The Whole Shootin' Match is a great film. What was even better was that after the screening we were treated to a Q and A with Sonny Davis who played Frank. Davis has never had big roles in big movies so a lot of people probably don't know who he is unless they are familiar with Eagle Pennell's The Whole Shootin' Match and Last Night at the Alamo. It was really neat to listen to Davis talk about his career in the movie industry. He was in Fast Times at Ridgemont High and Thelma and Louise. The Shootin' Match has been hailed as the first true regional cinema. The actors, the director, the scriptwriter and the crew were all from Austin or Texas. They were on the "inside". They were not outsiders (Hollywood people) trying to making a movie in or about Texas. The movie correctly portrayed normal life in Austin at the time (1978). Everything in it was authentic. The Texan accents were natural. In fact, everything in the movie seemed very natural. This may be do to the fact that they were encouraged by Pennell to improvise the script. There was a script, but they only loosely stuck to it. The movie was made out of love for the craft. Everybody had day jobs during the week because they weren't getting any money from the movie. They would shoot on the weekends. They barely had enough money to make the movie without paying everybody involved a salary. Lou Perryman and Sonny Davis play best friends in the movie. They were actually best friends in real life so it came across on the screen as something really special. The most endearing scenes for me were when one was down and the other was there to cheer him up.
Review of The Whole Shootin' Match
