By Richard Winters
My Rating: 4 out of 10
4-Word Review: Investigating mysterious cattle mutilations.
Ruben (Robert Urich) is a recovering alcoholic who quits his job as a cop and decides to move to rural Colorado with his teenaged daughter MacKenzie (Marin Kanter). Along the way their vehicle breaks down in the small-town of Buffalo. They decide to make their temporary home there and Ruben meets up with Harriet (JoBeth Williams) the newly elected sheriff. He learns that she’s investigating, with the help of local newspaper reporter Joe (Paul Dooley), some mysterious cattle mutilations that has been plaguing the area. Ruben, who grows fond of her, helps her in the pursuit for answers and comes to determine that it may have something to do with a nearby abandoned military complex as well as a neighboring cattle baron Ben (Hoyt Axton) who seems awfully worried about anyone snooping around.
The film’s direction, done by the still budding Alan Rudolph, is probably the best thing to recommend about what’s otherwise a pedestrian story. I liked the soundtrack, which despite the setting being quite rural, has a cool sci-fi vibe, and the grainy cinematography gives it a documentary feel. Rudolph’s use of capturing dialogue, which was clearly inspired by his mentor Robert Altman, is cool too as the camera will focus on one person, but we’ll hear the conversation of two other characters who are not in the shot. Unfortunately, the plot is unimaginative, and the mystery portion becomes too obvious.
Urich is miscast in the lead, the part was intended for Robert Mitchum who would’ve been far superior. Urich’s a nice guy and all, but not convincing as a brash, hard-edge cop making his entire performance come off as affected. His character arch, which focuses on an alcoholic trying to redeem himself, both with his career and relationship with his daughter, is too formulaic to be either gripping, or compelling though it’s interesting to hear him casually utter the slur ‘faggot’ at one point as it would be impossible for someone in a movie today to say that and still be deemed the hero.
I also didn’t feel an outsider was needed here as Urich seems to come up with all the clues that you’d think somebody living in the town would’ve deduced far earlier. A good example is when he follows some trucks to the military complex and starts to connect this to the cattle killings, but any other resident could’ve done this too and most likely would’ve. Most small-town people are characteristically suspicious of government agencies, so knowing that there was an abandoned federal outpost nearby would’ve made that area number one on their suspect list and would not have required the assistance of some big city cop to get them there.
Jobeth looks awkward and uncomfortable in her police uniform. I dug the idea of having a female sheriff, which hasn’t been done too much, so it offers a unique angle, but it approaches it in an illogical way. For instance, it has her attempting to break up a male bar fight by her trying to somehow tackle one of the men, who immediately fling her away as if she were a rag doll and it looks as pathetic as it sounds. Clearly, she should’ve gone into that with some backup by male deputies, or a taser, but for her to go in it alone and think somehow, she can ‘handle it’ makes both her and the film look like it has no common sense.
I will though give some credit to the scene where Urich is in her shower and he makes a pass at her and she in returns gives him a gut punch, which was unexpected as I was afraid it was going to turn into some sort of sappy, stereotypical love scene, which does occur later, but I at least enjoyed the momentary attempt to go against the grain.
Spoiler Alert!
I did enjoy Axton’s bad guy part. He performance isn’t anything spectacular and his poisoning moments, where he brushes his teeth with a contaminated toothbrush that causes his gums to bleed looks more like he’s just swishing around red Kool aid in his mouth. I also thought it was ridiculous that Urich would force Axton to drive the pick-up at gunpoint when he was clearly in a weakened and distressed state that could’ve killed them both. However, his death scene, where he kneels on the highway and has his abdomen burst out of his body, is awesome and the film’s best moment though it could’ve been extended.
The ending unfortunately offers no resolution. It has the night helicopters of the bad guys flying away while JoBeth and Urich remain on the ground watching helplessly. To sit through nearly 2-hours of this thing, which is at times a bit slow, there needed to be more of a finale. Preferably nabbing the baddies and breaking open the case and the fact that this doesn’t happen makes the whole thing feel like one big waste of time.
My Rating: 4 out of 10
Released: September 10, 1982
Runtime: 1 Hour 37 Minutes
Rated R
Director: Alan Rudolph
Studio: MGM
Available: DVD, Blu-ray, Amazon Video, YouTube
Scopophilia 