Tag Archives: Richard Farnsworth

Late Night Retro Television Review: Highway to Heaven 4.10 “A Dream of Wild Horses”

Posted on by Bradley Crain

Welcome to Late Night Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past!  On Thursdays, we will be reviewing Highway to Heaven, which aired on NBC from 1984 to 1989.  The entire show is currently streaming on Amazon Prime, Tubi and other services!

Episode 4.10 “A Dream of Wild Horses”

(Dir. by Michael Landon, originally aired on December 2nd, 1987)

In this episode, traveling angel Jonathan Smith (Michael Landon), and his companion Mark Gordon (Victor French) arrive at a struggling ranch where the widow Billie Harwood (Gail Strickland) is trying to keep her late husband’s legacy alive while caring for her young son Richie (Jason Horst) and aging father Jet Sanders (Richard Farnsworth). It seems that Jet, the patriarch of the family, sort of lost his will to live when he lost his wife and then his son in law, a man he truly thought of as a son. As Jonathan and Mark arrive on the scene, the family members are all at a breaking point. Jet wishes he would just die and quit being a burden. Billie is completely overwhelmed with the ranch, and you get the feeling she’s never truly mourned the loss of her husband. And Richie, who needs someone to love him and pay attention to him, instead is mostly ignored by his family. Jonathan, Mark, a pack of wild horses, and some divine compassion turn out to be just what the family needs to find the inspiration to start putting the pieces of their lives back together. 

Directed by Michael Landon, “A Dream of Wild Horses” is everything I would expect from this series. Considering this episode was in season 4, it’s possible the formula was starting to wear thin with viewers back in 1987, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. For a man like me who loves a good western, I especially enjoyed the ranch setting, the wild horses, and the presence of veteran, Oscar nominated actor Richard Farnsworth as Grandpa Jet Sanders. He’s believable as the man who’s lost his purpose in life, but he’s even better when he turns things around at the end. One of the things I like about this series is the way Jonathan always knows exactly what buttons to push to get the characters going in the right direction. From bluntly telling Grandpa that he needs to quit feeling sorry for himself, to offering the widow a shoulder to cry on, and helping both of them see how much Richie needs their love and guidance, Jonathan’s genuine compassion is something this world really does need. Skeptical viewers may even roll their eyes, but I choose to accept the episode’s inspiring messages at face value. There have been times in my own life when I just needed someone else to care, and this series leans into those types of interactions. This family was broken, and Jonathan and Mark helped turn things around for them by simply caring. Things may be more complex and nuanced in the real world, but the simple act of caring will always be powerful. 

Film Review: The Outlaw Josey Wales (dir by Clint Eastwood)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Towards the end of 1976’s The Outlaw Josey Wales, Josey (played by Clint Eastwood) says, “I guess we all died a little in that damned war.”

He’s referring to the American Civil War and the film leaves you with no doubt that Wales knew what he was talking about.  A farmer living in Missouri, Josey Wales wasn’t involved in the Civil War until a group of guerillas, the Redlegs, raided his home and killed his family.  Seeking vengeance, Wales joined the Bushwackers, a group of Confederate guerillas that were led by the infamous “Bloody Bill” Anderson.  After Anderson’s death and the South’s surrender, Senator James H. Lane (Frank Schofield) offers amnesty to any of the Bushwackers willing to surrender and declare their loyalty to the United States.  Fletcher (John Vernon), the leader of the surviving Bushwackers, thinks it’s a good idea and his men eventually agree to surrender.

Everyone except for Josey Wales.

Fletcher tells Josey that he’ll be an outlaw and that Lane will send his men to capture and execute him.  “I reckon so,” Josey Wales replies.  It’s not that Josey was particularly a fan of the Confederate cause.  Instead, having lost his family and his home and having seen hundreds of men killed, Josey no longer cares.  He’s got a death wish, something that becomes apparent when he later sneaks over to Lane’s camp and discovers that the leader of the Redlegs, Terrill (Bill McKinney), has been made a captain in the Union Army.  The surrendering Bushwackers, with the exception of Fletcher and a young man named Jamie (Sam Bottoms), are gunned down as they swear allegiance to the United States.  Joey springs into action, hijacking a Gatling gun and mowing down soldiers.  It’s a suicidal move and Josey appears to be willing to die, until he sees that Jamie has been wounded.  Josey and Jamie go on the run, pursued by soldiers and bounty hunters.

It sounds like the start of typical Clint Eastwood film and, make no mistake about it, The Outlaw Josey Wales features everything that most people have come to expect from Eastwood.  Josey Wales is an expert shot, often firing two guns while charging forward on his horse.  Josey has a way of words, explaining the purpose of getting “plain man dog mean” and telling a bounty hunter that there are better ways to make a living.  The main difference, though, is that Josey is no longer seeking revenge.  He’s lost his family and his home and he knows nothing is going to bring them back.  He sought revenge during the Civil War and saw so many people killed that, much like Jimmy Stewart in Broken Arrow, he just wants to disappear from civilization.

The problem is that men like Lane and Terrill have no intention of letting Josey Wales disappear.  The sociopathic Terrill sees it as almost being his God-given duty to kill Josey Wales and anyone else that he dislikes.  The bounty hunters are also after Josey Wales.  As Fletcher explains it, bounty hunting is the only way that many former soldiers can make money and feed their families.  As Josey moves through the southwest, his legend grows.  Every town that Josey stops in, he hears stories about the growing number of men that he has supposedly killed.

Josey also discovers that he can’t do it all alone.  He soon finds himself as a part of a new family, a collection of misfits that don’t have a home in Senator Lane’s America.  Lone Waite (Chief Dan George) is an elderly Cherokee man who suggests that Josey head for Mexico.  Little Moonlight (Geraldine Keams) is a Navajo woman who Josey rescues from two bounty hunters.  Sarah Turner (Paula Trueman) and her granddaughter, Laura Lee (Sondra Locke), are rescued from Comancheros.  Josey negotiates the release of two of Sarah’s ranch hands and befriends Chief Ten Bears (Will Sampson) while doing so.  Slowly, Josey comes out of his shell and starts to embrace life once again.  Josey goes from searching for death to searching for peace.

It’s one of Eastwood’s best films, ending on a note of not violence but instead sad regret.  It’s not only a portrait of a man learning to embrace life but it’s also a portrait of a country trying to figure out how to come back together after the bloody savagery of the Civil War.  Some, like Fletcher and Josey, want to move on.  Others, like Terrill, don’t have an identity beyond fighting and killing.  Eastwood gives a good performance but, as a director, he gives every member of the cast a chance to shine.  If you only know John Vernon as Dean Wormer from Animal House, his sad-eyed performance here will be a revelation.

Originally, The Outlaw Josey Wales was meant to be directed by Phillip L. Kaufman but Eastwood felt that Kaufman was taking too long to set up his shots and worrying about details that really didn’t matter.  Reportedly, while Kaufman was away from the set, spending hours searching for a historically-correct beer bottle to be used in a bar scene, Eastwood directed the scene himself and then convinced producer Robert Daley to fire Kaufman and allow Eastwood to direct the film.  (Kaufman also objected to the script’s anti-government subtext but seriously, that’s pretty much the subtext of every film that Eastwood has ever been involved with.)  The DGA later instituted a rule that, on productions in which the director was fired,  the replacement could not be a member of his crew or an actor in the cast but that was too late to help out Kaufman.

(Rumor has it that another reason Kaufman was fired was because he and Eastwood both “liked” Sondra Locke.  This was the first of six films that Eastwood and Locke would do together.)

To be honest, I think it worked out in the film’s favor.  It’s a little surprising that someone other than Eastwood was ever considered as director to be begin with, so perfectly does the story and the lead character fit with Eastwood’s persona.  Eastwood captures both the beauty of the untouched land and also the bloody violence of combat.  In many ways, this film almost feels like a prequel to Unforgiven.  The Outlaw Josey Wales is Eastwood at his best.

Film Review: The Straight Story (by David Lynch)

Posted on by Lisa Marie Bowman

Released in 1999, The Straight Story is one of the greatest films ever made about America.

Alvin Straight (Richard Farnsworth) is an elderly veteran of World War II.  He lives in Iowa, a kind but rather taciturn man who doesn’t have time for doctors and would rather live on his own terms.  That said, when his daughter (Sissy Spacek) finally does manage to drag Alvin to a doctor, he’s told to stop smoking and to start using a walker to get around.  Alvin refuses, though he does start using two canes.  Alvin is an old man.  He’s lived a long time and, in his opinion, he knows best about what he needs to do.

For instance, when Alvin hears that his long-estranged brother Lyle (Harry Dean Stanton), has had a stroke, Alvin decides that he need to go Wisconsin to see him.  The only problem is that Alvin can barely see and he can’t walk and there’s no way anyone is going to give him a car or even a driver’s license.  His solution is to ride a lawnmower from Iowa to Wisconsin.

It’s based on a true story and if The Straight Story sounds like a film that will make you cry, it is.  Richard Farnsworth was terminally ill when he was offered the role of Alvin and he accepted because he admired Alvin’s determination to live life his own way.  As portrayed in the film, Alvin is not one to easily betray his emotions.  He grew up as a part of that stoic generation.  He saw his share of violence and death while he was serving during World War II and one gets the feeling that his attitude has always been that, if he could survive that, he can survive anything.  (The closest Alvin gets to becoming openly emotional is when he meets another veteran in a bar and it becomes obvious that the two of them share a bond that, as people who seen and survived war, only they can really understand.)  Farnsworth so completely becomes Alvin Straight that it’s easy to forger that he was a veteran actor who had a long career before starring in The Straight Story.  Alvin may not show much emotion but Farnsworth communicates so much with just the weariness in his eyes and his slow but determined gait that we feel like we know everything about him.

The film follows Alvin on his way to Wisconsin.  Along the way, he meets various people and, for the most part, they’re all good folks.  Even the runaway hitchhiker (Anastasia Webb) turns out to be a kind soul.  When Alvin momentarily loses control of his lawn mower, a group of stranger run out to help him.  They don’t know who he is or why he was riding his lawnmower down the street.  All that matter is that, at that moment, he’s a person who needs help.  The Straight Story celebrates both the beauty and the people of America.  It’s one of the most sincere and life-affirming films ever made, one that contains not a trace of cynicism and which is all the better for it.  And while many people might be shocked to discover that this film was directed by David Lynch, the truth of the matter is that a strong love for America and Americana runs through all of Lynch’s films.  Lynch was an artist who believed that people could surprise you with their kindness and that’s certainly the case with The Straight Story.

The Straight Story was the only one of David Lynch’s films to receive a G-rating.  It was also the only film that Lynch made for Disney.  It’s interesting to look at Lynch’s filmography and see this heartfelt and deeply touching film sitting between Lost Highway and Mulholland Drive.  But The Straight Story really does feature David Lynch at his best.  It also reveals him as a filmmaker who could do something unexpected without compromising his signature vision.  There’s a lot of beautiful, Lynchian images in The Straight Story.  But there’s also a lot of heart.

Space Rage (1985, directed by Conrad E. Palmisano)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Space Rage is a mix of science fiction and the old west.

In what the movie insists is the far future, a sadistic and notorious criminal named Grange (Michael Pare) is a captured after robbing the Bank of the Moon. As his punishment, he’s sent to a prison planet called Botany Bay. Despite the name, the entire prison is a desert. (Maybe they named it after the doomed colony from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.) The prison is run by Gov. Tovah (William Windom), who uses the prisoners as slave labor in his mines. Grange doesn’t want to work as a miner so he plots his escape. There’s only one shuttle that goes from Botany Bay to Earth and Grange plans to be in control of it.

Two men are determined to stop Grange and his partners from escaping the planet. Walker (John Laughlin) is a young bounty hunter who is haunted by he death of his wife. The Colonel (Richard Farnsworth) is a former policeman who is haunted by nightmares of his time on Earth. Working together, the inexperienced Walker and the crusty, old Colonel try to thwart Grange’s plans.  Grange has an itchy trigger finger and is willing to kill anyone to get what he wants.  Grange may be quick on the draw but the Colonel might be even quicker.

Space Rage starts out as a western before becoming a prison film before then concluding as a Mad Max rip-off, with everyone chasing each other through the desert in intergalactic dune buggies.  The movie is only 75 minutes long but due to a repetitive soundtrack and some less than inspired dialogue, it often feels longer. The Botany Bay is too obviously Southern California to be an effective setting and neither Michael Pare nor John Laughlin seem to be invested in their roles. Not surprisingly, the film’s greatest strength is Richard Farnsworth, playing another no-nonsense veteran tough guy and doing what a man has to do to keep Earth safe.  His presence alone does not make Space Rage worth watching but it definitely helps.  It’s a good thing he was out there looking out for us.

The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1972, directed by John Huston)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

During the lawless day of the old west, a drifter named Roy Bean (Paul Newman) wanders into the desolate town of Vinegaroon, Texas.  When he enters the local saloon, he meets the vagrants who run the town.  They beat him, they rob him, and they tie him to the back of his horse and leave him to die.

Bean, however, does not die.  Instead, he’s nursed back to health by a beautiful young woman named Maria Elena (Victoria Principal).  Carrying a gun, Bean reenters the saloon and promptly kills nearly everyone who previously attacked him.  (“I’m not done killing you yet!” Bean yells at one fleeing woman.)  Bean sits down in front of the saloon and waits for justice.  Instead, he’s visited by a lecherous traveling preacher (Anthony Perkins), who buries the dead and gives Bean absolution.  Bean declares that he is now the “law of the West Pecos.”  As the preacher leaves, he looks at the audience and says that he never visited Bean again and later died of dysentery in Mexico.  He hasn’t seen Bean since dying so the preacher is sure that, wherever Bean went, it wasn’t Heaven.

Judge Roy Bean dispenses rough and hard justice from his saloon and renames the town Langtry, after the actress Lillie Langtry.  Bean has never met Langtry or even seen her perform but he writes to her regularly and pictures of her decorate the walls of his saloon.  Bean hires outlaws to serve as his town marshals and sentences prostitutes to remain in town and marry the citizens.  Lawbreakers are left hanging outside of the saloon.  Bean enters into a common law marriage with Maria and, for a while, they even own a bear, who drinks beer and helps Bean maintain order in the court.  Bean may be crazy but his methods clean up the town and Langtry starts to grow.  As Langtry becomes more civilized and an attorney named Arthur Gass (Roddy McDowall) grows more powerful, it starts to become apparent that there may no longer be a place for a man like Judge Roy Bean.

The real-life Judge Roy Bean did hold court in a saloon and he did name the town after Lilly Langtry.  It’s debatable whether or not he was really a hanging judge.  Because he didn’t have a jail, the maximum punishment that he could hand out was a fine and usually that fine was the same amount of however much money the accused had on him at the time of his arrest.  Because of his eccentricities and his reputation for being the “only law west of the Pecos,” Roy Bean became a legendary figure.  The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean acknowledges from the start that it’s not a historically accurate, with a title card that reads, “Maybe this isn’t the way it was… it’s the way it should have been.”

Based on a script by John Milius and directed by Hollywood veteran John Huston, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean is one of the strangest westerns to ever be released by a major studio.  Featuring multiple narrators who occasionally speak directly to the camera, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean is an episodic mix of low comedy, graphic violence, and syrupy romance.  (The film’s sole Oscar nomination was for the song that played over scenes of Bean and Maria going on a romantic picnic with their pet bear.)  Familiar faces show up in small roles.  Along with Perkins and McDowall, Tab Hunter, Ned Beatty, Jacqueline Bissett, Ava Gardner, and Anthony Zerbe all play supporting roles.  Even a heavily made-up Stacy Keach makes an appearance as an albino outlaw named Bad Bob.

Jacqueline Bisset in The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean

Milius has gone on the record as calling The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean a “Beverly Hills western” and he has a point.  He envisioned the script as starring Warren Oates as a less likable and much more morally ambiguous version of Judge Roy Bean and he was not happy that his original ending was replaced by a more showy pyrotechnic spectacle.  Milius envisioned the film as a low-budget spaghetti western but Huston instead made a Hollywood epic, complete with celebrity cameos and a theme song from Maurice Jarre and Marilyn Bergman.  Milius said that his experience with The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean is what led to him deciding to direct his own films.

Again, Milius has a point but John Huston’s version of The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean has its strengths as well.  Though he may not be the madman that Milius originally envisioned, Paul Newman gives a good, grizzled performance as Roy Bean and the role served as a precursor for the type of aging but determined characters that Newman would specialize in during the final phase of his career.  Due to its episodic structure, the film is uneven but it works more often than it doesn’t.  The chaotic early scenes reflect a time when the west was actually wild while the later scenes are more cohesive, as society moves into Langtry and threatens to make formerly indispensable men like Roy Ban obsolete.  Even the cameo performances fit in well with the film’s overall scheme, with Anthony Perkins standing out as the odd preacher.  Finally, the young Victoria Principal is perfectly cast as the only woman that Roy Bean loved as much as Lily Langtry.

Though it’s impossible not to wonder what Warren Oates would have done with the title role, The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean is a good end-of-the-west western.

Tom Horn (1980, directed by William Wiard)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Today would have been Steve McQueen’s 90th birthday.

Sadly, McQueen died in 1980 at the absurdly young age of 50.  In life, McQueen never got as much respect as he deserved as an actor but in death, he’s been rediscovered as not just an icon of cool but also as an underrated actor who, much like Clint Eastwood, could say a lot without uttering a word.  (Be sure to read Marshall Terrill’s biography of McQueen.)  When Steve McQueen (as played by Damian Lewis) showed up in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood, it seemed appropriate.  McQueen and Tarantino both seem made for each other, even if McQueen died long before Tarantino even wrote his first screenplay.

McQueen made two films shortly before he died, The Hunter and Tom Horn. Unfortunately, neither one of them was a hit with audiences or critics.  The Hunter, which was McQueen’s last film, is a forgettable movie that features McQueen as a bounty hunter who can’t drive.  Tom Horn, however, was an underrated western that features one of McQueen’s best performances.

In Tom Horn, McQueen plays the title character, a legendary frontier scout who is known for the role he played in the capture of Geronimo.  When the film opens, Tom Horn has seen better days.  With the frontier changing and the old west being replaced by the modern age, Horn has been reduced to being almost a vagrant, wandering from town to town in search of work.  When the film begins, Horn has found employment as a “stock detective.”  He’s employed by the local cattlemen to keep rustlers from stealing their stock.  Horn uses the same violent methods that he’s always used, gunning down rustlers and often doing so in public.  What Horn doesn’t realize is that times have changed and the methods that previously made him a legend are now making him a pariah.  When the cattlemen realize that the townspeople are turning against them because of Horn’s activities, they conspire to take out Horn themselves.

Tom Horn is based on a true story.  In 1903, Tom Horn was hung for shooting a 15 year-old boy.  While it is agreed that Horn killed many men over the course of his life, he was undoubtedly framed for the murder for which he was executed.  While sitting in his jail cell, waiting to be executed, Horn wrote the autobiography upon which this movie is based.  The movie makes the argument that Horn was executed because he was a reminder of what the West used to be like.  In order to prove that they were now ready to be members of civilized society, the cattleman had to sacrifice Horn in the most public way possible.

The film does a good job of capturing the final days of the old west and Steve McQueen does an even better job of playing a man who doesn’t realize that his time has come to a close.  Horn often seems to be the only man who doesn’t understand that the time of outlaws and the gunslingers is coming to a close and that leaves him defenseless when he’s put on trial.  Even after found guilty, Horn remains confident that he will somehow escape the hangman’s noose.  Tragically, it’s not until time is up that Horn truly comes to understand that the world has changed and civilization no longer has place for men like him.  The same people who used to depend on men like Tom Horn now just want to forget that he ever existed.  McQueen took a long break between making The Towering Inferno and Tom Horn and dropped out of the public eye.  The only film he made during that period was a barely released version of Enemy of the People.  When McQueen made Tom Horn, he was also a man out of time and he brings a sense of resignation and loss to the role that he might not have been capable of doing earlier in his career.

Sadly, it was while filming Tom Horn that McQueen first started to show symptoms of the cancer that would eventually kill him.  Tom Horn was released in 1980 and never got the attention that it deserved.  It’s a minor western classic and features Steve McQueen at his best.

 

A Movie A Day #107: The Legend of the Lone Ranger (1981, directed by William A. Fraker)

Posted on by Jedadiah Leland

Long before he found fame playing Deputy Hawk on Twin Peaks, Michael Horse made his film debut in one of the most notorious box office flops of all time, The Legend of the Lone Ranger.  

Michael Horse played Tonto, the young Comanche who rescues his childhood friend, John Reid (Klinton Spilsbury), and nurses him back to health after Reid has been attacked and left for dead by the notorious outlaw, Butch Cavendish (Christopher Lloyd).  Reid was a civilian, accompanying a group of Texas Rangers led by his older brother, Dan (John Bennett Perry).  When Cavendish attacked, John was the only survivor.  John wants to avenge his brother’s death but first, Tonto is going to have to teach him how to shoot a six-shooter and how to ride his new horse, Silver.  Finally, John is ready to don the mask and becomes the Lone Ranger.  It’s just in time, because Cavendish has kidnapped President Grant (Jason Robards).

An even bigger flop than the more recent Lone Ranger film starring Armie Hammer and Johnny Depp, The Legend of the Lone Ranger failed for several reasons.  For one thing, the film has a major identity crisis.  The violence is not for kids but most of the dialogue and the performances are.  For another thing, it takes forever for John Reid to actually put on the mask and become the Lone Ranger.  By the time the William Tell Overture is heard, the movie is nearly over.

It was made to capitalize on the same type of nostalgia that previously made Superman a hit and, just as Superman introduced the world to Christopher Reeve, The Legend of the Lone Ranger introduced the world to a football player turned actor, named Klinton Spilsbury.  Unfortunately, the world did not want to meet Klinton Spilsbury, whose blank-faced performance was so bad that James Keach was brought in to dub over all of his dialogue.   Spilsbury did not help himself by reportedly acting like a diva during the shooting, demanding constant rewrites, and getting into bar brawls offset.  Of the two actors who made their screen debuts in The Legend of the Lone Ranger, Michael Horse has worked again.  Klinton Spilsbury has not.

When The Legend of the Lone Ranger went into production, the film’s producers made the incredibly boneheaded move of getting a court injunction barring Clayton Moore (who had played the role on TV) from wearing his Lone Ranger uniform is public.  Since the semi-retired Moore was living off of the money that he made appearing as the Lone Ranger at country fairs and children’s hospitals, this move was a public relations disaster.  (For his part, Moore filed a counter suit and continued to make appearances, now wearing wrap-around sunglasses instead of his mask.)  Moore refused to appear in a cameo and spent much of 1981 speaking out against the film.

Finally, the main reason that Legend of The Lone Ranger flopped was because it opened on the same Friday as a little film called Raiders of the Lost Ark.

The rest is history.