Robert Redford

                                                             Part 2

Moving along chronologically, here is another handful of excellent movies starring the one and only Robert Redford.

Jeremiah Johnson (1972) is, as they say, based on a true story. Robert Redford is the title character, a legendary mountain man. Johnson has many adventures and many encounters with the Indians in the area. Some help him, some hate him. He reluctantly leaves his wife and son alone in their cabin to guide a US Army troop to their desired location. But when he returns he discovers his entire family has been killed by the Crows.  He goes after them with a vengeance. 

The Candidate (1972) is a cautionary tale for our time. Robert Redford is the candidate of the title, Bill McKay. A very popular California Repblican senator is up for re-election and probably unbeatable. The pols rope in charismatic, attractive McKay, telling him since he will lose, he can say anything he wants. He does. But the polls are terrible and he is convinced to change tactics. He ekes out a win he doesn’t really want and asks his handlers “What do we do now?” Indeed. There are lots of Bill McKays around filling up space as governors, senators and assorted ne’er-do-wells. 

The Way We Were (1973) pairs Redford with Barbra Streisand. He is an apolitical WASP and she is a cause-oriented Jew. This unlikely couple falls in and out of love several times. When they’re together it’s just so romantic you want to eat them up. But there are ruptures and sadly they part for good. This was a hugely successful film and the song from the title hit number one on the Billboard chart. 

The Sting (1973) reunites the happy warriors Robert Redford and Paul Newman. They are consummate con men and together they decide to take down racketeer Doyle Lonnegan by means of an incredibly complicated sting. It involves setting up a dummy horse racing betting parlor and getting Lonnegan to believe that it is real and he is about to get rich. Robert Shaw as Lonnegan is wonderfully unlikeable and you can’t wait for him to be victimized. Warning: You have to stay with this movie- the plot is dense and sometimes difficult to follow. This film won 10 Oscars including Best Movie and Best Director. 

The Great Gatsby (1974) is the third of four movie renditions of the F. Scott Fitzgerald novel. Guess what: None of them are very good. Robert Redford is just fine as Gatsby in this one and Mia Farrow is good as the ephemeral Daisy. Her laugh “sounded like money”.  I guess blame the screenplay, but it’s still watchable for the beautiful people and the scenic locations. The 2013 version with Leonardo DiCaprio as Gatsby isn’t much better. Scott Fitzgerald perfectly caught a certain group of Americans in the 20's. Unfortunately, the movies cant’ seem to follow suit. 

All of the movies in this article are for adults. 

                                                 Robert Redford, Actor

He was a fine, fine actor. I’ve noted about 25 really good movies with Redford as the primary actor. Where to even start? How about at the start!

    Redford’s first appearance of note is opposite Jane Fonda in Neil Simon’s Barefoot In The Park (1967). They are the classic oil and water couple: Corey (Fonda) is a free spirit while Paul (Redford) is a buttoned-down straight arrow lawyer. Their adventures in their terrible fifth floor apartment provide plenty of fodder for Simon’s witty dialog. Their unlikely neighbors provide lots of laughs. The title comes from Paul’s refusal to go barefoot in the park with Corey because it was too cold. Well, as someone has said, all’s well that end’s well. 

    Mr. Movie is often asked to tell his number one all-time best movie. He unhesitatingly says Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969). It has everything! Redford is paired with Paul Newman as the irrepressible Butch. Katherine Ross is just right as Sundance’s love. These outlaws lead the Hole In The Wall gang through many misadventures, including a memorable train robbery. The edge of the cliff scene where they’re cornered by a posse is justly famous. And who could forget the pair’s attempt to rob banks in Bolivia, though neither speaks Spanish. And it’s just one of the many delights! Alas, the film won only four “minor” Oscars. Another robbery!

    In Downhill Racer (1969) Redford is cast as David Chappellett, a selfish, arrogant athlete who cares only for himself. The iconic Gene Hackman is on board as the Olympic Men’s Ski Coach. He puts up with Chappellett’s attitude because he is the best skier on the team. Redford does a quite creditable job as the skier, and makes you dislike him just like his teammates do. When he wins the Olympic Gold, you’re really not that happy. This is not Miracle on Ice on skis. 

    Tell Them Willie Boy Is Here (1969) stars Robert Blake as Willie, a Native American on the run after killing his girlfriend’s father in self defense. His major pursuer is Cooper (Robert Redford), a Deputy Sheriff. The chase seems unequal since Cooper has a horse and Willie doesn’t. But the crafty Indian manages to avoid capture for nearly the whole movie. Willie is finally killed by Cooper, who delivers him to his people to be cremated the Indian way. Criticized for not turning over his corpse so that the curious can see him, Cooper responds “Tell them we’re out of souvenirs”.

    In The Hot Rock (1972) Redford plays Dortmunder, the ne’er do well criminal anti-hero of many Donald Westlake novels. He is recently released from yet another prison sentence. The title is from the big diamond Dortmunder wants to steal, and he gathers some of his shady cronies to help him. The diamond proves to be as elusive as it is valuable, and the chase to cadge it is filled with laughs. George Segal, Zero Mostel and Paul Sand are the nefarious crew recruited by Dortmunder. 

    All of the movies in this article are for grown-ups.

                                           ROBERT REDFORD, DIRECTOR

Robert Redford left this old world at 89,  having left behind a storied career as an actor, director and the developer of the Sundance Film Festival. It seems unbelievable now, but back in 1980 there were mostly doubters about Redford’s ability to direct. There were many catcalls when the “too pretty” Redford was selected to direct Judith Guest’s Ordinary People. 

Ordinary People (1980) is top ten stuff, a wonderful film. Donald Sutherland, Mary Tyler Moore, Timothy Hutton and Judd Hirsch lead a stellar cast in the story of a family’s desolate tragedy.  Redford won the Oscar for Best Director for this superb first effort, forever squelching any idea he was just another pretty face. And the movie won for Best Picture.  Timothy Hutton won the acting Oscar as Conrad, tormented by his inability to save his older brother in a sailing accident.  Donald Sutherland as the father and Judd Hirsch as the psychologist are also excellent. But it is Mary Tyler Moore who floors us, plucked by Redford from her outstanding career as a TV comedy actor, and  just totally good as the mother in denial. 

Quiz Show (1994) is a quirky microcosm of a society that puts too much value on money and success and not enough on what matters. John Turturro as a sore-loser whistle-blower and Ralph Fiennes as the fallen saint, Charles Van Doren, lead a fine cast and  Redford gets the most from them.  Redford was again nominated for Best Director but lost out to Robert Zemeckis for Forrest Gump.  

A River Runs Through It (1992) is  Redford’s faithful and winning adaptation of the Norman Maclean novella, and introduced the charismatic Brad Pitt as one of two disparate brothers whose only real tie is now their minister-father (Tom Skerritt) and fly-fishing. The gorgeous cinematography of the Montana countryside garnered an Oscar.

The Milagro Beanfield War (1988) involves a group of dirt-poor New Mexican farmers refusing to bow down to a brutish and powerful developer. The ensemble cast of mostly Hispanic actors is quite good, and  Redford develops a tone that is so winning and enjoyable we are swept along. And once again there is gorgeous photography, a Redford trademark.

Robert. Redford took a turn at directing himself in the offbeat The Horse Whisperer (1997) based on Nicholas Evans’ story of a traumatized young girl and a cowboy who heals damaged horses. The love interest is Kirstin Scott Thomas, who is excellent, as are Chris Cooper and Diane Wiest as the brother and sister-in-law.  Two Redford specialties are readily apparent here: beautiful scenery and absolute fidelity to the story on which the film is based. 

The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000), is a well-intentioned misfire. It is worth a look for the performances of Will Smith and Matt Damon and the beautiful photographyThe story involves a golf tournament funded by a wealthy woman. Smith is the mysterious Bagger Vance who suddenly shows up to caddy for the underdog local, played by Matt Damon. But it is easily the least of Mr. Redford’s directorial efforts.

All of these films are suitable for children 12 and up.

                                                                   Val Kilmer

                                                                         Part 2

The late (RIP at 65) Val Kilmer had an outstanding movie history.. He was always busy There are over 200 appearances in his short career. Mr. Movie has tried to dig out the very best. 

    Kilmer gets the title role in The Saint (1997). This character has been portrayed in numerous movies and TV shows. You could argue that Val is the one of the best. Well, at least it’s different. In most Saint outings he is a good guy, a hero. Not here. This guy is a professional thief who uses various disguises and the names of saints to do his dirty work. But- stay tuned- perhaps his last caper results in a big payday for some charities!

    Could film noir work as a tongue-in-cheek comedy. Actually, yes. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang (2005) is exactly that with Val Kilmer as private eye Perry Van Slike and Robert Downey, Jr. As a neophyte actor being taught the ropes of crime fighting by Perry. The two observe a car going into a lake and from there things get complicated. 

    In Felon (2008) Stephen Duff plays Wade Porter, who winds up in prison after killing a burglar. He doesn’t do well in prison and is transferred to a high security, and very badly run, prison. He is paired with John Smith (Val Kilmer), a hard-bitten lifer. But the two decide to expose the nefarious prison and this goes downhill for Smith, but not so for Porter. 

    Cinema Twain (2017) is to me Val Kilmer’s best performance. He begins as this middle-aged rather handsome actor. Before your very eyes he transforms himself into American legend Mark Twain. The monologue is updated with really very little quotation from Twain himself, buy with a good bit of biographical information about the author. Val not only knocks this out of the park, he wrote the thing and is the star. The results are  really quite extraordinary.  

    Let’s make a sequel to Top Gun (1986)! Call it Top Gun Maverick (2022). Can we get Tom Cruise back as ace fighter pilot Maverick? Of course. Oh, and can we get Val Kilmer back to play Iceman Kazansky, Maverick’s friendly rival. Certainly. The word is that Cruise and Kilmer’s pressure got this thing made.  Iceman is now a Fleet Admiral, and as such arranges to get Maverick assigned to his unit. Iceman dies before the movies is half over, and this is actually Kilmer’s last film. The aerial part is very exciting. 

    Val plays the man himself in Batman Forever (1995) but this is very minor Batman and not really worth your time. 

All of the films in this article, except Cinema Twain, are available for rent or purchase. There seems to be a problem with rights for the Twain movie. All are for adults

                                                                        Val Kilmer 

    Val Kilmer, handsome and talented, died at 65 from pneumonia complications. He joins a list that is far too long of actors who died too young.  He had battled throat cancer for years, a malady which altered his voice and finally made it difficult for him to even speak. He had quite a good, if brief, movie career.    

    Kilmer’s first appearance of note came in a role he seemed born to play. In Top Gun (1986) he portrayed the laid-back fighter pilot Ice. He made a good counterpoint to Tom Cruise’s character, Pete “Maverick” Mitchell. The two are rivals for the Top Gun trophy that goes to the best pilot. Later they help each other in real battles. The aerial dog fights are outstanding. And yep, you can see these guys in these same roles 36 years later. More on that later. 

    Next on the list is Willow (1988), a fairy tale with dwarves, wizards, enchanted babies and lots of magic spells. Val Kilmer had a good time playing Madmartigan, a magician able to disguise himself as needed and help the heroes prevail.

But Kilmer’s big break, and the part for which he is famous, is as Jim Morrison, lead singer of The Doors (1991).This rock biopic made lots of money and is maybe within shouting distance about the band’s rise to stardom. Val Kilmer does his own singing, and is so very good at it that other band members said they could not tell whether it was Kilmer or Morrison singing. What is perhaps true is the film’s portrayal of Morrison as a drug user, who sees himself as a messianic leader of the rock and roll culture. As the band members tire of Morrison’s antics, including his arrest and conviction for indecent exposure,  the band breaks up and Morrison hightails it for Paris with his wife. She finds him dead in a bathtub. He was 27.

Tombstone (1993) is one of many movies about the gunfight at the Okay Corral beween the Earp brothers and the notorious Cowboys gang, containing Johnny Ringo and the Clantons. Val Kilmer is on the side of the angels here, as Doc Holliday,  an old friend of the Earps. Though very sick with tuberculosis, which eventually kills him, he helps the Earps clear out Tombstone of the bad guys. 

It takes some guts to appear in a film with Robert DeNiro and Al Pacino, but Val Kilmer pulls it off with panache in Heat (1995). He is Chris, one of the gang of thieves  headed by Neil McCauley (DeNiro). Pacino is Lieutenant Vincent Hannah, tasked with the thankless job of tracking down and arresting the McCauley gang. There’s lots of shooting and double crosses galore and a very complicated screenplay.

All of the movies in this article are available for rent or purchase somewhere. All are for adults. 

                                                     BURT REYNOLDS

Burt Reynolds left us recently at 82. He was still charming and still working. He was a genuine football star at Florida State and some of his movies have a football motif. He was first famous (notorious?) for posing for a Cosmopolitan centerfold in 1972. It was quite a cause celebre at the time, and that issue of Cosmo quickly sold out. Reynolds greatly regretted doing this. But he had quite an interesting movie resume’ mostly in the 1970's.

Reynolds’ break-out part was the role of Lewis Medlock in the haunting Deliverance (1972). He and three friends, played by Ned Beatty, Jon Voight and Ronny Cox, decide to take a canoe trip through the northern Georgia wilderness. Things go horribly wrong, and the Beatty character is savagely raped by local hillbilly thugs. There is then murderous retribution, and a scary and fateful encounter with the river’s rapids. The lives of all the participants are forever changed (one fatally) and the fun outdoor adventure of the four city boys has become a nightmare.

In The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing (1973) Reynolds plays Jay Grobart, widowed husband of Cat Dancing. He sets out to avenge her murder and has many adventures along the way. This includes saving Sarah Miles from her abusive husband and joining forces with Jack Warden and Lee J. Cobb to rob a train. Then it gets complicated.

Burt Reynolds plays Paul “Wrecking” Crewe, a disgraced and imprisoned NFL quarterback in the unlikely but enjoyable The Longest Yard (1974). The sadistic warden (is there any other kind in the movies?) gets up a football game between the prisoners and the guards. He orders Crewe to throw the game and the guards go ahead by 24 points. But hey, this is a Hollywood movie and the final score won’t really surprise you. There are several pallid remakes of this movie, some foreign, some domestic, none much good. 

Another Reynolds football film is 1977's Semi-Tough, based on Dan Jenkins’ hilarious novel and featuring Burt and Kris Kristofferson as teammates on a fictional Miami pro team. There is a love triangle between those two and Jill Clayburgh, and a lot of satirical stuff about the self-help movement. The book is more about football and far better than the film (so what else is new?).

The Smokey And The Bandit “franchise” was custom-made for Burt Reynolds, and he played the Bandit (Bo Darville) with a wink and a grin. I’m not a big fan of these films, but I guess the best one is the first one if you like that sort of thing. 

Burt Reynolds was actually nominated for an Oscar for his part in Boogie Nights (1997) a fairly rough film about the porn industry. I guess it’s good of its kind but be advised it is very graphic. 

Reynolds has a cameo as himself in Mel Brooks’ very funny Silent Movie (1976). He also has a good turn in Starting Over (1979) with Jill Clayburgh.

All of the movies in this article are available for streaming somewhere.. All are for adults.

                                                      Graham Greene

    Graham Greene is a famous British author, who wrote such classics as The Ugly American. And though many of his novels were made into films, this article is not about that guy.  It is about the films of the Graham Greene who died recently at 73 and who made over 200 movie and TV appearances. Greene was a Canadian, a member of the Oneida tribe. He was the go-to guy when a casting director need an actor with his ability and ethnicity. 

    His most famous role, the one you might remember him from, is as Kicking Bird in Kevin Costner’s Dances With Wolves (1990). Costner wrote, directed and starred in a film he was avid to make. The doubters who wouldn’t help him financially had a large dish of humble pie when the film won Best Movie Oscar and grossed over 400 million dollars. As Union officer John Dunbar, Costner’s character is wounded and nearly dies. At his request he is transferred to the frontier, where he meets and is befriended by a tribe of Lakota Sioux. He and the medicine man, Kicking Bird (Greene) become quite close. Dunbar joins the tribe and marries one of the women. In much of the film the Lakota language is used with English subtitles. 

    Maverick (1994) is successfully transitioned from the hit TV series. Bret Maverick, Jr. is brought to film life by Mel Gibson, and he turns out to be a bigger con man then his infamous father. Jodie Foster is on hand as Annabelle, as good a scammer as the men. And not to be outdone by the white guys, Joseph (Graham Greene) shows that the Native Americans are also quite capable of a good hustle. All of them embark on various mildly nefarious schemes, many quite humourous. 

    Die Hard With A Vengeance (1995) is the third of the five Die Hard films and maybe the best since the first one. Bruce Willis is, of course, back on board as NYPD detective John McClane. The plot involves a series of bombs and bomb threats orchestrated by Simon (Jeremy Irons). McClane is assigned to stop him and is assisted by Detective Joe Lambert and other police officers. The wham-bang action ends with an improbable McClane shot at a helicopter containing the bad guys. 

    Wind River (2017) is a cracker jack crime drama about the murder of an Indian girl and her boyfriend in the frozen location of a Native American reservation and a drilling rig. Jeremy Renner stars as Wildlife Officer Cory Lambert, who discovers the frozen body of a Native American girl near the drilling outfit. FBI agent Jane Banner (Elizabeth Olsen) is dispatched to investigate. She is convinced it is a homicide but her superiors disagree and she’s on her own. She and Lambert continued to investigate with the help of the chief of the tribal police Ben Shoyo (Greene) and his officers. The discovery of the dead girl’s boyfriend’s mangled body intensifies the story. 

    Graham Greene has good, but minor parts in The Education of Little Tree (1997), The Green Mile (1999) and The Performance (2023). All of the films in this article are for grown-ups.