By John M. Whalen
When the “hardware widow†(Allyn Ann McClerie) asks
Monte Walsh (Lee Marvin) if he’d gotten used to the idea of his long-time
partner Chet Rollins (Jack Palance) and her being married, Monte says: “I never
had so many things to get used to in my whole life, as now.†That line of
dialogue in the middle of William Fraker’s “Monte Walsh†(1970) pretty much
sums up this first and best film adaptation of Jack Schaeffer’s novel about the
end of the Old West in general and the cowboy life in particular. It’s a true classic and even though it
features two of the toughest tough guy actors of the sixties and seventies,
it’s not a melodramatic shoot-em-up, full of violence, sound and fury. Rather it’s
an elegiac portrait of the way it must have really happened, presented in a style
as realistic as the Frederick Remington paintings shown under the opening
credits.
At the start of the story, Monte and Chet are two
cowboys riding back to Harmony, Montana, and the ranch where they work, only to
find that everything is gone. The winter was so severe the local ranchers gave
up and sold out to Consolidated Cattle, an Eastern syndicate “run by accountants,â€
according to foreman Cal Brennan (Jim Davis). Brennan is managing the only
spread left by Consolidated and offers them jobs. The film’s first act
introduces the basic situation and most of the main characters which include
Shorty (Mitchell Ryan), a bronc buster full of mischief and braggadocio, and
Martine (Jeanne Moreau), a prostitute who Monte calls The Countess because of
her French accent and is in love with in his own way. There’s a bunkhouse full
of familiar actors you’ve seen before, including Bo Hopkins, Michael Conrad,
and J.D. Spradlin.
Once the mise en
scene is established, screen writers Lucas Heller and David Zelag Goodman
prepare us for the trouble lying ahead by introducing the character of Fightin’
Joe Hooker (John McLiam), an old, deranged Civil War veteran who rides fence
and keeps muttering, “I had a good life.†Chet and Monte remark to themselves that it appears Fightin’ Joe’s life
is about over. Riding fence is the lowest job a cowboy can have. Soon after,
when all the hands are out on the prairie, gathered around the chuck wagon,
they see Fightin’ Joe on his horse whooping and galloping in a suicide charge straight
off a cliff.
When they return to the ranch Brennan informs them that
Consolidated has ordered four layoffs and Shorty is one of those given his
walking papers. Monte gives him some money, knowing there just aren’t any
cowboy jobs available anymore. Chet meanwhile has had his eye on the widow who
owns the hardware store. In one scene, he asks Monte if he remembered how many
cowboys there were when they first got there. “There’s a hell of a lot fewer
now,†he says without waiting for an answer. He tells Monte he’s going to marry
the “hardware widow.†Too make matters worse for Monte, Martine is moving to a
town 40 miles away. There aren’t enough men left in Harmony for her to make a
living.
After Chet’s wedding, Monte rides to see Martine and proposes
marriage. Only trouble is neither one had any money. He says he’ll come back
after he finds a job. Back in Harmony that night he walks down the dirt street
of the sleeping town and the bleak look on his face shows he’s finally aware of
how bad his situation has become. He discovers the grey bronc that Shorty had
never been able to break penned up in a corral belonging to the owner of a Wild
West show. Monte saddles up and rides the bronc, destroying half the buildings
in town in the process. The scene conveys Monte’s sense of growing frustration
as civilization has been taking away all the things and people he knew. The
destruction of the buildings may be only coincidental to Monte doing what he
does best perhaps for the last time, but it’s also meant to show a displaced
cowboy wreaking some revenge on the progress that is making him obsolete. The
Wild West Show operator offers him a job playing a fictitious outlaw. Monte
needs the money but he thinks about it and turns it down, saying. “I’m not
going to spit on my whole life.â€
There have been many films about the ending of The Old
West. Sam Peckinpah’s “Ride the High Country,†“The Wild Bunch,†“Pat Garrett
and Billy the Kid†and “The Ballad of Cable Hogue†immediately come to mind, as does Tom Gries’s
“Will Penny,†with Charlton Heston. These are great films, but “Monte Walsh†is
more like “Will Penny†and “Cable Hogue†in the sense that Peckinpah’s action films
have plots revolving around violence and revenge, while “Monte Walsh†has very
little, if any, plot. There are shootings and fist fights, but are shown merely
as part of the everyday life of a cowboy. Instead of the heavy blood-letting found
in the “The Wild Bunch†most of the action in “Monte Walsh†is rather
good-natured and usually ends in laughter and a drink. These scenes are made
all the more poignant as we watch the impersonal and far more lethal forces moving
into the west, slowly killing the kind of life these people knew.
The times soon become so desperate economically the
characters are forced to change. Lack of employment and the possibility that
there will soon be no place for them, drives them to desperate acts. The
gradual erosion of the situation the cowboys and Monte’s lover face is
portrayed so subtly and realistically that it comes almost as a surprise when
things do suddenly take a violent turn.
“Monte Walsh†was remade in 2002 with Tom Selleck. Unlike
that version, the original film does not present the Eastern syndicate and the
railroad as evil villains. Fraker and his writers instead merely show the
inevitability of progress and how civilization’s forward expansion necessarily
makes some things and people extinct. It’s unfortunate but it’s just the way
things are.
Not enough can be said about the understated,
thoughtful performances by the three leads. Marvin reveals a sensitivity that
only a truly tough man can risk showing. His quiet, low key portrayal and his
gradual understanding of what is happening around him slowly builds to a truly
sad and tragic scene near the end of the film. Palance again reminded us of
what a great actor he was in the days when he played Mountain Rivera in Rod
Serling’s “Requiem for a Heavyweight,†on Playhouse 90. And Jeanne Moreau moves
us deeply as she accepts Monte’s proposal, and later, when he can’t find a job,
tells him “It’s okay.†She wasn’t expecting a wedding right away, knowing in
all likelihood there never would be one.
“Monte Walsh†was Fraker’s first directorial effort. He
is better known as a cinematographer who worked on “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
Nest†and “The Professionals,†also with Lee Marvin. His only other notable
directing job was “The Legend of the Lone Ranger.†On “Monte Walsh†he turned
the lensing over to David M. Walsh who captured some nice images of the area
around Tucson, subbing for Montana.
The music score was by John Barry with a tune “Good
Times Are Coming†sung by Mama Cass. Barry’s score has been highly praised, but
I found it too reminiscent of some of the Bond films he’d done, and for that
reason somewhat distracting. The Mama Cass vocal was another discordant
element, definitely a product of the time the film was made—the peace and love
music of the
Seventies “Flower Power†generation. However, the
ironic tone of the lyrics perfectly fit the movie’s theme.
The Kino Lorber Blu-ray give us “Monte Walsh†in full
2.41:1 aspect ratio, as it
was filmed. Earlier VHS versions cropped the film to 1.85:1 . Color and picture are excellent. Sound is monaural and a
bit bright, making Barry’s score shrill at times. However the dialog is clear,
with the music never overpowering the actors’ words. Unfortunately there are no
extras on this Blu-ray other than the original theatrical trailer.
“Monte Walsh,†especially on this Kino Lorber disc is
highly recommended to all lovers of the western and to those who enjoy films that
try to attain the status of a work of art simply by telling the truth.
(John M. Whalen is the author of "Hunting Monsters is My Business: The Mordecai Slate Stories" . Click here to order the book from Amazon)
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