They Shoot
Horses, Don’t They?
(1969)
Did Sydney
Pollack’s film about a Depression Era dance marathon inspire Derek and Clive’s Non-Stop Dancer sketch (“I said, “All right, you non-stop dancer,
start dancing”)? It would be perversely appropriate if it did, as They Shoot Horse, Don’t They? is
Hollywood cinema at its most banal and self-important. Its characters wear
their pain on their sleeves and the film does the same with a subtext so
blatant it could only have come from an era when a strong message could be
mistaken for depth.
It’s 1932,
and a selection of hopefuls assemble under a big top to dance (and race) their
way to a promised $1,5000. Hours turn into days and days into weeks. It’s a
metaphor for life under the American capitalist system, geddit? The commentary
is so overt that it is unsurprising to learn Jane Fonda only came on board
after she was promised script input (the film is based on Horace McCoy’s 1935
novel, and was once lined up as a Charlie Chaplin vehicle, until he was
labelled a Commie and refused re-entry to the States). With lines like, “Maybe it’s just the whole world is like
Central Casting. They got it all rigged before you ever show up”, nothing
is left for the viewer to intuit. Indeed, given the distance between how
important the filmmakers think this is and the actual content, one has to lay
the charge of pretentiousness at their door.
And yet, Horses appears to be held in consistently
high regard; certainly in its home country. Or perhaps it’s that those who love
it, really love it. I readily admit
that although I knew the title (as I’m sure most people do) I had no advance
awareness of the story. As realisation dawned that the entire film would constitute
the dancing competition, furnished with woefully theatrical scenarios, and in
the company of characters who elicit little sympathy but really suffer (and who, consequently, are dream roles for actors),
I had that sinking feeling. Because the film becomes an endurance test for the
viewer not dissimilar to the one for the characters. I even wondered if it was
based on a play, as the confined setting and indulgent character vignettes lend
themselves more to the stage than cinema. You could almost see the flip side of
the pitch for the film as a Producers-esque
disaster-waiting-to-happen (Leslie Nielsen would have been great in the Red
Buttons role).
As it is the
film just goes on and on and on, resistant to structural forms such as acts or
dramatic turning points. To be fair, the last fifteen minutes do engage. But the rather clumsy gimmick
of the flashback structure has already telegraphed this (early on we see that
Michael Sarrazin’s Robert has been arrested).
Pollack isn’t
as relaxed a storyteller at this point, or maybe he’s just indulging in the
more experimental impulses of the era. Some of his choices, particular in an
opening flashback to the childhood of Robert, are downright clumsy (such that,
when the film’s title is finally uttered, it comes across more as a laboured
punchline than a profound insight into the state of things). He’d directed TV
for a number of years, and his first couple of features were jobbing director
ones. But, in 1969, things changed. He’d just come off extensive reshoots on
(arty, political) Burt Lancaster fable The
Swimmer. His wannabe WWII art film Castle
Keep was a bit of a mess but, like Horses,
shows a desire to explore big ideas but without the required restraint or
judgement to do so successfully. The success of Horses gave him the cachet to pursue his own projects, which tended
to be much less ambitious in content and theme (but, invariably, quite
successful) than either of these films.
Horses was highly
acclaimed and garnered nine Oscar nominations (the highest ever without a Best
Picture nod). Gig Young won Best Supporting Actor for his jaded compere (the
actor died in a murder-suicide in 1978). The performances are strong across the
board, albeit some are expectedly indulgent. Sarrazin is the reactive, reserved
centre. Accordingly, it is Fonda’s brittle, caustic Gloria who invites the
attention. This isn’t such an unfamiliar type for Fonda during that period, and
neither is Susannah York’s Alice; both are expectedly accomplished and both
received Academy nominations. York’s breakdown scene, in particular, is a moment
where the film escapes its all-encompassing despair and becomes something more;
alive. Also appearing are the great Bruce Dern, a very young Bonnie Bedelia
(she seems to have spent most of the next 20 years on TV, until her late ‘80s
rebirth) and Al “Grandpa Munster” Lewis.
It’s been
interesting discovering (or revisiting) a few of Pollack’s films of late,
especially since he is one of those seamless storytellers who doesn’t tend to
betray himself with stylistic touches or particular narrative obsessions; you
might not be able to tell one of his movies just by looking at it, but if you
were told he had directed a given film you might well connect it to his trait
of assured handling of material and the confidence to let it breathe. And
while, of the four of his films I have looked at in the last few months (Horses, The Way We Were, Three Days
of the Condor, The Electric Horseman),
I would praise only one of them unreservedly (Condor) all of them have strong themes and accomplished
performances, sufficient to make them worth investigating.
**
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