Once Again Ain’t Got No Time For Corner Boys-With Clint Eastwood And Jeff Bridges’ Thunderbolt And Lightfoot (1974) In Mind-Yet Again A Film Review Of Sorts

Once Again Ain’t Got No Time For Corner Boys-With Clint Eastwood And Jeff Bridges’ Thunderbolt And Lightfoot (1974) In Mind-Yet Again A Film Review Of Sorts

DVD Review

By Zack James
     
Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, starring Clint Eastwood, Jeff Bridges, George Kennedy, 1974

Yeah, I know it has been a while since you have seen my by-line running in this publication but let me explain. Or try to since our site manager Greg Green has asked me to ask for your indulgences. This whole mess really goes back to 2017, the year of the 50^th anniversary of the Summer of Love which if you do not know by now let me tell you got practically 24/7/365 coverage in American Left History. The saturation coverage ordered by previous site manager Allan Jackson (and one of those “present as the creation” as they like to say when this publication started out in hard copy form back in 1974, I think) for young and old writers alike. This ordered madness started a rebellion among the younger writers, which included me, who did not give a rat’s ass about the Summer of Love or had to ask the older writers or their parents what it was all about.

What is not well known is that my oldest brother, Alex, just Alex not Alexander, was the catalyst for that wall to wall coverage after he went out to San Francisco that year and was inundated with stuff commemorating the event including a multimedia exhibition at the de Young Museum in Golden Gate Park the site of much of the music madness. Once Alex talked to Allan the gold rush was on. See Alex, Allan and the key person driving the action that year the late Pete Markin had been, at Markin’s urging knee- deep in the Summer of Love craziness that stalked the land then. Moreover, as a result of all that nostalgia. Alex, Allan and whoever was left standing from the old Acre neighborhood of North Adamsville located south of Boston, the Tonio’s Pizza Parlor (which is still there just with long gone Tonio) “corner boys” got together to contribute to a memorial book of their experiences, including 1967 in honor of their fallen comrade Markin. Markin, the “idea” guy for a million legal and illegal things they did back in the day, their expression not mine. (Being a decade younger than Alex I did not know or remember much about Markin, except the stories, although he and Alex were best friends and he had come over to our house many times).

Guess who they wanted to iron out the contributions, the personal remembrances, edit and see that the thing was produced. Yes, yours truly. Which leads us to the reason for my prolonged absence from my by-line. Another Acre corner boy, Jimmy Higgins, the “muscle” of the group, of the corner boys, passed away in 2018 and Alex, Allan and the others tagged me with doing the same things for a memorial book in Jimmy’s honor (a guy I did not know at all and who as far as I know never came to the house).

This work on the combination of books and the extraordinary, hell, maybe weird is better exploits of this generation of corner boys is what I immediately started thinking about when Greg assigned me my first film review back Clint Eastwood (Thunderbolt) and Jeff Bridges’ (Lightfoot) Thunderbolt and Lightfoot from 1974. Not that either of them were corner boys, or at least I don’t think so since Clint’s character was several years older than the brash Bridges’ but that throughout the film the bonds of buddy-hood grew until the tragic end of Lightfoot succumbing to the vicious injuries sustained when one of their comrades in crime Red, played by George Kennedy, went crazy after the heist they pulled off. Those bonds and that age difference, experience difference is what is driving this final part of the review.

The contribution from several corner boys that overlapped both memorial books was the role that one “Trigger” Burke played as a model for the Acre corner boys. Burke was about ten years older than my brother and his crowd but as they came to high school age they would see Trigger around, would see him coming out of the Dublin Grille (no longer there), mostly, which was a few doors down from Tonio’s and he would stop and talk to them. Burke was something of a local legend among corner boys from all the corners, a guy who had done a few bank robberies, done a little time and had plenty of money (and girls, women not all of them his age either usually younger and according to Alex foxy) and respect among the eager corner boys.

Markin, and Jimmy Higgins who lived across the street from the rooming house where Burke lived, were the real devotees of what he had to say. As it turned out half of Markin’s ideas, his plans for grabbing dough, fast and smooth, had been hatched by one Trigger Burke. As Alex kept painfully reminding me the ideas might have been Markin’s via Burke but the operation chief was always after a first close call with the coppers when Markin led the operation had been one Frankie Riley, the acknowledged leader of the Tonio’s corner boys.

Given the plotline of this film, basically after various crazed and random wild boy escapades in the hills of Montana Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, now bonded for life, a heist film it was no wonder why I thought about those Burke stories. In the end although the second heist was botched by Red’s crazed response to Lightfoot and the pair found the original heist money, they got away clean. Well as I telegraphed above not real clean since Lightfoot passed away from his injuries from that bastard Red. A cause for thought. I was glad in a way as much as I admired my distance oldest brother Alex that I was ten years younger than him and never had to go the midnight creep route by the time I got to highs school.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot, that Trigger Burke who lived across the street from the late Jimmy Higgins when he was growing up was none other than one of the famous Brink’s armored truck robbery guys in the early 1950s. No wonder the Acre corner boys worshiped at his shrine.
                                       

When The Wild West Really Was The Wild West- “Wild Bill”- A Jeff Bridges Retrospective

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Wild Bill Hickok.

DVD Review

Wild Bill, Jeff Bridges, Ellen Barkin, John Hurt, directed by Walter Hill, 1995

Those of us who grew up in the 1950s in the early days of television, black and white television, got our heroes, our Western heroes strictly in white hat, and our bad guys strictly in black. And the Indians (a.k.a. Native Americans) well, the less said about the treatment of those benighted and betrayed people the better. Of course this view was all hokum, or worst. It took the likes of Larry McMurtry, Cormac McCarthy and others in literature to give us a more realistic view of the rawness, untamed rawness of the Old West. And the likes of Walter Hill to give us a more truthful cinematic view, a view with muddy streets, whiskey breathe, fistfights at the drop of a hat, or less, treachery among enemies, treachery among friends, many social diseases and all. And that was on the good days. The good director here has taken on the legend of Wild Bill Hickock, generally given the better of it in Western lore as an associate of Buffalo Bill, a civilizing influence, and a king hell gunfighter.

Of course, the subtext for this review is that the actor playing Will Bill is none other that last year’s Academy Award winner Jeff Bridges for his “modern” cowboy role (singer-songwriter, okay) in Crazy Hearts. My argument underlying the choice of subtext is that Bridges was born to play theses good old boy Western parts and has done mainly stellar work in the genre ever since he cut his teeth on the modern Texas good-old-boy-in-the-making Duane Jackson in the film adaptation of McMurtry’s The Last Picture Show. And at the acting level that is true here, although the existential characterization and the Bridges cool wit is perhaps a little over the top for the nitty-gritty West of the late 19th century.

One comes away from this film feeling, and maybe not incorrectly, that the distance between hero and villain (here in this contrived concoction about the manner of Bill’s untimely end, as villain, the son, the driven son of “spurned” mother whom was once Wild Bill’s lover) is who is left standing at the end. And for most of his life from his service in the Union Armies during the American Civil War until that fateful day that Bill was just one step too cool Will Bill was the last one left standing. But, see there was that little matter of the spurned woman, and that driven son to lay old Bill low. In any case if you have not seen a Western since the 1950s (although I guess I would want to know where you have been) you will be hard-pressed to sort out the heroes from the villains here. The Indians (a.k.a. Native Americans) as usual, in real life or fiction, get short shrift.

Sure Rob Banks-As Willie Sutton Said-“That Is Where The Money Is” Chris Pine And Jeff Bridges “Hell Or High Water” (2016)-A Film Review

Sure Rob Banks-As Willie Sutton Said-“That Is Where The Money Is” Chris Pine And Jeff Bridges “Hell Or High Water” (2016)-A Film Review   

DVD Review

By Seth Garth

Hell and High Water, starring Chris Pine, Jeff Bridges, Ben Foster, 2016

I was more than happy to take this assignment from Greg Green our site manager and a guy who has proven to be a great editor over time. I am happy because I always am ready, willing and able to review a Jeff Bridge’s film ever since I first saw him way back when in The Last Picture Show and have wondered ever since why, until Crazy Hearts several years ago, he had not won an Oscar for his many great performances. I am happy also because any film that starts with a Townes Van Zandt song (Dollar Bill Blues) and a slew of other cowboy-etched efforts will immediately draw my attention. To add another point I am always happy to review a modern cowboy film where the actors, or one actor Chris Pine, who plays somber brother Toby to Ben Foster’s wild boy Tanner, remind me of the late Sam Shepard and his stoic routines playing a man of the West.

But most importantly for this film Hell and High Water I have been given an opportunity to answer back to young and up and coming film reviewer Sarah LeMoyne about something she wrote about my attitude toward snitches in her review of 1988’s Married To The Mob. There Sarah castigated me, and by implication half the older male writers at this publication because, come hell or high water, we are since corner boy days very, very squeamish about finks, you know snitches in that case by that role of one ex-wife of a mob hit man to the FBI. As Sarah said in the interest of love that woman had every right to snitch. I went crazy when she mentioned to her take when she asked my opinion. Now I get a real rebuttal since I am sure that she would not want anybody to snitch to the Texas Rangers on sexy and cowboy handsome Toby who after all was not doing it for the mob, just a job, but for his sons. Sarah can stew in her juices on that one until she replies in some future review she writes-if she gets one.                 

  

But on to the real deal, on to the “skinny” as Sam Lowell who backs me up 100% on this snitch business. Toby and Tanner, one thoughtful the other a wild boy, brothers are robbing banks to right some wrongs to their family but also as just mentioned to ensure that Toby’s sons don’t have to grow up and be dirt poor like he had grown up in rural Texas. Why banks. Well as the title to this review points out in regard to a classic statement on the matter by the famous, or infamous, bank robber when asked- “that is where the money is.” That was Toby’s plan in any case. You might ask why banks in this day in age but it seems down in prairie Texas and maybe plenty of other places as well the branches of major banks are not up to snuff necessarily on the latest security technology. So the boys play out the old Wild West banking robberies scenario to further Toby’s plan for his sons. Tanner, a jailbird is just along for the adventure, for the blood sport, for kicks and because Toby is his brother.

Come hell or high water though, using that phrase again in a different context, the law, here the well-known Texas Rangers, headed by a pair of agents, one the almost retiree Marcus Hamilton, played by versatile Jeff Bridges, are on the case. The wily old Marcus has the case half figured out before noon that these robberies were planned and were aimed at a particular banking system. All they had to do was wait it on at one of the branches and the game would be over. Old Marcus proved to be right except before the end his partner was killed by the warrior king Tanner in a shoot-out scene very reminiscent of the final showdown between the character played by Humphrey Bogart in High Sierra and the coppers also after a failed robbery with deaths involved. Well Tanner was doomed anyway. Toby is another story since he actually was able to succeed in his plan-in the short run. See Marcus figured him in on the caper as well but couldn’t quite get anybody else to connect the dots. He and Toby have a final verbal confrontation before the curtain closes leaving everybody to wonder what will happen next. Making me try to get Sarah LeMoyne to squirm a little over whether she would turn Toby in, snitch on the guy. For now that’s it.   

***When The Wild West Really Was The Wild West- “Wild Bill”- A Jeff Bridges Retrospective

DVD Review

Wild Bill, Jeff Bridges, Ellen Barkin, John Hurt, directed by Walter Hill, 1995


Those of us who grew up in the 1950s, those of now AARP-worthy , in the early days of television, black and white television, got our heroes, our Western cowboy heroes strictly in white hat, and our bad guys, mal hombres, strictly in black. And the Indians (a.k.a. Native Americans these days) well, the less said about the treatment of those benighted and betrayed people the better. Of course this view was all hokum, or worst. It took the likes of Larry McMurtry, Cormac McCormack and others in literature to give us a more realistic view of the rawness, untamed rawness of the Old West. And the likes of Walter Hill to give us a more truthful cinematic view, a view with muddy streets, whiskey breathe, fistfights at the drop of a hat, white or black , treachery among enemies, treachery among friends, many social diseases and all. And that was on the good days. The good director here has taken on the legend of Wild Bill Hickok, generally given the better of it in Western lore as an associate of Buffalo Bill, a civilizing influence, and a king hell gunfighter.

Of course, the subtext for this review is that the actor playing Will Bill is none other than Academy Award winner Jeff Bridges for his “modern” cowboy role (singer-songwriter, okay) in Crazy Hearts. My argument underlying the choice of subtext is that Bridges was born to play theses good old boy Western parts and has done mainly stellar work in the genre ever since he cut his teeth on the modern Texas good-old-boy-in-the-making Duane Jackson in the film adaptation of McMurtry’s The Last Picture Show. And at the acting level that is true here, although the existential characterization and the Bridges cool wit is perhaps a little over the top for the nitty-gritty West of the late 19th century.

One comes away from this film feeling, and maybe not incorrectly, that the distance between hero and villain (here in this contrived concoction about the manner of Bill’s untimely end, and as avenger -villain, the son, the driven son of “spurned” mother whom was once Wild Bill’s lover) is who is left standing at the end. And for most of his life from his service in the Union Armies during the American Civil War until that fateful day that Bill was just one step too cool Will Bill was the last one left standing. But, see there was that little matter of the spurned woman, and that driven son to lay old Bill low.

In any case if you have not seen a Western since the 1950s (although I guess I would want to know where you have been) you will be hard-pressed to sort out the heroes from the villains in this film. The Indians (a.k.a. Native Americans) as usual, in real life or fiction, get short shrift.

***A Jeff Bridges Retrospective- “Stick It” (Yes, Stick It) - A Film Review

DVD Review

Stick It, starring Jeff Bridges, Missy Peregrym, Touchstone Films, 2006

Over the past few years or so, since he won the Academy Award for best actor for his role as broken down country singer/songwriter Bad Blake in Crazy Hearts I have been reviewing the cinematic work of Jeff Bridges as his films have come into my hands. Most of my reviews have been positive reflecting the very real talent and flare that Jeff Bridges brings to the movies. That said, I am at a lost for why he did the film under review, Stick It, that while marginally entertaining at times is an incredible waste of his time and talent.

Now I am not, and never have been, privy to the decisions that actors make about taking on scripts. Maybe they see something in the plot line, maybe they are looking for something a little edgy, or maybe just for the dough, not an unimportant consideration in fickle movie land. But now I can add Jeff Bridges to the vast number of very talented actors that have been in “turkeys”, for whatever reason.

Strangely, it is not the subject matter, the trials and tribulation of a troubled, ex- or maybe not so ex- gymnast (Haley Graham, played by Missy Peregrym) trying to find her place in the world, the non-monastic gymnastics training world that is off here but the subtext that the teenage rebellion of a gymnast attempting to dramatically change the way the sport is conducted has enough energy to fill an hour and one half film. It really doesn’t since an amazing amount of time is spent in various clips of gym activity. And Jeff Bridges as a washed-out (kind of) gym camp owner is in the thick of this thing as Haley’s substitute father/confessor.

There are plenty of issues (sexual, physical, psychological) that could have been raised by a close look at the cult-like elite gymnastics world (or any high-level sports training) but none, other than a silly attack on the scoring system, are addressed by a film which decided that it did not want to tackle them and played instead to a kind of campy teenage melodrama. And high talent (although poor gymnast, incredible poor, making me feel practically like a champ in comparison, a very hard task to do, and sage) Jeff Bridges got caught in the middle.

When Bad Blake Was Bad- Jeff Bridges’ “Rancho Deluxe”

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Jeff Bridges’ Rancho Deluxe

DVD Review

Rancho Deluxe, starring Jeff Bridges, Sam Waterston, United Artists, 1975

I have over the past several years, ever since Jeff Bridges won his well- deserved Oscar for his portrayal of bad boy singer-songwriter Bad Blake, in Crazy Hearts been on a tear to review his earlier work. My premise has been all along that the persona of Bad was genetically-engineered in Bridges by his previous performances on the screen. And in some case that proved true. In the film under review here, Rancho Deluxe, an argument can be made for the randomness of that genetic structuring. This one does not lead to thoughts of future Oscars (or nominations) for one Jeff Bridges.

Why? The 1970s were a great time to debunk the various ingrained notions about the heroic cowboy, about the “freedom” of the Old West, and about the civilizing mission of the white man. This film attempt in its way to put a big pin in that balloon with a send-up of what the New West looks like. That is not bad as an idea, except the saga gets bogged down in 1970s ennui (or maybe anytime ennui). Jeff and Sam (Waterston, as an Indian, not a Native American even) are cattle rustlers in Big Sky Montana seemingly out on a lark. The get in and out of various forms of mischief and mayhem, with and without women, until the final reckoning- caught and placed in the state pen (not like the old days when they would have been hanged, hanged high). And that seems fitting. Sorry Jeff, maybe that is why I had a hard time finding this one to review.

A Jeff Bridges Retrospective- “Stick It” (Yes, Stick It)- A Film Review

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for Stick It, starring Jeff Bridges.

DVD Review

Stick It, starring Jeff Bridges, Missy Peregrym, Touchstone Films,2006

Over the past year or so, since he won the Academy Award for best actor for his role as broken down country singer/songwriter Bad Blake in Crazy Hearts I have been reviewing the cinematic work of Jeff Bridges as his films have come into my hands. Most of my reviews have been positive reflecting the very real talent and flare that Jeff Bridges brings to the movies. That said, I am at a lost for why he did the film under review, Stick It, that while marginally entertaining at times is an incredible waste of his time and talent. Now I am not, and never have been, privy to the decisions that actors make about taking on scripts. Maybe they see something in the plot line, maybe they are looking for something a little edgy, or maybe just for the dough, not an unimportant consideration in fickle movie land. But now I can add Jeff Bridges to the vast number of very talented actors that have been in “turkeys”, for whatever reason.

Strangely, it is not the subject matter, the trials and tribulation of a troubled, ex- or maybe not so ex- gymnast (Haley Graham, played by Missy Peregrym) trying tot find her place in the world, the non-monastic gymnastics training world that is off here but the subtext that the teenage rebellion of a gymnast attempting to dramatically change the way the sport is conducted has enough energy to fill an hour and one half film. It really doesn’t since an amazing amount of time is spent in various clips of gym activity. And Jeff Bridges as a washed-out (kind of) gym camp owner is in the thick of this thing as Haley’s substitute father/confessor. There are plenty of issues (sexual, physical, psychological) that could have been raised by a close look at the cult-like elite gymnastics world (or any high-level sports training) but none, other than a silly attack on the scoring system, are by a film which decided that it did not want to tackle them and played instead to a kind of campy teenage melodrama. And high talent (although poor gymnast and sage) Jeff Bridges got caught in the middle.

*A Jeff Bridges Retrospective- Bad Blake As President- "The Contender"

Click on the headline to link to a Wikipedia entry for the film, The Contender.

DVD Review

The Contender, Jeff Bridges,  Joan Allen, Gary Oldman, 1999

I have spilled much ink this year, in the wake of Jeff Bridges’ Oscar victory in the role of broken down country singer-songwriter, Bad Blake, in the film Crazy Hearts , arguing that he had been preparing for that role since he first broke out as the future good ol’ boy, Duane Jackson, in The Last Picture Show. I will argue here that his persona as the President in this film, The Contender, follows that same career path. Bridges plays the up front and in your face, wise, witty, populist-oriented, but also politically savvy good ol’ boy president to a tee, from his bowling in the White House basement to his plebeian culinary tastes. I will rest my case on those scenes.

What I will not rest my case on is the plot; liberal, feminist-friendly, democracy-friendly, and politically feel good that it turns out to be. Apparently, for some undisclosed reason, the then sitting Vice President dies leaving under the then (and now, as well) current constitutional amendment the need for the president to appoint a successor (and for Congress to approve of that appointment in some form). Of course, Bridges, as a second and final term president, has more candidates that he can shake a stick at, including one prominent recently heroic state governor. He, eventually, settles on an Ohio (naturally, the Midwest for balance and stability) woman Senator. Seems that good ol’ boy Bridges, carrying a secret progressive streak, like every president before him, starts to worry about his legacy and having appointed the first woman Vice President is where he will hang his hat.

That is the easy part. What transpires though is said (if you can believe this about anyone from Ohio) woman Senator has an allegedly shady sexual past, among other personal problems that pile up as the film progresses. Moreover, various Congressmen, including the chairman of the committee that will give its advice on the appointment, are gunning for said Senator for their own reasons. The bulk of the remainder of the film centers of the political fight to save the president’s appointment, led by the President himself and his trusty advisers (using all the powers at their disposal).

Hold on a minute, I can enjoy a political thriller just as well as the next guy but this whole thing has the quality of a science fiction thriller. What were those screenwriters in the year 1999 on anyway? Why? Simple. Anyone who has even glanced at a newspaper headline over the last twenty or so years (or checked out the Internet, for that matter) KNOWS that no sitting president, second term or not, legacy or not, would do anything but make the quickest withdrawal of the appointee in recorded history (or be pushed out the back door by his party’s leaders, they still have to make a living remember) the minute the facts of the Senator’s case were known. Even old stand up Bridges. So if you want to see Bad Blake in a science fiction thriller this is for you. Oh, as almost always is the case, Bridges is just fine here.

*Once Again On Jeff Bridges- The Songs Of "Crazy Heart"

Click on the headline to link to a YouTube film clip of Townes Van Zandt performing If I Needed You.

CD Review

Crazy Hearts: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, Jeff Bridges and various artists, New West 2010

I have already give kudos to Jeff Bridges for his Oscar-winning performance in Crazy Hearts elsewhere so we need not go into that one in detail. That one was easy. See it. Why? Well, if for no other reason that Jeff Bridges finally won an Academy Award for his lead role as Bad Blake in it, a role that he has been waiting for about forty years to cash in on. Every since I first saw Bridges as Duane Jackson in the screen version of Larry McMurtry’s great novel of the New West, The Last Picture Show, I have known that he had the righteous, good-hearted, hard-drinking, devil-take-the-hinter post, sexually energetic and troubled “old geezer” that he personifies in the Blake role in him. He has done other fine performances but there is something just a little extra that he brings to that good-ole-boy role, young or old.

Frankly Bridges, through the character of Bad Blake, an alcoholic, back roads traveling, down on his luck, hard living country singer, an “outlaw” singer for sure, carries the film. The story line, in film and in real life (think Kris Kristofferson, Waylon Jennings, Willie Nelson, and half of male Nashville), has been done to death. So Bridges’ performance and the soundtrack are the important in redeeming the production. And part of that excellent performance by Bridges was his actually singing some of the material. That in itself was refreshing (and brave), somewhat akin to actors doing their own stunts.

Of course having legendary music man T-Bone Burnett on board never hurts. The CD is a mix of Bridges film songs (including variations on some of the songs, as was done in the film, including by Ryan Bingham on I Don't Know0 and other country and blues artists. Outstanding other songs, as always, are done by Lightnin’ Hopkins (Sam Phillips) and Townes Van Zandt (an outlaw singer/songwriter who could have been put of that list above, as well). If you are in an “outlaw” country mood get this. Hey, watch the film too, okay.

*A Jeff Bridges Retospective- "Cutter's Way" - A Film Review

Click on the headline to link to a "YouTube" film clip of the end of "Cutter's Way". Hey, I already told you about the end I just want to show you how Cutter gets Bone off dead-center.

DVD Review

Cutter’s Way, Jeff Bridges, John Heard, Lisa Eichhorn, Columbia Pictures, 1981

In a recent review of “Crazy Hearts”, the vehicle for Jeff Bridges’ Oscar-winning performance as down and out country singer/songwriter Bad Blake, I noted that, in a sense, he had been preparing for and playing up to, in one form or another, that role since the start of his career. The line from Duane in “The Last Picture Show” to Bad in “Crazy”, although not a straight, one-dimensional line, has exhibited some familiar mannerism and acting tics. Like, for example, that sense that you come away with after watching Bridges, or rather his characters, that he is always ready to walk away from a bad situation at the drop of a hat. And not look back, and with no regrets. Except, of course, when duty calls for him to “take it on the chin” for the good guys. “Cutter’s Way”, a film toward the beginning of Bridges long career is an exemplar of just that idea.

In the aftermath of Bridges’ Oscar a number of art theaters are putting together and presenting a retrospective of his work. A local theater in the Boston area is one such venue. “Cutter’s Way, while no means his best work, is worthy of inclusion in such efforts. Here Bridges plays beach bum, hanging-around guy, semi gigolo, Richard Bone, who seeming cannot be moved off a dead pan, dead-center of existence. Except he has this quirky friend, Cutter, a dysfunctional, psychically and physically wounded Vietnam vet looking for a quick hit at success. The plot line here provides amble opportunity for that after Bone is tangentially involved in a murder case. Needless to say old Cutter means to, come hell or high water, get a pay off from a rich guy who seems to have done the deed. And it goes from there.

Now here is the odd part. Bridges puts in an adequate performance as the blasé roustabout Bone and displays those mannerisms mentioned above that are his trademark. However, old gravelly-voiced, gritty-etched, eye-patched John Heard steals the whole show with his bravado performance. Although Cutter is, in the end, unsuccessful, trying to save his marriage to his long-suffering wife and does not win the prize that he so frantically seeks at that same end able to get Bone off dead-center. Kudos, Cutter/John Heard.

* A Second Look At Bad Blake- A Jeff Bridges Film Retropsective

Click on the headline to link to a "Boston Sunday Globe" article, dated April 25, 2010, concerning a Jeff Bridges retrospective at a local theater.

Markin comment:

Long before Jeff Bridges won his well-deserved Oscar for his Bad Blake role in last year’s “Crazy Hearts” I noted, in a response to someone’s comment in another blog, that in a sense he had been playing those kind of award-worthy roles all his now forty year acting career and that he should have been honored long time ago. I also noted the similarities between the way he played his role as Duane in “The Last Picture Show” and Bad Blake in “Crazy Hearts”. Now for those who did not, or do not, believe me and need visual proof you are to be well-treated. At least those in the Boston area and, perhaps, in your town if you push for it you will get a chance to see a Jeff Bridges retrospective at the local theater described in the “Boston Sunday Globe” linked article. The following is not an exclusive list of my choices but “Last Picture”, “Rancho Deluxe”, “Fat City”, “ The Big Lebowski”, and, of course “Crazy Hearts” should be on your dance card. If no retrospective is coming up in your area check out “Netflix”. They are all available on that site. Kudos, Duane. Kudos, Bad.