Making film connections, as flimsy as they may be, is one of my uncanny abilities. When Kino Lorber recently re-issued THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR, COMING HOME, and THE BIG COUNTRY, I didn’t think there would be a common thread among them.
Though released a decade apart (1968 and 1978), THOMAS CROWN and COMING HOME offers the shift from old studio platformers with attractive top-line talent to “New Hollywood” with top-line talent in more intimate character dramas. Then there’s BIG COUNTRY, an epic-size 1950s Western from William Wyler, one of the most distinguished American filmmakers in cinema history yet rarely mentioned in the same breath as Spielberg, Scorsese, or Ford.
Boom! A connection emerged. These were filmmakers with no signatures in their direction except in how they portrayed the humanity of their subjects. Yes, even something as eye-catching as THOMAS CROWN has a languid quality about its two principal stars (Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway). Then, in the afterglow, we get the following: a heist flick that’s less interested about the job and more interested in showing why McQueen is indeed the “King of Cool”; a Vietnam War drama about the war at home; and a massive Western about a New England sea captain (Gregory Peck) who is unassailable to rough-and-tumble cowboy masculinity as he reunites with his fiancée.
Norman Jewison helmed the heist a year after IN THE HEAT OF THE NIGHT – where Sidney Poitier delivers the slap heard around the world. It must have felt like a cool breeze, a racy escapade instead of a racially charged murder investigation. That picture had substance. THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR is a case of style over substance. But, man, the style on the show would make Guy Ritchie grow a second head. That’s not to say it’s a great picture or even a very good one. I’ve learned (from reading about Steve McQueen) that the less he has to recite lines, the better he is for the picture. Alan Trustman’s script is so slim I’d wager a quarter of the film is just montages of McQueen and Dunaway cavorting in artful, quick-cutting montages.
The story goes that McQueen’s Thomas Crown is a bored businessman who orchestrates stealing several million from a Boston bank just for thrills. Dunaway’s Vicki Anderson is the insurance investigator the bank hires to track down the persons responsible. The opening heist offers multiple vantage points in panels of alternating sizes (all expertly constructed by Jewison’s pupil, Hal Ashby), which gives the film such a distinctive look. I’m sure at the time, audiences were puzzled by the creative touches and their insertion. Now, they seem to punch up the story when the narrative lulls. For late ‘60s American films, Jewison offered a bit of old Hollywood glamour while carousing with the new generation he helped introduce.
COMING HOME is Hal Ashby’s penultimate work of the 1970s. In terms of accolades, it may be his most recognized. Nominated for eight Academy Awards, including Best Picture and Ashby for directing, and winning three; Best Original Screenplay with Jon Voight and Jane Fonda winning for their lead performances. It’s a Vietnam War drama, only it’s not really about the war abroad but about a romance that develops between a paraplegic Vietnam veteran, Luke Martin (Voight), and a Marine wife, Sally Hyde (Fonda), who does volunteer work at a VA hospital, while her husband, Captain Bob Hyde (Bruce Dern), is deployed. The project was conceived many years earlier as Fonda was inspired by her friendship with Ron Kovic, a paraplegic Vietnam War veteran. His story and memoir would be the basis for the Oliver Stone film BORN ON THE FOURTH OF JULY, starring Tom Cruise. With COMING HOME, Fonda takes this friendship and that of another to examine the emotional toll of war on families. In the succeeding years of the Vietnam War, this subject matter wasn’t an easy sell for filmmakers to board the project. Coincidentally, Michael Cimino was approached, but he declined and made THE DEER HUNTER instead.
With plenty of star power, COMING HOME was a hit with crowds and critics. Perhaps it’s generational, but Fonda’s passion project only registered with me three times. The first is the opener, where disabled vets are playing pool. Voight is spread out on a gurney. He doesn’t talk. The actor rationalized it would be disrespectful to speak as if he were one of them in the presence of those who were injured in combat.
The second is Robert Carradine’s minor supporting role, playing the brother to Sally’s bohemian friend. He is in the same VA hospital, suffering from psychological trauma sustained after a brief tour in Vietnam. He doesn’t emote like Voight or Bruce Dern when he returns home. His trauma is more severe, so his movements come across as listless. It’s pretty impressive and nuanced compared to the histrionics of anger, bitterness, and resentment on display from Luke and Bob.
Finally, Luke’s remarks are heard in front of a gymnasium full of fresh-faced teens listening to officers who served in Vietnam. The speech is fine, but juxtaposed in the sequence is Bob at the beach, removing his Marine uniform and wedding ring as he goes off into the ocean. This apogee is easier to stomach than what occurs in Cimino’s DEER HUNTER, but it seems like quick turndown service before fading to black.
COMING HOME isn’t peak Ashby. That would come the following year with Peter Sellers and BEING THERE. Next to SHAMPOO, it is probably Ashby at his most commercial during the 1970s. And what a decade. In the seventies, Ashby was involved in intimate character dramas, which is what John Hughes was for teenage comedies. It is just a continuous hot streak before petering out. And if you were an actor – young or old –looking to get recognized for awards or stardom, Ashby was your guy.
Acting accolades could also be said of William Wyler, who, as it turns out, was a mentor to director Norman Jewison. Aside from twelve Oscar nominations for directing, Wyler filmed many stars to Tinseltown trinkets. This includes the western THE BIG COUNTRY. In a picture populated with Gregory Peck, Charlton Heston, Carol Baker, and Jean Simmons, singer Burl Ives wins the West as the villainous Rufus Hannassey. He has a longstanding beef with Charles Bickford’s Major Henry Terrill. Gregory Peck’s James McKay is thrown in the middle as he is engaged to Terrill’s daughter, Patricia (Carroll Baker). But the real center of the Terrill-Hannassey dispute is an abandoned ranch known as the Big Muddy, which contains a vital river for both families in herding their cattle. That the ranch is owned by schoolmarm Julie Maragon (Jean Simmons) seems insignificant to either man in this feud. But not to McKay, who offers to buy it outright as a wedding present.
During the 1950s, the big screen was losing to the small screen with the advent of television. The novelty of Westerns had worn thin; audiences were feeling saddle soreness sitting in movie theaters. Why go out when you can watch cowboys snoot and snort in the comfort of your own living room? Enter “40-Take Wyler” and his final western. THE BIG COUNTRY is a grand spectacle. It’s large, and it’s nearly three hours. Yet, even as today’s audience complains about film length, Wyler’s film does not feel slow. The pacing is so great you lose yourself in unbelievable wide shots. In a rare supporting role, Heston is a brooding adversary to Peck’s quiet hero. Their highlight is a fist-fight under moonlight. Wyler cuts from close shots to the wide landscape where the two look like ants moving around on screen. There is no rousing music, just the sounds of fists, feet, and falls. Cinematic heavies having a tussle. The man who would be Atticus Finch vs. Moses.
Anthony Mann and Budd Boetticher may have dominated the 1950s with their Western oeuvre, but Wyler makes sure to ride into the sunset, returning a genre for the first time (and last time) in decades. He may be herding stock of Western characters in each scene through multiple takes, but Wyler ensures the story doesn’t get lost in the sagebrush.
Special Note: These re-issues include all previous legacy features found on their original Kino Lorber releases. All three have the same video transfers they had previously, but COMING HOME is encoded at a higher bit rate and on a dual-layered BD50 disc. THE BIG COUNTRY comes with new commissioned artwork and slipcover, but it still retains the original art from 2018 as a reversible cover.
Blu-ray Grades:
The Thomas Crown Affair: C+
Coming Home: B-
The Big Country: B+
