I have no clue what to say about this movie. I can see where the negative reviews are coming from, I can understand why Paramount shelved it as "noncommercial." The story is a mess lacking much purpose or anything resembling an emotional throughline-- and yet I cannot dismiss this movie. It's too interesting for that.
The movie follows a childish, mischievous, pill-popping, yee-hawing criminal named Cooper (played by Alan Arkin) who steals a truck and tears across the country swindling people, making a mess, and dodging the cops. Cooper's motives are not like the similarly aimless anti-heroes of EASY RIDER, who seek freedom from social conformity, and he's not merely a greedy criminal. He seems to get a thrill out of tricking other people and I don't think his ends are any more sophisticated than that.
My only issue is that all of this really just goes nowhere. This isn't a character study, even though we get hints at a sadder core to Cooper's personality, such as when he talks about his father or when he reacts with sorrowful compassion at the plight of a young prostitute tethered to a stove in a cheap shack. It feels like such a waste that the script does nothing more with Cooper than make him the centerpiece of a series of gags.
Paul Benedict plays the seemingly sane hitch-hiker who comes along with Cooper, but he lacks much chemistry with Arkin and when he tries to turn the tables on Cooper at the end, it feels less shocking and more like another random event in a conga line of them.
Overall, I would only recommend this movie to a certain kind of viewer. If you love Alan Arkin and the weird landscape of 70s Hollywood, then this will be appealing, more or less. This was a wasted opportunity and it might have gone better had screenwriter Terence Malick actually directed it as well. As it is, I laughed too much to deem it a failure.
The movie follows a childish, mischievous, pill-popping, yee-hawing criminal named Cooper (played by Alan Arkin) who steals a truck and tears across the country swindling people, making a mess, and dodging the cops. Cooper's motives are not like the similarly aimless anti-heroes of EASY RIDER, who seek freedom from social conformity, and he's not merely a greedy criminal. He seems to get a thrill out of tricking other people and I don't think his ends are any more sophisticated than that.
My only issue is that all of this really just goes nowhere. This isn't a character study, even though we get hints at a sadder core to Cooper's personality, such as when he talks about his father or when he reacts with sorrowful compassion at the plight of a young prostitute tethered to a stove in a cheap shack. It feels like such a waste that the script does nothing more with Cooper than make him the centerpiece of a series of gags.
Paul Benedict plays the seemingly sane hitch-hiker who comes along with Cooper, but he lacks much chemistry with Arkin and when he tries to turn the tables on Cooper at the end, it feels less shocking and more like another random event in a conga line of them.
Overall, I would only recommend this movie to a certain kind of viewer. If you love Alan Arkin and the weird landscape of 70s Hollywood, then this will be appealing, more or less. This was a wasted opportunity and it might have gone better had screenwriter Terence Malick actually directed it as well. As it is, I laughed too much to deem it a failure.