Midnight Cowboy

After a long string of unremarkable Netflix rentals a surprise. Midnight Cowboy was a forty-one year old movie that I found I knew little about.

 

Released in 1969, this movie was directed by John Schlesinger, who over a nearly 50 year directorial career worked on many well known movies such as, The Falcon and the Snowman, Marathon Man ending with the forgettable Madonna film The Next Best Thing. The director passed in 2003.

 

The movie is about a Texas greenhorn named Joe Buck. Buck is a handsome young man with past that hinted at throughout the movie, a past that includes maternal abandonment and molestation. Fresh out of the service Joe decides to leave his dish washing job in Texas for a New York career as a male prostitute. On arrival he soon finds that New York is burgeoning with the easy pickings of women wanting to pay for getting laid. In his downward spiral he is befriended by down-and-out but outcast named Ratso Rizzo. In their deepening poverty Buck has to turn to street hustling with the only people who will pay, men. It's not what he wants but from his earlier experiences knows he will survive. Joe's friendship with Ratso is one of cooperation, they learn to steal and cheat effectively as a team. Their targets are small, usually food to eat, booze to drink. Living in an abandoned tenement Ratso is become very sick, he wants to escape to Florida. As the infirmity become critical, Joe Buck takes to the street and is picked up by an older man who he kills in his hotel room for the cash in his wallet. With enough money for the trip, the two are on bus ride south, a trip Ratso does not survive

 

The cast is small but skilled.

• Dustin Hoffman plays Ratso Rizzo a role for which he should have won the Academy Award.
• Jon Voight play Joe Buck the Texas greenhorn
• Sylvia Miles plays Cass, an interesting part, Joe's first mark who turns the tables.
• Brenda Vaccaro plays Shirley the only woman that pays Joe for the pleasure. Love that voice.

I give this movie a rating of 44 of 50. A very good movie that won 1970 Oscars for Best Director, Best Picture, and Best Writing. This is the only movie released with an X rating to ever win Best Picture.

• Character Development, 10 of 10, the descent of man under stress.
• Screenplay, 8 of 10.
• Acting, 8 of 10, no Academy Awards, Hoffman is superlative.
• Photography, 8 of 10. Some of that outdated sixties color shifting and collage views.
• Plot, 10 of 10.  Unique. 

 

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