Robert Altman’s creation of the (some say debatable) western ‘McCabe & Mrs. Miller’ was a movie that took all the folklore and legend of the old West and turned upside down; the storyline completely disregards the heroism and male depiction in every western the True Grit class has seen up to this point.
The movie begins with a gambler named John McCabe arriving in the Northwest town of Presbyterian Church (Ironically named after the church that is RARELY frequented by the townsfolk). McCabe, due to rumors of gun fighting and badassness (although in reality not very badass) quickly takes a predominant position in the town… which wouldn’t be very hard for most anyone seeing as this was a mining town filled with simpleminded people.
Because McCabe is a businessman, he constructs a very simple brothel with 3 whores he purchases from a pimp in a close town and is able to start turning some profit. This is when the opium addicted leading lady arrives (Constance Miller), convincing McCabe that her skills as a businesswoman in the Brothel business are better then his. After the two become business partners Mrs. Miller creates quite a bit more profit and as a result the two open up a higher-class brothel, which makes them even more money. At the same time a serious relationship has begun to develop between Miller and McCabe.
After some time has passed, a couple of men from the Harrison Shaughnessy mining company turn up attempting to buy not only McCabe’s business but also the surrounding Zinc mines. Despite Shaughnessy’s violent reputation and Mrs. Miller’s warnings about the cavalier attitude Shaughnessy has when it comes to killing, McCabe doesn’t want to sell at the price they offer. And because McCabe is a big, scaredey baby trying to talk a big game, he gets nervous and doesn’t communicate well with, and oversteps his boundaries/worth during the deliberations.
A little after the Shaughnessy men leave, three bounty collecting killers sent by the disgruntled mining company arrive into town. (One killer was this badass guy wearing a coat so sexy PETA couldn’t force themselves to throw paint on it, the other looked like he was beaten with ‘the ugly stick’, and the last being this psycho kid who must have had some seriously morbid and sick thoughts) Anyway although McCabe is not a gun fighter and isn’t all that bad ass he stays in the town…even though this choice might have made him a BAMF it was canceled out because initially McCabe went up to the killers’ cabin and tried to satisfy whatever it was the killers might have wanted.
In the final scenes, when the killers finally come after McCabe, he is terribly frightened. He has been waiting for this moment since they have arrived and so was able to kill two men by shooting them in the back -first time gritters- and even manages to kill the third while he was fatally injured (although he still tricked the third guy too). All the while this is happening the townsfolk are banding together to put a fire out that started in church in the beginning of the gunfight… (Remember the townsfolk are oblivious to the gunfight). The last scene of the movie is a zoom in of McCabe while he dies and a zoom in of Mrs. Millers face as she gets high in an opium den (she is suggested to be the only person who may have realized/cared about McCabe’s death).
I think that yes, this was definitely a Western however I think it was completely in a different category from most any other Western film made. They depicted the lead man as someone who wasn’t necessarily brave, or a powerful figure over the woman in his life. Not only do these things make a difference but also the entire backdrop of the movie was very different from the open, sandy, and sunny planes of the true West. Last but not least Robert Altman kills the lead in the end of the movie, not only that but he kills him without allowing to leave a true mark on the people or townsmen. To say the least this movie definitely pushes all your cowboy stereotypes right out the saddle.
No comments:
Post a Comment