McCabe & Mrs. Miller (1971)

Thanks for the memories!

Crappy film

As Good As It Gets

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

Let me start out by saying that I am a fan of director Robert Altmam and have enjoyed many of his films. "MASH," "Nashville," and "The Player" are absolutely brilliant pictures and there is much to enjoy in many of his other films, including "The Prairie Home Companion," "The Company" and "Cookie's Fortune." However, he has also made his share of turkeys. Among these I would include "Short Cuts," "Popeye" and "Come Back to the 5 & Dime Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean." His two worst efforts, however, are probably his two Western films, "Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson" (quite possibly the worst Western ever made) and this incredibly overrated film."McCabe" does have some good points, which include terrific attention to detail in art direction-set decoration and Julie Christie's excellent performance, but these are not enough to overcome poorly lit photography, the annoyingly unclear overlapped dialogue, Beatty's poor acting and Leonard Cohen's insipid musical score. The downbeat story, depressing mood and the slow pace of the film really made it a chore for me to sit through as well.It's mind-boggling how anyone could place this on their list of favorite Westerns (unless you really don't like them to begin with), let alone place it on their list of favorite films, period ("Citizen Kane" or "Casablanca" or "Lawrence of Arabia" anyone!).

"McCabe and Mrs. Miller", with its frontier mountain town setting and inclement weather, seems to subvert the common notions of the Western. No pretty vistas or noble gunfights in the dusty streets here, just rain and snow and mud. It's mildly off-putting in the film's beginning, but it actually sets up some nice atmosphere. I really liked Julie Christie, who was really the movie's bright spot. Her scenes schooling Warren Beatty on how to run his town were a treat. She's got a terrific English wit with a salty tongue. I was disappointed that she virtually disappeared during the third act, but it's in the service of the tense cat-and-mouse shootout. This movie is memorable for being different, sure, but there's also the bittersweet ending. It strikes me as a cynical comment on capitalism, but at least Beatty gets the last word when the fat cats try and take his business by force.7/10

A braggart and wheeler-dealer called Mr Cabe (Warren Beatty) arrives a in a remote Old West mining town , and he opens a bordello . His ambitious enterprise thrives until a large corporation arrives on the scene . There then appears an ex-whore named Mrs Miller (Julie Christie) who offers to use her experience to help McCabe run his business, while sharing in the profits . Both of whom become business partners . Soon after , the mining deposits in the boom small-town attract the attention of a major enterprise , which wishes to buy out McCabe along with the rest . He refuses and then problems emerge .This stunning Western contains drama , thrills , a love story , wintry realistic vision , and shootouts at its ending . Life in the turn-of-the-century Northwest is given an awesome treatment in filmmaker Altman's visually splendid Western drama and including some brief touches of comedy . The biggest complaint against this film , as it seems to me , is that results a little bit boring , overlong and slow-moving . Being based on Edmund Naughton's novel titled ¨McCabe¨ and adapted by Brian McKay and the same Robert Altman . We meet a fantastic cast of roles, played by many of the best actors around giving marvelous acting . As top-notch acting by Warren Beatty as an ambitious small-timer businessman as well as two-bit gambler . However , Robert Altman's initial preference for the role of McCabe was Elliott Gould, whom the studio producing the film refused to accept . Nice performance from Julie Christie as as a prostitute with heart that beats to the jingle of gold . First-class support cast such as Rene Auberjonois , William Devane , John Schuck , Corey Fischer , Bert Remsen , Keith Carradine's film debut , Michael Murphy and Shelley Duvall , Altman's usual , in fact , this is second of seven films that actress Shelley Duvall made with director Robert Altman . Many of the people playing small parts, bit roles, and extras were allowed to create their own characters for the movie . Sensitive score plenty of wonderful as well as sad songs by Leonard Cohen . During post-production on this film, 'Robert Altman' was having a difficult time finding a proper musical score, until he attended a party where the album "Songs of Leonard Cohen" was playing and noticed that several songs from the album seemed to fit in with the overall mood and themes of the movie . Cohen, who had been a fan of Altman's previous film, Brewster McCloud (1970), allowed him to use three songs from the album - "The Stranger Song", "Sisters of Mercy" and "Winter Lady" . Colorful and evocative cinematography in Panavisión by classic cameraman Vilmos Zsigmond , giving a rich texture on the Western atmosphere .The motion picture was well directed by Robert Altman who offers an adequate image of Western period , as he deglamorizes ordinary mood with his realist sights . At the beginning Altman realized Shorts and he then went to Hollywood to direct Alfred Hitchcock's TV show . From here, he went on to direct a large number of television shows, until he was offered the script for ¨M.A.S.H.¨ (1970) in 1969 . This wasn't his first movie , but it was his first success . He was hardly the producer's first choice - more than fifteen other directors had already turned it down . Altman filmed another Western titled ¨Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull's History Lesson¨ starred by Paul Newman . After that, he had his share of hits and misses, but ¨The prayer¨ (1992) and, more recently, ¨Gosford Park¨ (2001) were particularly well . And this ¨Mr Cabe and Mrs Miller¨ that ranked #8 on the American Film Institute's list of the 10 greatest films in the genre "Western" in June 2008.

Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller is unlike any western movie I have ever seen before with a much diverse story to other western movies that I've seen. The movie focuses on John McCabe (played by Warren Beatty) a businessman who is planning on opening a saloon and meets a prostitute during construction named Constance Miller (played by Julie Christie) who then end up being business partners with the gambler McCabe owning the saloon and Mrs. Miller owning the house of prostitutes portion of it. It was a surprise to find out that this movie was shot in Vancouver Canada when I really thought that it was shot somewhere in South Dakota.The costumes to this movie are brilliant, as well as the cinematography, makeup, acting, gunfight scenes as well as the gambling scenes, acting, and Robert Altman's direction for the film, and the casting . One thing I find to be funny about Beatty's performance is that whenever he has a cigar in his mouth he sounds like Jimmy Stewart when he is in a western movie. The movie is just brilliant including the other stuff I just mentioned as well as the very good storytelling