Picked this one up on ebay – what a delight.
It’s the mid 1930s and Louis Tater, a very young and very naive ‘writer of western novels’, somehow stumbles his way into playing bit parts in terrible low budget westerns after being conned into traveling west by a fake University.
A very green Jeff Bridges plays Tater to perfection. His head jam packed with one western cliche after another – courtesy of novelist Zane Grey – Tater is a wide-eyed, daydreaming child lost in the ugly adult world of supply and demand and the predatory ways of con men both far and near.
Undermining his gifted good looks at every turn, Bridges shows a real talent for comedy. His physical stumbling and bumbling matched beautifully by pitch perfect line readings that expose Tater as a pretentious and clueless kid.
Of course, in 2021, we know Bridges is a terrific talent capable of playing the hell out of comedy roles – “The Big Lebowski” being a perfect example. Still, it’s remarkable to see that he had that talent at such a young age and was able to use it so flawlessly here in HOTW. There is not a single false step in his performance – that’s how good he is.
Tater walks and talks like he’s been ripped out of a 70s after school special and dropped into the middle of a Robert Altman film. In a way, he’s like a prop one might use in an experiment that seeks to measure the level of kindness in a given society. Almost child-like in nature, it’s as if Tater is saying to everyone he meets, “I’m available to be taken advantage of – just form an orderly line. And, please, no pushing.” In the jaded, anything-for-a-buck world Tater finds himself in, he is like one of those fish you always hear about being shot in a barrel.
Blythe Danner is terrific as Miss Trout. She plays the whip smart, quietly sexy film company employee with ease. Trout is cynical, yet not so much that she fails to appreciate Tater’s appealing innocence. Danner handles that tricky balance perfectly.
That’s probably why Tater’s scenes with Miss Trout are so refreshing. She’s the only decent person on the whole damn ranch. Her seduction of Tater is a lovely little scene in which Danner, as Trout, is simultaneously charmed and aggravated by her would-be lover’s clumsily romantic ways. Director Howard Zieff (“Slither”, “Private Benjamin”) adds a nice visual touch to the scene by bookending it with a shot of a hula girl lamp – moving hips and all.
And, as in Elia Kazan’s stunner, “A Face in the Crowd” (1957), Andy Griffith proves, once again, that the roles that bring out the best in him are the roles that bring out the worst in him. Peel away that veneer of folksy, country boy charm and you have an actor capable of switching hats from white to black – or somewhere in between – without so much as messing up a single hair on his head. Though Pike is a lightweight compared to AFITC’s Lonesome Rhodes, Griffith still makes you feel the deadness that lies just behind the eyes of his long since lost soul of a character.
HOTW surveys the damage done when one falls too deeply for myths. It’s a cautionary tale that transcends its world of westerns – whether on screen or in book form – to raise a big flapping red flag to any poor soul naive enough to mistake a plate of bullcrap for pasta primavera.
It’s also a truly remarkable example of how to balance comedy and drama. It’s not so silly that it loses its depth, nor is it too serious to make attempts at broad comedy seem out of place.
Somehow, HOTW rides two horses at the same time and does it so well you’d think it was as easy as a gallop in the park.
