Hadn't seen this movie in more than twenty years and so I was able to look at it from a more or less historical perspective. The story is simple. A middle-aged cowboy escapes from jail, rides his horse into the mountains towards Mexico, is pursued by agents of social control with modern technology, and is finally done in on a rain-slick highway by a truck full if ironic crappers.
The first time I saw it, it seemed full of impressively new ideas. The cowboy (Kirk Douglas) is napping in the desert near his horse and is waked up by an overhead jet airplane. Douglas has a fight with a one-armed man in a saloon, after he ties one of his own arms behind his back. The juxtaposition of the old ways (a man on horseback in the wilderness) and the new (sheriff Walter Mathau with his jeep, radios, and helicopters).
The chief impression it left me with this time is that it MUST have been a pretty good story because "Rambo" is practically a remake. The only thing is that if this were a McDonald's meal, "Rambo" would be extra-sized. Douglas is an ordinary but stubborn man whose alienation from society is never explained. Rambo is a superman who is deliberately mistreated by authorities despite his having won more medals in Viet Nam than anyone could imagine. Rambo whips everybody. Douglas is killed by a truckload of toilets. "Lonely Are the Brave" is a far more mature movie.
Douglas's horse, Whiskey, plays an important role in the movie. Douglas himself may have learned how to deal in his own quiet way with legitimated authorities, but Whiskey represents the Old West. He holds Douglas up. He's frightened by noisy helicopters and betrays Douglas's presence. He slips on a highway amidst the traffic and dooms them both. Whiskey is in a sense that part of Douglas that keeps getting him into trouble.
The movie, like most others of its period, strikes us as heavily orchestrated now -- booming dramatic drums and whatnot. But it's easy enough to see how a narrative dealing with alienation from modern life would have fit into the early 1960s, when this was released. The 1950s were in retrospect a period of bland and prosperous conformity. The lawns of the newly constructed and almost identical ranch houses were as neatly trimmed and manicured as the haircuts of the time. The late 1950s and early 1960s were a prelude to the last half of the 60s when all hell broke loose. Kirk Douglas seeking freedom on a horse isn't really that different from Peter Fonda doing the same thing on a motorcycle.
It's not a great movie, but it is far more complex and human than "Rambo." This movie is filmed without color but it's really "Rambo" that is black and white.
The first time I saw it, it seemed full of impressively new ideas. The cowboy (Kirk Douglas) is napping in the desert near his horse and is waked up by an overhead jet airplane. Douglas has a fight with a one-armed man in a saloon, after he ties one of his own arms behind his back. The juxtaposition of the old ways (a man on horseback in the wilderness) and the new (sheriff Walter Mathau with his jeep, radios, and helicopters).
The chief impression it left me with this time is that it MUST have been a pretty good story because "Rambo" is practically a remake. The only thing is that if this were a McDonald's meal, "Rambo" would be extra-sized. Douglas is an ordinary but stubborn man whose alienation from society is never explained. Rambo is a superman who is deliberately mistreated by authorities despite his having won more medals in Viet Nam than anyone could imagine. Rambo whips everybody. Douglas is killed by a truckload of toilets. "Lonely Are the Brave" is a far more mature movie.
Douglas's horse, Whiskey, plays an important role in the movie. Douglas himself may have learned how to deal in his own quiet way with legitimated authorities, but Whiskey represents the Old West. He holds Douglas up. He's frightened by noisy helicopters and betrays Douglas's presence. He slips on a highway amidst the traffic and dooms them both. Whiskey is in a sense that part of Douglas that keeps getting him into trouble.
The movie, like most others of its period, strikes us as heavily orchestrated now -- booming dramatic drums and whatnot. But it's easy enough to see how a narrative dealing with alienation from modern life would have fit into the early 1960s, when this was released. The 1950s were in retrospect a period of bland and prosperous conformity. The lawns of the newly constructed and almost identical ranch houses were as neatly trimmed and manicured as the haircuts of the time. The late 1950s and early 1960s were a prelude to the last half of the 60s when all hell broke loose. Kirk Douglas seeking freedom on a horse isn't really that different from Peter Fonda doing the same thing on a motorcycle.
It's not a great movie, but it is far more complex and human than "Rambo." This movie is filmed without color but it's really "Rambo" that is black and white.