Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)
Dir. George Roy Hill
Starring: Paul Newman, Robert Redford, Katherine Ross
A classic western depicting the final days of Butch Cassidy (Newman) and the Sundance Kid (Redford), as
the train robbers flee to Bolivia to escape the law.
The movie fits in to the buddy comedy mold, showing Butch
and Sundance to be easy going friends who just want to keep on going through
life stealing some money and getting by. But the film is interesting due to the
two sides it keeps showing. Parts of the movie are cool and fun, with the 2
having their adventures and delivering amazing dialogue. The movie is a hang out
movie, one that you watch not only to see the story, but also to hang out with
the fun characters. Much like Rio Bravo or the Steven Soderbergh
Ocean’s movies, the film is fronted by characters that are just fun to watch.
This is directly due to the great casting of the leads. The film simply wouldn’t
work without the chemistry between Redford and Newman, and
But there are other scenes that give the movie a sense of
melancholy, ruminating on their eventual end, and the end of the west. This is
something that is noticeable from the beginning of the film, with the 20th
Century Fox logo presented in Sepia tone leading into a newsreel about the
exploits of the duo. It paints them as an old legend, and it’s fitting that the
portion of the story that would feature the characters at their happiest in New
York is also presented in a similar way*. They are happy, but their natural inclination towards crime wouldn't allow them to go the straight and narrow. But ultimately this movie is about endings. The film constantly
has characters telling the leads that their time is up, and how they don’t have
a place in the new world. Etta tells Sundance “I won't watch you die. I'll miss
that scene if you don't mind”, which is why she eventually leaves them in
Bolivia. The only two that don’t seem to realize it are Butch and Sundance, or
else you’d like to hope that they would make a better attempt to stay straight.
And even those attempts weren’t going to last. Butch says that he doesn’t want
to be a farmer because it would cause him to have to work hard, so he goes back
to what’s easy, robbing people. But every time that they try them backslide, fulfilling
Bledsoe’s earlier line “Your times is over and you're going to die bloody. And
all you can do is choose where". And the ending, with the iconic freeze
frame featured on the poster, doesn’t feel glamorous to me. It feels sad, but at the same time it's the only way that their story could end. So ignore what Roger Ebert said, about how the ending "doesn't belong". Aside from the fact that it was the actual end for the two, the movie telegraphs it in way that makes sense**.
And there’s the Raindrops Keep Falling on My
Head scene, which should feel cheesy, but it works and it feels fun. It helps that it is a great song, but the scene just puts a smile on my face just thinking about it.
And something needs to be said about Katherine Ross as Etta Place. It would be easy for the role to be kind of wet blanket, with her constantly trying to constantly bring down the two outlaws with her legitimate concerns for their well being. But she plays the role in a way that while she seems fun, but she can't bear to see these two men that she loves continue on their path to doom. She plays the role with a sense of fun and warmth, and when she leaves it has impact.
And something needs to be said about Katherine Ross as Etta Place. It would be easy for the role to be kind of wet blanket, with her constantly trying to constantly bring down the two outlaws with her legitimate concerns for their well being. But she plays the role in a way that while she seems fun, but she can't bear to see these two men that she loves continue on their path to doom. She plays the role with a sense of fun and warmth, and when she leaves it has impact.
This is one of the greats. It doesn’t really fit in the
traditional western mold, but that’s one of the things that is great about the
film. It's a must see for anyone, western or not.
*I know that it was originally meant to be a scripted scene,
and was turned into a montage of still images because they were denied usage of
the stages built for Hello Dolly for anything other than still photography. But
this helped the film in my opinion.
**I like Roger Ebert's writing on film, but this is one of those times when he was extremely wrong about a film.
**I like Roger Ebert's writing on film, but this is one of those times when he was extremely wrong about a film.
No comments:
Post a Comment