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The credits roll over Sirkian satin and the Wizard of Oz farm is filmed through the Duel in the Sun filter, though the overture of childhood isn't complete until a discordant note ("Anybody doesn't like it, they can blow it out their ass," grumbles the moppet) sends it collapsing into the present. The grown Alice (Ellen Burstyn) is forlorn in suburban New Mexico, flapping against glass doors like an ensnared gazelle. Abruptly widowed, she hits the road with teenage son (Alfred Lutter) in tow. (The car has barely left the driveway when the smartass kid kicks off his "Are we there yet?" mantra.) The journey through the New West is a bumpy one, Phoenix is a lounge saloon sans piano and Tucson is a greasy spoon managed by vaudevillians, the heroine ponders it all with a softly caustic "Quo vadis?" Humming with nervous energy, Martin Scorsese's camera is in a state of continuous discovery—the eye drawn to macho rituals here explores unknown spaces in tandem with his wandering protagonist, beguilded by Burstyn's scarred feistiness. Roughness is never far even in playful moments, the grinning beau (Harvey Keitel) can turn into a psychotic cheater, switchblade and scorpion-pendant and all. (As the Good Cowboy, Kris Kristofferson takes Alice's jittery hand and drawls soothingly: "Steeeeady, big feller. It gets easier.") At his most generous, the director slows down the riotous flow and savors the makeshift sanctuaries of garage sales and motel rooms, watching the characters sunbathing on the dusty sidewalk with an amiably blowsy waitress (Diane Ladd) or sipping wine with a mischievous tomboy (Jodie Foster). (Scorsese ditches the rhythm once back with the guys in New York, but Demme runs with it.) A comedy of effulgent grubbiness, a pugnacious treatise on melodrama (cf. Aldrich's Autumn Leaves), an ode to the heroine who will have her song heard. With Billy Green Bush, Lelia Goldoni, Vic Tayback, and Valerie Curtin.
--- Fernando F. Croce |