I'd like my vote to be 6 1/2, but can't do it. I don't know how I'd missed it, but I had barely heard of this movie -- in fact, knew nothing about it except its title -- until about a month ago. It's not a great film, but it is good amusement. Steve McQueen's role seems like a pale imitation of his former work, until one realizes that he was dying of cancer at the time of its making, and that the character he portrayed was SUPPOSED to be worn out and past his prime. Over all, it works for me. I found several interesting juxtapositions in The Hunter. 1). McQueen became a star playing a bounty hunter on TV, and he was a bounty hunter in his last film; 2). Eli Wallach played his enemy in The Magnificent Seven, and his primary employer here; 3). Ben Johnson was his employer, then his enemy, in The Getaway, and is a nemesis here. I feel as if circuits were being completed in Steve's last movie, as if he were sort of uniting the threads of his career. I'll see this film again.
Review of The Hunter
