“Moby Dick? Isn’t that a social disease?”
The following is my contribution to the For the Love of Film (Noir) Blogathon and fundraiser for the Film Noir Foundation to help preserve our film heritage. The Blogathon is hosted by Marilyn Ferdinand and Self-Styled Siren. Please visit their sites for further information.
Based on Newton Thornburg’s novel of sleepy SoCal decadence — minus the toddler character (“old brown pants”) and a haunting breakdown set in an amusement park — Cutter and Bone was released by United Artists in 1981 to unanimous indifference, save for the few sharp critics who recognized its sun-blanched brilliance. Believing the film’s two stars, Jeff Bridges and John Heard, were hovering in Oscar territory, UA re-issued the picture through their boutique “Classics” division, changed the title to Cutter’s Way to yet more consumer apathy and another handful of rave reviews. Two years later, you could see it on cable TV every other night of the week. And, no, it won no Oscars.
The YouTube clip posted above is the film’s opening seven minutes. The slo-mo parade (“Old Spanish Days”) is infused with a creeping sense of history and tradition, about to be juxtaposed with Heard and Bridges’ woozy, boozy friendship, and a bitter murder mystery that lands at the feet of a corporate authority figure, a great white whale in a tailored suit. That such a knowing reflection of alternate Americana came from director Ivan Passer, a Czech émigré, still boggles the mind.
Film noir? No doubt. The musical score by Jack Nitzsche, combining glass harp, glass harmonica, zither and electric strings is far removed from the noir staple of bluesy sax and tinkling ivories, but nonetheless captures the sad, tenuous nature of noir and its rootless, luckless people. The sinuous theme playing over the credits in this clip is used sparingly throughout the movie.
The scene then shifts to a motel room where Bridges’ Bone has just had sex with Nina van Pallandt — the Baroness van Pallandt, that is, formerly of the singing duo Nina & Frederik before the Baron was gunned down in a drug deal and Nina went on to act in some Robert Altman movies. (Bond aficionados, take note: she sang “Do You Know How Christmas Trees Are Grown?” in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.)
Mature and intelligent (unlike most of the characters in the book and on the screen), Cutter’s Way delivers noir to a voyeuristic conclusion, observing seedy outcasts behind closed doors. Bridges is excellent, as is Lisa Eichorn as the third point in a triangle (her line, “Get fucked, sweetie” still packs a wallop), but Heard steals the show as Alex Cutter, half a man (one eye, one arm, one leg) devising a plan to bring the world’s powerbrokers to their knees. Crashing through windows on his grand charger, the Nitzsche music swelling to its glorious crescendo, he confronts his Moby Dick, but needs the hand of a friend to take the bastard down. Which is where noir meets some kind of poetry.
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The YouTube clip posted above is the film’s opening seven minutes. The slo-mo parade (“Old Spanish Days”) is infused with a creeping sense of history and tradition, about to be juxtaposed with Heard and Bridges’ woozy, boozy friendship, and a bitter murder mystery that lands at the feet of a corporate authority figure, a great white whale in a tailored suit. That such a knowing reflection of alternate Americana came from director Ivan Passer, a Czech émigré, still boggles the mind.
Film noir? No doubt. The musical score by Jack Nitzsche, combining glass harp, glass harmonica, zither and electric strings is far removed from the noir staple of bluesy sax and tinkling ivories, but nonetheless captures the sad, tenuous nature of noir and its rootless, luckless people. The sinuous theme playing over the credits in this clip is used sparingly throughout the movie.
The scene then shifts to a motel room where Bridges’ Bone has just had sex with Nina van Pallandt — the Baroness van Pallandt, that is, formerly of the singing duo Nina & Frederik before the Baron was gunned down in a drug deal and Nina went on to act in some Robert Altman movies. (Bond aficionados, take note: she sang “Do You Know How Christmas Trees Are Grown?” in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.)
Mature and intelligent (unlike most of the characters in the book and on the screen), Cutter’s Way delivers noir to a voyeuristic conclusion, observing seedy outcasts behind closed doors. Bridges is excellent, as is Lisa Eichorn as the third point in a triangle (her line, “Get fucked, sweetie” still packs a wallop), but Heard steals the show as Alex Cutter, half a man (one eye, one arm, one leg) devising a plan to bring the world’s powerbrokers to their knees. Crashing through windows on his grand charger, the Nitzsche music swelling to its glorious crescendo, he confronts his Moby Dick, but needs the hand of a friend to take the bastard down. Which is where noir meets some kind of poetry.
posted by Flickhead at
9:23 PM
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