Director: Paul Schrader
Date Watched: 10-7-2024
Where: Alamo Drafthouse South Lamar, Austin, TX
Rating: 8/10
I went into this cold. My cousin mentioned the movie to me a while back, and I’d never heard of it. He said it’s a good neo-noir. A couple days later I saw it was playing at the Alamo, so I bought a ticket. I took my seat knowing absolutely nothing about the film other than that it was made in the late ’70s, and it’s a good neo-noir.
The opening credits were encouraging– George C. Scott, Peter Boyle, Dick Sargent, all good actors. Written and directed by Paul Schrader? That’s good, too. He wrote Taxi Driver and Raging Bull. By the time the credits ended, I was sold.
And then the movie rolled, and yes, it’s good. It’s great, even. It unfolded slowly, and never ceased to be entertaining. It’s not for everyone, as there is a lot of nudity and somewhat graphic sexual imagery and content, but it’s all told from the point of view of Patton’s character, who is a conservative, naive, religious man, forced to explore the underworld of pornography and prostitution. It gets darker and darker as it goes along.
Scott is great. He really sells his character, and him slowly adapting to the world he finds himself in is very well done. Towards the end, he gets a sidekick, played by an actress I didn’t recognize, Season Hubley, who really held her own when sharing the screen with him. I wonder why she didn’t become a bigger star. Her role is something like Jame Lee Curtis’ in Trading Places, and she’s just as good at the role.
The film has a superb fight sequence near the end that takes place on one of the hilly side streets in San Francisco’s North Beach. It looks like it might be Romolo Place, though it was hard to tell. The way the steep street was integrated into the fight was incredible, and the entire scene breath-taking.
The shots of Los Angeles and San Francisco, probably taken in 1978, were a nice trip down memory lane.
If you aren’t put off by the gritty subject matter, this is a film well worth watching.