cinema, pure and simple. There is no person before or since that has portrayed General George Armstrong Custer better than Richard Mulligan in this film. Dustin Hoffman gives a truly wonderful performance as Jack Crabb all the way from boyhood to an aged man of one hundred and twenty one years old. The makeup done on Mr. Hoffman for the old man scenes is incredible. You can hardly tell that it's Dustin Hoffman under it. All the Indian actors are real American Indians and the movie is so much the better for it. The man playing Little Big Man's father, who is a fine actor seen in many a western movie, should have been nominated for an Oscar for this as I do believe Richard Mulligan was. The movie can seem long at some points but as soon as you would begin to notice you yanked quickly back into another engaging predicament Mr. Crabb has gotten himself in. One of my favorites is when he becomes a gun slinger with the outragous outfit to go along with the attitude. But when he meets up with Wild Bill Hickock and sees his first dead man, he quickly changes profession. The climax of Little Big Man is probably one of greatest moments in cinema. Jack Crabb is an Indian scout for General Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. It does not get any better and is a must see.

Oh, and Faye Dunaway gives an erotic seduction performance that gives me goose pimples every time I see it.

Terrific film adaptation of Thomas Berger's novel
Just a few years after success in The Graduate, Dustin Hoffman continued his identification as the Everyman of modern youth in this delightfully rambling, mordant, and affecting picaresque set in the American frontier. Hits all the right notes perfectly in its representation of the contrary and conflicting moods of a person awkwardly attempting to makes sense of the world and find a place in it. Enjoyable in its own right as a marvelous piece of movie story-telling, the film yields greater meaning when viewed with appreciation for the conflicts of the late 60's: the war in Vietnam, the generation gap, Native American and other groups' struggle for freedom and respect. Chief Dan George turns in a magnificent performance as Cheyenne tribal leader Old Lodge Skins, Hoffman's adoptive "grandfather" and the film's spiritual centerpoint. I've watched this movie several times and always come away moved by the beautifully poignant ending with Grandfather and Little Big Man on the mountaintop. You'll want to view this film again and again.

ehhh
I've read the book, so I'm definitly biased, but I'd like to think that even if I hadn't read the book I wouldn't like this movie. It gets two stars for Dustin Hoffman and his Indian wife, who was really hot.

"I wasn't just playin' Indian - I was livin' Indian!"
Little Big Man is framed as a retrospective narration by Jack Crabb, who at age 120-plus, is the oldest living survivor of Custer's last stand at Little Big Horn, and in the 1960's (?) is being interviewed by a newspaper writer.

As kids, Jack and sister Caroline are the only survivors of an Indian attack, and they are taken to an Indian village and meet "Old Lodge Skins", the chief. Caroline expects to be raped later (and is somewhat disappointed when she is not) and rides away at night. The Cheyenne ("human beings") adopt Jack. Due to his small stature, Jack is named "Little Big Man" after he saves Younger Bear from a Pawnee attack.

In a battle againt the cavalry, just before he is about to be killed, Jack ID's himself as a white man, and is put in the care of Reverend Pendrake, whose wife (Faye Dunaway) takes an interest in Jack. He is taught to to read and write, and takes up religion with Mrs. Pendrake. After he finds Mrs. Pendrake and a soda-shop man in bed, that ends his religion phase.

Jack takes up with Mr. Meriwether, a con-man, and ends up getting tarred and feathered by a group lead by his own sister. Jack moves in with Caroline and she teaches him to shoot ("Go snake-eyed"). Jack becomes a flashy gun-fighter known as the Soda Pop Kid after his drink of choice. He meets Wild Bill Hickok ("Might I ask who I are addressin'?") but gives up gunfighting after Hickok kills a man in a bar. Caroline disowns him, so Jack gets a partner, becomes a store owner, and marries Olga, a large Swedish woman. Jack's partner is a crook, and he goes bankrupt.

General Custer is passing by, takes pity on Jack and advises him to "go west" with his personal guarantee of safety - cut to Indians raiding a stage coach and riding off with Olga. Jack looks for her unsuccessfully, and heads deeper into Cheyenne country, where he is ambushed. He convinces the Indians of his identity, and returns to their camp. He tells Old Lodge Skins about Custer.

Jack rides off, and joins up with Custer to be a scout to find his wife. Custer is snobby and gives him a job as "mule-skinner". He rides in a massacre against an Indian village which he tries to stop, then escapes himself. He meets "Sunshine" as she is about to give birth in the bushes, and returns to the Indians with her. Old Lodge Skins is now blind from a wound. Jack stays with Sunshine and she hooks him up with her 3 sisters, so he now has 4 wives as Old Lodge Skins once predicted. It turns out his competitive Indian arch-enemy has married Olga.

After birth of a son, the Indians are attacked and Sunshine and the baby are killed. Custer orders Jack hanged, but Jack identifies himself and talks his way out of it. Later at camp, Jack has the opportunity to kill Custer but chickens out. Custer insults him and Jack goes back to the white man as a common drunk. He meets Hickok again and learns Hickok was seeing Mrs. Pendrake, now a widow and prostitute. Hickok gives some money to Jack to give to the widow for a train ticket, then is shot and killed. Mrs. Pendrake flirts with Jack, but Jack just puts Hickok's money on her stomach and leaves.

Jack becomes a drunk again, and sees Meriwether (now with a hook and peg-leg) and does not join him in buffalo hunting. He has reached his low-point, and goes into the wilderness to become a hermit. He sees an animal's gnawed off foot in a trap and "snaps". He goes to a cliff to commit suicide, but hears the passing cavalry.

He decides to "meet the devil head on", and joins Custer again. Custer wants to use him as a "perfect reverse barometer" to out-fox the Indians. He asks Jack's advice on a proposed attack, which results in Custer's famous last stand at Little Big Horn.

Jack rejoins the Indians. Old Lodge Skins gives a moving speech, and goes to the hilltop to die. The narration leads us back to the present as old Jack Crabb winds up his story.

Originally R-Rated, the movie was re-rated PG-13, for violence and some sexual situations. The movie runs 138:35 minutes not counting end credits (listed as 139 on DVD, 147 at IMDB). I know they've cut the part of sleeping with the three extra wives when shown on TV.

Spectacular cinematography including the snow-covered great plains. Nice harmonica/guitar-based score. Excellent acting by all, and direction by Arthur Penn. Richard Mulligan as Custer is one of the best characters on film. Some of the movie dealing with the massacre of the Indians is truly sad, but the movie also contains a lot of ironic humor. Movies don't get better than this. DVD has widescreen movie, setup/subtitle options, and chapters.

In a year of Oscar insanity, Little Big Man had one nomination - Supporting actor for Chief Dan George - and "Airport" gets 10 nominations and wins a couple. Obvious a reflection of the political problems of the times.

"Sometimes grass don't grow, wind don't blow, and the sky ain't blue"

Timeless Film
Little Big Man is one of my all time favorite movies fro many reasons. Dustin Hoffman gives what I believe to be his greatest performance as Jack Crabb. His range here is incredible as he portrays a man torn between two cultures and his life weaves back and forth between the white world and the indian world in which he was raised. His performance is funny when appropriate and yet filled with pathos and emotion when the necessary. An absolute masterful job of acting.
The Cheyenne scenes are moving and Ghief Dan george who plays Crabb's adoptive grandfather provides the film with gravity as he consistently demnonstrates wisdom and dignity despite the increasingly difficult circumstances that his tribe finds themselves in.
I don't know the actor's name who plays Custer but he provides just the right amount of comic bravado to make Custer seem to be a pathetic character who's hubris led to his troops demise. While this may or may not be an historically acurate portrayal it certainly fits the mood of the film.
Other famous western personalities such as Wild Bill Hickock are included in the story as Jack Crabb's life zig-zags it's way through the west. A fabulous ride and a very memorable film to be enjoyed again and again. ... Read more

Amazon.com essential video

One of the landmark films of the 1960s, Bonnie and Clyde changed the course of American cinema. Setting a milestone for screen violence that paved the way for Sam Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch, this exercise in mythologized biography should not be labeled as a bloodbath; as critic Pauline Kael wrote in her rave review, "it's the absence of sadism that throws the audience off balance." The film is more of a poetic ode to the Great Depression, starring the dream team of Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway as the titular antiheroes, who barrel across the South and Midwest robbing banks with Clyde's brother Buck (Gene Hackman), Buck's frantic wife Blanche (Estelle Parsons), and their faithful accomplice C.W. Moss (the inimitable Michael J. Pollard). Bonnie and Clyde is an unforgettable classic that has lost none of its power since the 1967 release. --Jeff Shannon ... Read more

Reviews (73)

The original Natural Born Killers!
Rarely has a film been as widely influential as director Arthur Penn's crime spree masterpiece. Single-handedly spawning the psychotic-lovers-on-the-run sub-genre (Badlands; Natural Born Killers; True Romance; SFW etc.) and simultaneously breaking the envelope in its frank, realistic depiction of violence - see this movie for a pre-Wild Bunch usage of exploding blood satchets in an equally elegiac gunshot death sequence - Bonnie and Clyde decisively consigned all vestiges of 50's Hollywood to the scrapheap of the 60s and signaled the start of the most creative, daring and satisfying decade in Hollywood history, the Seventies. Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway are at the peak of their powers as actors and pop culture icons and blister across the screen with their volatile, unpredictable and ill-fated relationship. One of the first movies to be decidedly anti-Establishment, its jaundiced view of family, town, country and violent confrontation with authority and tradition is obviously not for the Norman Rockwell crowd, although the authenticity of time and place is impeccable. With gorgeous golden rural landscapes, gorgeous golden Faye Dunaway and some of the best costume design ever put to screen, this is one film you need to have on DVD. Even the best VHS version is too grainy to do this movie aesthetic justice. An essential for collectors of crime movies and those interested in historically significant movies. But it also works on the simplest level as well: a well-paced exciting story, skillfully and violently told.

"We rob banks!"
Criminals became a whole lot more glamorous with the release of Arthur Penn's "Bonnie and Clyde." They were now slim and fit and not hunchbacked or overweight. They had beautiful faces that were not marred by scars or eye-patches. This was Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway looking their best and being as bad as they could.

Clyde Barrow (Beatty) rescues Bonnie Parker (Dunaway) from her uneventful life back home and promptly plunges her into a life of crime. In a country where despair has become a way of life thanks to the Depression, the bank robbers become heroes to the common folk who have been victimized by the instruments of capitalism. Relying on their wits and a touch of good fortune, the young lovers evade the law while basking in their newfound fame but their luck eventually runs out and they meet their end in a hail of bullets.

"Bonnie and Clyde" is infamous for introducing a new level of graphic violence to cinema by way of its final shoot-out. However, that one aspect of the film tends to overshadow its other accomplishments. The moral ambiguity running throughout the film distinctly separated it from the "white-hats-and-black-hats" characterizations of past Hollywood heroes and villains. This problematic approach to morality was a byproduct of the upheaval society itself was undergoing in the late-Sixties as it was discovering how difficult it was to distinguish between the good guys and the bad guys in the real world. The film also went to great pains to appear as realistic as possible. Difficult themes in film were often satirized or exaggerated to soften its impact on the audience, but Penn created such an authentic feel to "Bonnie and Clyde" that the line between fantasy and reality became uncomfortably blurred. Throw in solid supporting work by Estelle Parsons, Gene Hackman, Michael J. Pollard, and Gene Wilder to complement the film's other aforementioned accomplishments and what you have is milestone work whose impact on the medium has been far-reaching.

More Hollywood garbage
Hollywood has a track record of turning vile, murdering cowards and criminals into folk heroes. This piece of trash is among the winners. What a load of pure hogwash. When it first came out, the critics went into ecstasy about the sexual message all through the movie, using handguns as a phallic symbol. More Freudian dribble!!! The police are the villians here while the gang are the heroes. (The scene with Denver Pyle playing Texas Ranger Frank Hamer sneaking up on the bloodthirty duo is pure bilge. If the real Capt. Hamer had had his way, B&C's crimewave wouldn't have lasted any length of time.) The real Bonnie Parker was absolute trash. She blew a policeman's head off point blank with a sawed off shotgun! And she's a HEROINE ? More like she was on HEROIN. If you think this is a "Robin Hood" tale of robbing from the rich and giving to the poor, you live in a fantasy world. The small businesses that Barrow and Parker robbed were "mom and pop" stores. And the poor certainly didn't benefit. The only redeeming part of this film is seeing these two thugs riddled by gunfire by the law. A fitting end.

We Rob Banks!
To me, the best film of 1967 (above the other landmark film of that year, The Graduate), and one of the most startling films ever made. I think that the "modern era" of moviemaking begins with Bonnie and Clyde." It's really about a "family" of bankrobbers who owe much of their success to the press; the newspapers make it seem as if they intend to terrorize every small town that has a bank to begin with. And so the Barrow gang becomes legendary during the depression, and heroes to some because they are against the government that is taking so much away from the "little people." Although much praised, "Bonnie and Clyde" was controversial in its day, partly because of the considerable bloodshed and partly because audiences felt bad for the two criminals. As one character says, "they're just a bunch of kids!" This is one of the rare films in which the violence punctuates the story--it makes the viewing experience more powerful. Because of it, one watches much of the film in a state of apprehension.

Natural born killers
Trust Hollywood to turn two common criminals into two American folk heroes. Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker were two small-town young people drifting aimlessly during the Great Depression of the 1930's; she's bored out of her gourd, and he's a felon who had killed fourteen men by the time he met his end at the ripe old age of twenty-four. They meet, fall sort of in love, and embark on a petty crime spree. At first it's all good-humored fun; they steal a couple of cars, hold up a couple of stores, and in a moment of hilarious insanity, Clyde attempts to rob a bank that went bust a week before, much to the amusement of the banker and Bonnie, who's collapsing with laughter over the steering wheel. But then a storekeeper takes offense at Clyde attempting to hold him up, and is pistol-whipped by Clyde in his frantic efforts to escape. Once the batterer storekeeper ID's Clyde's photo to the cops, things turn serious.

As Clyde's posse expands to include a lowlife neer-do-well named C.W. Moss and Clyde's brother Buck and his sister-in-law Blanche, their crimes get bolder and the violence spirals out of control. A bank robbery in broad daylight (while C.W. manages to get their getaway far stuck in a too-tight parking space) goes off almost without a hitch; but when Clyde shoots a pursuing cop in the face and his head explodes all over their back windshield, the fun stuff is over. They're wanted criminals being chased from Arkansas to Oklahoma and back to Louisiana. As their notoriety spreads, so does their audacity. In one of the funniest scenes in the film, they capture a sheriff who was about to sneak up on them and handcuff him while Clyde snaps pictures of Bonnie holding a gun on him. But their fame comes at a terrible price; they're wanted outcasts, alienated even from their own. When Clyde meets Bonnie's mother and tells her they'd like to live within three miles of her, Mrs. Parker tells her daughter, "You try to live three miles from me, and you won't live long, honey."

From the scene where Buck expires in a hail of police bullets to the slow dance on the killing ground in Louisiana, the film takes on a somber tone in stark comparison to the lighthearted opening sequences. Once the cascading violence has turned brutal, the movie becomes darker and more foreboding as well. But as bad as they are, we can't help but like them. Maybe that's the difference between Hollywood and real life. One wonders how many people who came across Bonnie and Clyde actually liked this pair?

The tension between Bonnie and Clyde helps keep the movie on edge. Arthur Penn's superb direction, assisted by knockout performances from the cast, helps keep the movie on a razor edge balanced between laughter and revulsion. Warren Beatty was never better than in his title role as Clyde Barrow, and Faye Dunaway makes a perfect Bonnie to his Clyde. Michael J. Pollard is winning as the doofus C.W. Moss and Gene Hackman is wonderful as Buck, torn between his loyalty to his brother and his love for his ditzy wife. But Estelle Parsons, as that ditzy wife, almost runs off with the film; her hysterics during the shootout between Clyde's gang and the cops has the viewers in equal hysterics rolling in the aisles. The cinematography is great; we feel all the heat, dust, and emptiness of Depression-era America, and the foot-stompin' banjo music by Flatts and Scruggs helps anchor the movie to its time and place. "Bonnie and Clyde" has become an American classic, one of the best films to come out of the 1960's. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Gene Hackman and Matt Dillon play a typical (if unlikely) father and son, at odds over the usual generational stuff. Then Gayle Hunnicutt, as the wife and mother, disappears--and suddenly Sonny Boy discovers something he never knew about stuffy old Dad: that he's actually a retired government agent who's pretty handy with a gun and more than willing to waste whoever gets in his way as he tries to get his wife back alive. They bounce around Europe in pursuit, with the kid getting in Dad's way, in a plot that winds up chasing its own tail. Hackman and director Arthur Penn were much more effective a decade earlier when they made Night Moves. --Marshall Fine ... Read more

Reviews (4)

matt dillon kicks ass
i am a fan of matt dillon(drugstore cowboy, over the edge, the flamingo kid and albino alligator just to name a few) I also liked this film. It's got suspense, its got action and mystery. There are some holes in the movie. Gene Hackman kicked in this movie a major punch as Dillon's father/ex CIA agent. They have to find out who kidnapped his wife and so they go to Paris, where Hackman used to work, but left a long time ago and Dillon is just learning about the hidden past of his father. People try to kill him. In the end its very good and its really pleasing. I enjoyed it

One OUTSTANDING film
If you're looking for a good old film to watch, watch TARGET. It's a great story with character development, some twists, a creative story, and too good of a film to find a place to pause. This movie DESERVES to be on DVD. If all those junky films are on DVD, there's no reason for this not to be on DVD.
I vote for this to be on DVD, many times over!

Let's all vote for it.
With all the garbage appearing on DVD, it's a downright shame that a fine movie like ÇTargetÈ hasn't yet made it in that medium. It's even reached a point where it's even hard to get it on prehistoric tape.

Sleeper
During the first 15 minutes you will wonder why you are watching this movie. But then it takes off and doesn't disappoint. Suspense, action, and adventure keep you riveted. Everyone to whom I have recommended it has agreed. ... Read more

Amazon.com essential video

This tense, 1964 action drama from John Frankenheimer (The Manchurian Candidate) stars Burt Lancaster as a member of the French Resistance trying to prevent Nazi looters from taking valuable art treasures out of the country. A great ride all the way, with Frankenheimer at his inimitable best. This is a true, human-scale action movie of the sort we used to think of before "action" meant blowing up asteroids in space. Kinetic but almost rueful in tone, the film's chases and fights aren't just eye candy but rather encourage audience involvement in moral stakes. Crisp and serious performances all around from Lancaster and 1960s icons Paul Scofield and Jeanne Moreau. --Tom Keogh ... Read more

Reviews (41)

One of the Best
An engrossing WELL-WRITTEN story (Hollywood, PLEASE take note), excellent cast, superb acting on the part of all the actors (not just the leads), painstaking staging and Frankenheimer's direction blending all these essential elements into a thoroughly enjoyable movie. What can you say about a rousing action movie that also makes you think? You can say it's rarely found in today's films. The primary quandry here is just what is the value of art in terms of the human lives that must be expended to preserve it? Is it truly a country's heritage or just oils on canvas for which the people who will have to die for it have little or no real appreciation? Is it worth saving because of its beauty or its value? And when does the cost of saving it become too high? The movie works on all levels, but the characters (and the actors portraying them) are exceptional. The stand-outs: Burt Lancaster, the yardmaster/resistance leader who really doesn't want to do this one last (and seemingly unimportant) job so close to the end of the war; Paul Scofield, the intense German colonel who loves (obsesses over) the art and is taking Lancaster's attempts to thwart his plans for it very personally; Wolfgang Preiss, the "good German officer" who does not agree with his superior but does his duty until he can do it no more; Jean Moreau, the pragmatic French hotel proprietress who has had to comfort one too many fellow widows and Michel Simon, the old engineer who fondly remembers dating a girl who posed for Renoir and decides to make this fight his own. No one who loves a good movie should miss this film. It's not just for action/war movie fans.

Underrated war actioner--art for whose sake?
_The Train_ has held up well since its release in 1965. Dismissed as an improbable shoot-em-up then, it tells a much richer story than the special-effects vehicles in the genre nowadays. Burt Lancaster isn't especially gallic as the Frenchman Labiche, but his acting talent and intensity soon steamroller any resistance the viewer may have. Paul Scofield is perfectly cast as a cultured monster, the Nazi colonel who is bent on spiriting the paintings away into Germany. One can easily picture him murdering hostages between sips of cognac.

Shot in black and white, the film is dark and greasy-looking. The screen is filled with churning railroad machinery much of the time, which dwarfs the people around it. The wheezing, snorting engines are also stars in this movie. Even the sky looks dirty in the daylight scenes. Oh yes, there's a sensational train wreck, too. Definitely less mindless than your average Rambo flick, but no less exciting.

The Train
Is a work of art worth a human life?
We are near the end of World War II. It's August 2, 1944, the "1511th day of German occupation" of Paris. German Colonel von Waldheim (Paul Scofield) enters a dark museum and turns a spotlight on a painting. He stares at it with the eyes of a lover beholding his best beloved. He turns another spotlight on another painting. The Hun is humanized, and we sympathize with his quiet passion.
It comes as a bit of a shock when he announces that he is taking the paintings, hundreds of Miros and Picassos and Matisses and others, with him when the Germans evacuate Paris. A resistance group, led by railroad worker Paul Labiche (Burt Lancaster), is enlisted to stop them. Labiche initially refuses. It's one thing to blow up a train, dangerous enough - it's another to stop a train without damaging what's inside it. National heritage or not, men will die. There are more important targets than a train filled with art. Things change, though, and eventually Labiche and the remnants of his resistance group find themselves trying the impossible.
I've always been a little leery of Burt Lancaster. Maybe I was traumatized by viewing THE RAINMAKER or ELMER GANTRY at a young and impressionable age. He sometimes seems all horse teeth and braying charm and dis-tinct e-nunc-ee-a-shun. Not so here. In THE TRAIN he's restrained and natural and completely convincing. Scofield is equally strong as his brutal nemesis.
Sometimes the extras on a dvd aren't worth the bother, but I loved the director's commentary by the late John Frankenheimer. It was like taking a course in the art of film making.
Frankenheimer tells us he was trying to give the movie a realistic feel, which I understood before listening to the commentary track but didn't really understand how he went about it. One trick he used was to open the f-stop on the camera and keep everything in focus, something that would have been impossible if THE TRAIN wasn't shot in black and white. Everything is kept in focus and he keeps the background action busy and interesting.
Frankenheimer is an unabashed fan of Burt Lancaster, with whom he made five movies. Not only does Lancaster do all his own stunts in this one, including a dangerous backwards fall off of a moving train, he even fills in as a stunt double for another actor. The original stuntman made a fall off a roof look like an "olympic jump," and 'realism' was the keyword in this one. Lancaster did take a nice tumble off the tiles, but you've got to wonder about the wisdom of it all. Lancaster was injured during the filming of THE TRAIN; on his first day off in weeks he played a round of golf and twisted his knee when he stepped into a hole. His right knee swelled up 'like a basketball.' Frankenheimer shot Labiche in the leg halfway through the movie to explain the limp.
The only phony movie aspect to this movie is the dubbed voices of some of the French actors. You can't hide dubbing very well, and Frankenheimer doesn't have much to say about it. I wouldn't knock a star or even a half-star off because of it. This is a tremendously entertaining film.

Great movie.
There are an amazing amount of action films these days. Each one of them attempts to beat the last one's visual effects. And in this competition, hollywood has lost track of what makes a truly great action film... Skill. Most of the action films these days are entirely uncreative, and many of them are very, very boring. Who really want's to see a dozen tiles fall to the ground and break in slow motion, as films such as "the Matrix" use this technique constantly. But this film is different. It carries raw emotional power, and it's star, at age 50, did all of his own stunts, and even drove the locamotives that his character drives. This movie is awesome, and I highly recommend you buy this DvD. And by the way, this music track is a lot of fun to listen to when you're sick.

Perfect film on less- than- great DVD
The audio on the MGM DVD was lacking the full spectrum of audio, in my opinion. If you don't care so much about audio, it would be a 5 star DVD, but for those feeling that audio is an important factor, a star must be deducted. Bass and treble just weren't tweaked in DVD production which made the audio seem really flat, and I know that MGM could have produced a better job. It seems that a good number of the MGM DVDs lack the care and attention of producing consistently superior products.

The DVD gives the viewer options to listen to music only and has an option for director's comments during the film. I was at first dismayed because at the beginning of the movie, director John Frankenheimer just wouldn't open up. But he started sharing some interesting things as the movie progressed. There is also an 8- page booklet that gives some interesting production notes and history.

The video quality from, I think, an original film print is pristine. Frankenheimer's locations and times of filming were very effective in evoking a very dismal feeling as the European conflict was drawing to a conclusion. I love Frankenheimer's use of deep focus -- which is using wide angle lenses to have both near and far- away characters and scenes in focus -- to give a vision that many other filmmakers fail to incorporate effectively.

I'm glad that there was explanation in the film about why people were more concerned with paintings than people in a story that was loosely based on an actual event. Many westerners like Paul Labiche (Burt Lancaster) would not care about the value of crates of artwork in a time of war, but schooling by caretaker Miss Villard (Suzanne Flon) expressed the passion and pride that the French feel for such paintings. This helped explain why some would scarifice their lives to save the crates. (Ms. Flon, born in 1918 is apparently still alive and acting, too.)

It's quite a story of saving "priceless" paintings at the expense of one's life. It seems like a WWII action film (which has its share of blowing stuff up), but its story actually weighs the value of art against the value of life. Labiche from the very beginning of his introduction battles Col. von Waldheim (Paul Scolfield), who wants him to deliver the art to Germany AND The Resistance, who want the art protected from the Nazis. Labiche is actually alone in his own beliefs as an American, being tugged by both sides while ultimately struggling with making sense of the conflict over the art.

The movie is well- developed from Lancaster asking Frankenheimer to direct "The Train" after original director Arthur Penn abandoned the project a week after production. I only say that because everything that was directed by Frankenheimer was terrific. The choice of the players, scenery, editing, camera placement and post production yielded a perfect war film that wasn't simply about war. It was about the value of life and what people value in their lives.

Watch for the one scene of a runaway train's derailment -- one of a dozen cameras mounted to film the scene -- came within inches of being wiped out by the locomotive's wheels and the scene has become a classic in filmmaking history. ... Read more

Amazon.com

You can get anything you want there, or so went Arlo Guthrie's song, a lengthy monologue about a Thanksgiving dinner and how its aftermath kept Guthrie out of the Vietnam-era draft. Arthur Penn's movie version, which stars Guthrie, James Broderick, and Pat Quinn, has a shambling, good-natured feel, much like Guthrie's epic tall tale. But as it follows Guthrie's adventures (he gets arrested for improper disposal of Thanksgiving garbage and the arrest renders him unfit for military service, in the draft board's eyes), it also examines the freewheeling nature of relationships in that period--and the toll that freedom took on those relationships. Guthrie is a natural performer, particularly funny during the draft board sequence; but the heart of the film is Quinn and Broderick's troubled marriage. --Marshall Fine ... Read more

Reviews (24)

From someone who knows Arlo
I am a folksinger and have known the Guthries for a very long time. I knew Marjorie Guthrie, but not woody because I was just little when he died.
I can tell you that Marjorie Guthrie loved this movie and would be very happy that people are still watching it. Marjorie died of cancer back in the 1980's.
I myself love this movie and have seen it many times. As I'm writing this, the movie is on TV right now. I ran to the computer to see if it's on DVD. I really thought it wasn't out on DVD yet but to my surprise it is and I ordered it right away. This is a movie I will love all my life time and my son too,
who I named ARLO. Please do watch this movie. It's one of the best in movie history.

Forget the song! The movie is not about the song.
....

Alice's Restaurant is about life and loss, and the traps we allow ourselves to get caught up in. It's about addiction, youth, anarchy, death, freedom, and aimlessness. It's a celebration and a lament for all those things. If the movie was given its proper due, it might be regarded as Arthur Penn's masterwork. It is a record of a facet of the human condition in the late 1960s, and it uses songs and humour as a counterpoint to the underlying seriousness of the subject matter.

See the movie. Don't expect to 'see' the song. Movies don't work that way. People who want to see a celluloid retelling of Arlo Guthrie's famous song are not giving a great director his due, and they're denying themselves a deeply moving cinematic experience. They just don't make movies like this anymore, except that another director named Penn - Sean Penn - once came close to such a true depiction of human drama with his own Vietnam era movie 'The Indian Runner', but what the younger Penn achieves with a less subtle (although no less effective) approach, the older Penn achieves in a truly realistic and understated way.

With the sixties coming back...
I did like this movie, although it isn't as much of a masterpiece as they want you to think. With the talk of the draft coming back, this movie gives this new generation of hippies (my generation, a.k.a. the young "kids" into politics and against the current war) a reason to feel there are backed by the older hippie generation. I know the music of Arlo, and enjoy it a lot. Like others have said, the song is a bit better, for it isn't as dramatic. I like to compare this movie to the Graduate, for that is a much more light hearted, 60s drama, though not about the war. All in all, I'd say I may come to own the movie, if I watch it a few more times and enjoy more and more, but I may just keep it in my head to rent again sometime in the future.

lovely
As a child I pestered my mother for information about 60's culture. One day I think she had just had enough and rented this film and the documentary Woodstock for me and said, "here maybe this can answer your questions." I fell in total love with Arlo that day as well as the rest of Alice's Restaurant. It isn't the greatest acting in the world, but Arlo's added commentary and reflections on the DVD version make it fantastic. I always smile when I think of this film and Arlo Guthrie's impact on my world. I'm smiling right now! Do yourself a favor and get this DVD, you'll love it.

You Can Get Anything You Want, At Alice's Restaurant...
I was one year old when this movie came out. Growing up I had all the influences of the 60's and none of the benefits. So I can understand how someone in their early 20s during the late 60's could identify with this movie, but I really can't relate to the lifestyle. Some of the "free spirit" attitudes just made no sense to me. The hippies seemed to have no sense of responsibility or accountability - maybe that was the point, but certain scenes didn't really stress the negative aspects of this attitude. The young mother dragging on a joint holding a newborn, or Alice hooking-up with the junkie behind Ray's back. These scenes were at the parts meant to accentuating the positive side of free spirits, not the negative; but I can't see anyone in any decade thinking a woman getting stoned holding a baby is cool. Also, the hippies seemed a little over the top in begin jerks to poor Officer Obie. Chill out, the guy's only doing his job. After all, for being hippies, Arlo WAS littering up nature. And I couldn't really get over the fact that a bunch of kids who have no jobs (Alice seemed to fail miserably at the Restaurant) could afford a huge Thanksgiving dinner or that megaparty-wedding. Where'd they get the money? Since this movie in part idealizes hippie life, I can only wonder about the reality of hippie life.

I guess I really didn't know what to expect when I rented the movie. Since the song is satirical and a little caustic, I expected the movie to be the same; but it bounced back and forth all over the place. The song "Alice's Restaurant" is fantastic as a biting commentary on the draft and the establishment, but the movie jumps from enacting the song, to showcasing the free hippie life, to a drug overdose death (which is distinctly NOT funny), to slapping women and becoming an ugly drunk. Nor was there any character development, not even with Arlo, who at the end makes the comment "I've got a lot of hard traveling to do" (like, what have you been doing so far?). The director's many messages were ultimately muddied and lost. Other period movies with much the same themes ("MASH", "Catch 22", "Harold and Maude", "Easy Rider") were more successful in getting their underlying messages across.

Ok, maybe I'm overanalyzing. It would have been pretty cool to be at that Thanksgiving dinner (although I wouldn't have wanted to deal with the War). And there are some absolutely great aspects to this movie. Probably the best is Arlo's commentary. I saw the movie a second time with the commentary on and it is an absolute riot. 35 years later that guy is STILL a crackup. The music is really very good too, especially the folk music with Pete Seeger. Arlo is a great musician. And Tina Chen is gorgeous - she's worth renting the DVD alone (kudos to the director for hiring an Asian-American to play the girlfriend at the height of the Vietnam War). So I give the DVD a solid 3 stars. It's worth a view if you have any interest in the 60's scene, and I'm sure many people will love it and want to own it. ... Read more

Amazon.com

Penn and Teller burst onto the scene as part of the new-vaudeville wave of the mid 1980s. Riding high on the basis of a hit off-Broadway show, these two magicians--who poke fun at magic even as they pull off masterful illusions with a taste for blood--tried to transfer that sense of gruesome wonder to the big screen and missed the boat badly. Working with director Arthur Penn, they concocted a movie about themselves, in which Penn (the big one, who talks; the diminutive Teller never speaks) announces on national TV that he wishes someone would try to kill him. An intriguing idea, except they never do anything with it. There's the occasional bit of sleight of hand and the odd practical joke, but otherwise, this movie can't pull a rabbit out of its hat. --Marshall Fine ... Read more

Reviews (7)

R.I.P. P&T
The dark comedic brilliance of Penn and Teller is brought to the screen by the legendary director Arthur Penn. Filmed on location in Atlantic City, P&T Get Killed shows the boys doing what they do best. The film also showcases some of thier most memorable stunts. A must see for any P&T fan, cult movie fan, or film noire fan.

smile and the world wonders what you're smiling about
Where to begin? I'm always wary of giving movie reviews since so much is personal taste but here goes.
I won't tell you the story, the title pretty much gives it away however I will say I was impressed by the acting of them both not all TV & stage actors can make the transition.

I was especially impressed with Teller's physical acting, very savvy, the silent film stars would have been touched. Yes it's a dark and funny film, so was Dark Star (remember that one? Harold and Maude?), so were many of Hitchcock's it's no suprise to find Teller is a fan.
Sit back and enjoy Penn and Teller's world. N.B no sequel!

HOLY [Stuff]......
..was this movie good, i loved every second, especially the end.
hahaha.....hehehehe. Great Movie!!

I can't believe this movie was actually made.
Penn and Teller Get Killed is a bizzare, mind bending, dark, dark, dark, dark comedy from the comedy/magic team of Penn Gillette and Teller. Written by it's stars, this movie reaches levels of darkness even Hitchcock wouldn't dare to venture. And therin lies the comedic brilliance of Penn and Teller. This film gets better with each viewing. It's not for everyone, but if you are into dark comedies or just want to spend a couple of hours simultaniously laughing and scratching your head, then Penn and Teller Get Killed is the film for you.

Surreal.
This is a really cool movie because it totally reflects Penn's views on things (religion, dogma, romance, etc.). A really unique film (and I must say that Penn's hair looks better now than it did in this movie). ... Read more

Reviews (46)

Digging Bear's Review
A masterpiece of American cinema, pure and simple. There is no person before or since that has portrayed General George Armstrong Custer better than Richard Mulligan in this film. Dustin Hoffman gives a truly wonderful performance as Jack Crabb all the way from boyhood to an aged man of one hundred and twenty one years old. The makeup done on Mr. Hoffman for the old man scenes is incredible. You can hardly tell that it's Dustin Hoffman under it. All the Indian actors are real American Indians and the movie is so much the better for it. The man playing Little Big Man's father, who is a fine actor seen in many a western movie, should have been nominated for an Oscar for this as I do believe Richard Mulligan was. The movie can seem long at some points but as soon as you would begin to notice you yanked quickly back into another engaging predicament Mr. Crabb has gotten himself in. One of my favorites is when he becomes a gun slinger with the outragous outfit to go along with the attitude. But when he meets up with Wild Bill Hickock and sees his first dead man, he quickly changes profession. The climax of Little Big Man is probably one of greatest moments in cinema. Jack Crabb is an Indian scout for General Custer at the Battle of the Little Big Horn. It does not get any better and is a must see.

Oh, and Faye Dunaway gives an erotic seduction performance that gives me goose pimples every time I see it.

Terrific film adaptation of Thomas Berger's novel
Just a few years after success in The Graduate, Dustin Hoffman continued his identification as the Everyman of modern youth in this delightfully rambling, mordant, and affecting picaresque set in the American frontier. Hits all the right notes perfectly in its representation of the contrary and conflicting moods of a person awkwardly attempting to makes sense of the world and find a place in it. Enjoyable in its own right as a marvelous piece of movie story-telling, the film yields greater meaning when viewed with appreciation for the conflicts of the late 60's: the war in Vietnam, the generation gap, Native American and other groups' struggle for freedom and respect. Chief Dan George turns in a magnificent performance as Cheyenne tribal leader Old Lodge Skins, Hoffman's adoptive "grandfather" and the film's spiritual centerpoint. I've watched this movie several times and always come away moved by the beautifully poignant ending with Grandfather and Little Big Man on the mountaintop. You'll want to view this film again and again.

ehhh
I've read the book, so I'm definitly biased, but I'd like to think that even if I hadn't read the book I wouldn't like this movie. It gets two stars for Dustin Hoffman and his Indian wife, who was really hot.

"I wasn't just playin' Indian - I was livin' Indian!"
Little Big Man is framed as a retrospective narration by Jack Crabb, who at age 120-plus, is the oldest living survivor of Custer's last stand at Little Big Horn, and in the 1960's (?) is being interviewed by a newspaper writer.

As kids, Jack and sister Caroline are the only survivors of an Indian attack, and they are taken to an Indian village and meet "Old Lodge Skins", the chief. Caroline expects to be raped later (and is somewhat disappointed when she is not) and rides away at night. The Cheyenne ("human beings") adopt Jack. Due to his small stature, Jack is named "Little Big Man" after he saves Younger Bear from a Pawnee attack.

In a battle againt the cavalry, just before he is about to be killed, Jack ID's himself as a white man, and is put in the care of Reverend Pendrake, whose wife (Faye Dunaway) takes an interest in Jack. He is taught to to read and write, and takes up religion with Mrs. Pendrake. After he finds Mrs. Pendrake and a soda-shop man in bed, that ends his religion phase.

Jack takes up with Mr. Meriwether, a con-man, and ends up getting tarred and feathered by a group lead by his own sister. Jack moves in with Caroline and she teaches him to shoot ("Go snake-eyed"). Jack becomes a flashy gun-fighter known as the Soda Pop Kid after his drink of choice. He meets Wild Bill Hickok ("Might I ask who I are addressin'?") but gives up gunfighting after Hickok kills a man in a bar. Caroline disowns him, so Jack gets a partner, becomes a store owner, and marries Olga, a large Swedish woman. Jack's partner is a crook, and he goes bankrupt.

General Custer is passing by, takes pity on Jack and advises him to "go west" with his personal guarantee of safety - cut to Indians raiding a stage coach and riding off with Olga. Jack looks for her unsuccessfully, and heads deeper into Cheyenne country, where he is ambushed. He convinces the Indians of his identity, and returns to their camp. He tells Old Lodge Skins about Custer.

Jack rides off, and joins up with Custer to be a scout to find his wife. Custer is snobby and gives him a job as "mule-skinner". He rides in a massacre against an Indian village which he tries to stop, then escapes himself. He meets "Sunshine" as she is about to give birth in the bushes, and returns to the Indians with her. Old Lodge Skins is now blind from a wound. Jack stays with Sunshine and she hooks him up with her 3 sisters, so he now has 4 wives as Old Lodge Skins once predicted. It turns out his competitive Indian arch-enemy has married Olga.

After birth of a son, the Indians are attacked and Sunshine and the baby are killed. Custer orders Jack hanged, but Jack identifies himself and talks his way out of it. Later at camp, Jack has the opportunity to kill Custer but chickens out. Custer insults him and Jack goes back to the white man as a common drunk. He meets Hickok again and learns Hickok was seeing Mrs. Pendrake, now a widow and prostitute. Hickok gives some money to Jack to give to the widow for a train ticket, then is shot and killed. Mrs. Pendrake flirts with Jack, but Jack just puts Hickok's money on her stomach and leaves.

Jack becomes a drunk again, and sees Meriwether (now with a hook and peg-leg) and does not join him in buffalo hunting. He has reached his low-point, and goes into the wilderness to become a hermit. He sees an animal's gnawed off foot in a trap and "snaps". He goes to a cliff to commit suicide, but hears the passing cavalry.

He decides to "meet the devil head on", and joins Custer again. Custer wants to use him as a "perfect reverse barometer" to out-fox the Indians. He asks Jack's advice on a proposed attack, which results in Custer's famous last stand at Little Big Horn.

Jack rejoins the Indians. Old Lodge Skins gives a moving speech, and goes to the hilltop to die. The narration leads us back to the present as old Jack Crabb winds up his story.

Originally R-Rated, the movie was re-rated PG-13, for violence and some sexual situations. The movie runs 138:35 minutes not counting end credits (listed as 139 on DVD, 147 at IMDB). I know they've cut the part of sleeping with the three extra wives when shown on TV.

Spectacular cinematography including the snow-covered great plains. Nice harmonica/guitar-based score. Excellent acting by all, and direction by Arthur Penn. Richard Mulligan as Custer is one of the best characters on film. Some of the movie dealing with the massacre of the Indians is truly sad, but the movie also contains a lot of ironic humor. Movies don't get better than this. DVD has widescreen movie, setup/subtitle options, and chapters.

In a year of Oscar insanity, Little Big Man had one nomination - Supporting actor for Chief Dan George - and "Airport" gets 10 nominations and wins a couple. Obvious a reflection of the political problems of the times.

"Sometimes grass don't grow, wind don't blow, and the sky ain't blue"

Timeless Film
Little Big Man is one of my all time favorite movies fro many reasons. Dustin Hoffman gives what I believe to be his greatest performance as Jack Crabb. His range here is incredible as he portrays a man torn between two cultures and his life weaves back and forth between the white world and the indian world in which he was raised. His performance is funny when appropriate and yet filled with pathos and emotion when the necessary. An absolute masterful job of acting.
The Cheyenne scenes are moving and Ghief Dan george who plays Crabb's adoptive grandfather provides the film with gravity as he consistently demnonstrates wisdom and dignity despite the increasingly difficult circumstances that his tribe finds themselves in.
I don't know the actor's name who plays Custer but he provides just the right amount of comic bravado to make Custer seem to be a pathetic character who's hubris led to his troops demise. While this may or may not be an historically acurate portrayal it certainly fits the mood of the film.
Other famous western personalities such as Wild Bill Hickock are included in the story as Jack Crabb's life zig-zags it's way through the west. A fabulous ride and a very memorable film to be enjoyed again and again. ... Read more

Amazon.com

After winning an Oscar for his first screenplay (Breaking Away), Steven Tesich mixed fact and fiction in a telescopic view of the '60s. Like Tesich, Danilo (Craig Wasson), immigrates to America (Easy Chicago, Indiana to be exact) with his Yugoslavian parents. The center of his life is two other high school friends and the woman all of them are in love with: Georgia Miles (Jodi Thelen), a flower child even before she finds the movement. Georgia and Danilo are probably meant for one another but are too swept up in the '60s to settle down. The men fall in and out of Georgia's arms and through all the touchstone issues of the '60s: Vietnam, civil rights, hippies, sexual politics, and drugs. Director Arthur Penn shies away from the Pomp and Circumstance of later '60s-themed films like Forrest Gump; these characters witness the '60s more than participate. Even the soundtrack is different: it's void of hit songs, continually returning to a beautiful onscreen musical motif. What makes (The New York Times put the film on their 1981 Top 10 list) or breaks the appeal to the viewer is Tesich's tendency--successful or not--to reach for the "big scene," bursting with bravura emotions, most notably in the huge, tragic surprise that is the film's turning point. If you're caught up in Danilo's plight, the movie will make your list of favorites that no one else knows about. --Doug Thomas ... Read more

Reviews (4)

One of my all-time favorite movies
I absolutely love this movie. I've seen it quite a few times and I still find it beautiful. I've cried during multiple scenes througout the film and even if I just catch the last few minutes I find myself crying. It's a wonderful tale.
Now, to be a bit more specific, it's about four friends (surprise!) who grow up together during the 60's and come in and out of eachother's lives. There is the whole thing about the torment in the 60's and "free spirits" but it really upholds the traditional values, showing the faults in this type of adolescent thinking. There is also a oldworld-newworld conflict because Danilo, the main character, is an immigrant from Yugoslavia.
There are so many levels of plot, but the emotion is what makes this film special. There are extreme moments of elation followed by bitter sadness and depression. It's real, it's beautiful, and it's a must see!

Fate!!!!
I searched for this video for years and, finally, I just stopped looking. Since I currently purchase primarily DVDs, most of my searches are in the DVD category. It is fate that a friend was searching VHS movies and I happened to mention "Four Friends" - he found it!!! This movie paints a wonderful picture of life, friendships, love and family in the 60's. Each actor plays a special part in the film and in my heart. Thank you, Craig!!!

Astonishing!
This is Arthur Penn's greatest movie and should have taken its place as an American classic long ago. It drops a narrative bombshell halfway through that comes closer than anything else I've seen to evoking the traumas that America experienced in the 60s. It's wonderful to have it avaliable on video at last, but the luminous cinematography by Ghislain Cloquet deserves to be seen on widescreen DVD (any hope of this, MGM?).

Craig Wasson: another offbeat movie role
I have been searching(unsuccessfully)for about five years for this movie. I live in Northern Indiana, and while some of the so called depictions of scenery here are not right, the movie does bring back some of the trials and tribulations of a personal nature that I went through living in this part of the US. Craig Wasson, as usual, in his offbeat characterizations, keeps this movie on its edge with his performance of a disillusioned 60's child going through some of the problems of growing up a baby boomer with all the attendent problems of too much, too soon. ... Read more

Description

Teenage desperado Billy The Kid avenges the murder of his employer and escapes to Madero where he is given sanctuary by a gunsmith and his beautiful wife. From the play by Gore Vidal. ... Read more

Reviews (4)

Gore Vidal...what do you expect?
I agree with Seaside, Ca. He's dead on and the Hamlet characterization couldnt be more accurate.

Is there some reason Hollywood cant get Billy the Kid right? This one was just as bad as Peckinpah's offering, and every bit the worst western of the 50's. Actually, I have no words. Read the guy below...apparently I'm the one that's traumatized.

Billy the Kid Goes Method
There is a moment in this heavily stylized western where a character, for no real reason, rolls around in the dirt moaning "You're not him! You're not him!". This scene could be a great metaphor for the entire film; because the movie is definitely NOT about the real Billy the Kid. This movie is about Paul Newman turning in a weirdly over-the-top performance and everyone else in the film looking on, aghast. True, there are some good scenes, and Newman has his good moments. He's intense, that's for sure, and also extremely funny, although not always intentionally, I suspect.

The plot concerns the adventures of Billy and his two pals as they avenge the death of a friend of Billy's. They ride around, they shoot people, Billy acts weird, they shoot more people, the law's on their tail, more shooting, Billy seduces the wife of a friend in a weird manner, some shooting, Billy gets caught, acts weird in jail, escapes, and dies weirdly. The highlight of the movie occurs when Billy interupts the wedding of his friend Pat Garrett, and after promising Pat he won't kill anyone "here" proceeds to kill someone a few feet away. Pat then begins stomping around in the mud yelling "My wedding's HERE! And HERE! And HEEEERRRRE!". It didn't make sense to me either.

Pat vows to bring Billy in for his long-overdue hanging, and so he does, only to experience post Billy-Arresting Depression.
Finally ending about twenty minutes later than it should, it's fair to say "The Left Handed Gun" left me pretty much speechless. I mean, it's AMLOST a good movie, but then something bizarre will happen, or the dialogue will get really strange, and it's derailed again. And poor Paul seems to think he's playing Hamlet or something; I seriously doubt Billy the Kid, or anyone in the Old West, was this full of angst.
To be fair, I must mention I saw this movie with my sister at 3 in the morning, so my view may be a bit warped. Plus my sister said she liked it, but she did look a bit traumatized. View at your own risk.
(If you do see it, watch out for the scene where "Moon" dies, nose flattened against a window pane. Kinda funny.)

Great Movie!!!
I'm not really a western movie fan, but this one caught my attention completely. I believe that it was a very good movie. Paul Newman did a brilliant job playing "Billy the Kid." It had a great story and believable characters, which makes this movie a fantastic one.

May be Historically Inaccurate but a Helluva Good Film
Paul Newman, still years away from the legend that he was to become, does a fine job in this heavily-glamorized account of the life of Billy the Kid. His famous blue eyes seem to possess an otherworldly glow in the black and white cinematography and his pouty expression fits perfectly with this melodramatic presentation.

This a typical misunderstood-youth-goes-bad film that probably fit the angst of 1950's teens who were themselves rebelling to the status quo with rock music. The fact that Newman's Kid travels with two other young men makes "Gun" a perfect reflection of the era.

Able support comes from co-stars John Dehner as Pat Garrett and Hurd Hatfield as pulpwriter who may have homoerotic designs on Kid. Even, James Best, who would be forever remembered for his role as the Sheriff on "The Dukes of Hazzard," does admirable as one of the Kids "boyz." Denver Pyle, also of "Dukes" has a memorable "turn" as one of Billy's victims.

Leonard Rosenman also contributes an excitingly robust score.

"The Left-handed Gun" is a rarity among the western genre: a Freudian horse opera. ... Read more

Reviews (2)

This is the better version
Rod Steiger is a better Marty. He brings an awareness of his own "plainness" that never leaves his face. The old black and white studio films for TV are grainy and hard to watch, but the emotional content of this and another favorite of mine ("Requiem for a Heavyweight" with Jack Palance) give us an intimacy and immediacy that the larger films with longer story lines don't. Also Nancy Marchand as the plain woman he comes to love is just as subtle and underplayed, her pain over her situation evident without overacting. I highly recommend this to people who like "small" films.

excellent for it's time
I saw the movie version starring Ernest Borgnine, and enjoyed it very much. You can obviously see how society in the 90's is so different than it was in the 50s, these days Marty would probably be a nerdy engineer instead of a butcher. Marty's aunt's being thrown out would not happen now, because Marty's cousin's wife would be working. Also Brooklyn, doesn't have as much Italians now as it did then. ... Read more