Another hookless macro-blog post, yet another follow-up macro-blog post. I'm back to films again, after a brief interlude. But one of the three films I'm discussing features Bob Dylan. He's also on the soundtrack!
Can you guess what it is? It's Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid, pleb! I was able to catch it on TCM over winter break. I added the movie to my observation journal after enjoying Ride the High Country.
I've been on-and-off of a Western kick since the fall, including Euro-Westerns. The Mercenary. Sabata. The Hellbenders. A Pistol for Ringo.
I can tell I'm getting older because I'm starting to appreciate Westerns. (I can also tell because I read a lot of noirs over the break.) But with my recent Westerns bias, I've also come to admit my general "Seventies" bias. The decade hosted a few of my recent favorite genre discoveries.
Burnt Offerings. Grizzly. Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires. The Devil's Rain.
Also, about all of the film commentators I respect are boomers (okay). So there's also their own bias towards that decade. Are my tastes just the result of trickle-down nostalgia? Yes. I confess I'm the product of auteur theory brainwashing (and Criterion and TCM).
So Pat Garrett falls in the middle of that great four-way intersection. The four roads are the Seventies, recommendation, availability and "Great (Male) Director" status. Yet, as of today, I can only appreciate Pat Garrett. Why?
Because I think Pat Garrett, and two other films, may delineate "the edge" for my Seventies viewing. The other pair are Winter Kills and Boom! (pictured above). All three are bloated cult items, the product of a troubled production.
And they all sound great on paper! Winter Kills is a paranoid conspiracy thriller like Under the Silver Lake. Boom! is John Water's favorite film, based off of a Tennessee William's play. And Pat Garrett is a violent, meandering chase film, scored my an adrift Seventies Dylan.
Yet the viewing experience doesn't live up to the promise of the page. I fell asleep during Winter Kills. I was on my phone for most of Boom! I debated turning off Pat Garrett after an hour and thirty minutes.
At a certain point, self-made adversity doesn't equal an entertaining byproduct. You always hear the cliche (but true) story about Jaws and how the shark they built didn't work. Spielberg had to improvise, so they ended up not showing as much of the shark.
This byproduct of adversity improved the film because it leaned into suspense. And Spielberg himself didn't destroy the shark, it was an act of God. You can't say the same of Peckinpah's consumption. Or Richard Burton's pre-shoot Bloody Mary.
This personal bias exists for other media. Sorry, but I don't get the appeal of Exile on Main Street. I can only listen to a British junkie try to sound like Muddy Waters for so long. How's that for a cold take?
Full disclosure: I'm straight-edge. Intoxication isn't a personal experience. Maybe, then, I can't see the appeal of intoxicated direction and performance. But I also only have so much free time for movies. Maybe my vitriol is for misspent hours.
There may be other factors. The reappraisal-industrial-complex exists because of hot takes and decontextualization. And those darn boomers may have infected us all with their misguided nostalgia. For imminent hipsters, personal branding was championing only the most obscure cultural items.
So reader, beware. I've started watching the trailer before deciding to add a film to my journal. I've also started listening more to friend's recommendations. Shout out to my girlfriend MK for making me watch People Just Do Nothing.
And I'll always be here to steer you to the right things! But remember, we'll all be wrong someday, even me. But speaking of nostalgia . . .