Thu 6 Apr 2023
Notes on a Western Movie by Dan Stumpf: LONELY ARE THE BRAVE (1962).
Posted by Steve under Western movies[9] Comments
by Dan Stumpf:
This is not a review of
LONELY ARE THE BRAVE. Universal, 1962. Kirk Douglas, Gena Rowlands, Walter Matthau, Michael Kane, Carroll O’Connor, William Schallert, and George Kennedy. Screenplay by Dalton Trumbo, from the novel The Brave Cowboy by Edward Abbey. Directed by David Miller.
This is not a review, because I haven’t seen Lonely Are the Brave in its entirety. Nor do I intend to. No, this is more of a reminiscence and reflection on what I HAVE seen of it, and not to be taken for a serious evaluation.
Lonely aired on the 9 PM Saturday night movie back in 1972. I remember the approximate date, because I was working 3rd shift that night and had to leave for work at 10 PM. I wasn’t particularly keen on watching it, because I knew how it ended –
(PARENTHETICAL NOTE AND !!!WARNING!!
Indeed, every reviewer in the Free World seems to have felt duty-bound to reveal the ending of the film, and if I mention it here, well you got your !!!WARNING!!! )
–and I had no taste for the pre-fab defeatism of a story like that. But this was in the days of very limited choices, before cable, VCRs, and all that, so I settled in to watch the first half of Lonely Are the Brave.
And it wasn’t half bad! Kirk Douglas stars as a shiftless cowboy who wanders in to visit his old buddy (Michael Kane) and learns from his wife (Gena Rowlands) he’s in jail for helping out some migrant workers. There’s real power in this scene, what is commonly and conveniently called Chemistry between the actors as they convey longing, frustration, and rueful passion between them. So Kirk, being soft of heart and head, decides to spring his old buddy from jail.
A terrific (and quite brutal) bar fight lands him in the pokey with his friend and a file to cut away the window bars (No, I didn’t believe it either!) Come to think of it, Kirk gets three nasty thumpings in this movie, and ends up with nothing worse than a few scratches and makeup-man-made bruises, but I digress; things don’t go as planned because his childhood buddy is too mature for anything as dumb as a jail-break.
Which leaves Kirk at loose ends and looking kind of childish. Also, he should get out of town pretty quick. But he makes a final stop to see Gena, reflects thoughtfully on old times, his inability to grow up with them, and the love that might have been… Then saddles up his horse and rides off into the sunrise, down the way to Mexico. At which point I had to buckle on my gunbelt and head into Night Shift.
But the more I thought about Lonely, the more I liked it right there, ending with that image of the sadder-but-wiser hero on his way to some mythical fade-out always just beyond the end credits.
And so I have been content to leave it that way. I know the ending of Lonely Are the Brave, and it just doesn’t interest me.
But I highly recommend that first half!
April 6th, 2023 at 10:51 pm
For Jonathan’s take on this film, follow the link:
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=39768
April 7th, 2023 at 3:07 am
Keep watching. It’s a very good film, with Matthau in a fine non-comic role.
The trouble is the hero doesn’t end up sadder-but-wiser, but sadder-but-just-as-stupid.
April 7th, 2023 at 7:53 am
This is one of my favorite western films. I last saw it in 2012 so it’s time for me to see it again.
April 8th, 2023 at 2:18 am
Not just a great Western, but a great film touched with an elegaic but not unrealistic view of the West and Western myth and the appeal to certain immature traits in men who probably should know better.
I know it took a title like LONELY ARE THE BRAVE to bring in the movie audience, but I think Abbey’s original title THE BRAVE COWBOY tells us a great deal more about the story and the hero.
The ironies are pretty obvious, but then you want them to be obvious in this sort of movie where subtle might not work with Rowlands and Matthau the adults in the room surrounded by people who won’t or can’t grow up.
William Schallert and Carroll O’Connor both have strong character roles in this one.
I don’t blame Dan though one bit because I have to space out viewings of this one pretty far apart because that ending is a heart breaker. I’ve always thought this would make a great double feature with Douglas in Wilder’s ACE IN THE HOLE.
I’ve often wondered if this influenced David Morrell’s FIRST BLOOD a bit in theme and setting.
The cowboy hero of this appears as a much older figure in another Abbey novel of a much different sort.
This, MAN HUNT, THE NAKED PREY, MAN OF THE WILDERNESS, JEREMIAH JOHNSON, FIRST BLOOD, and THE OLD MAN AND THE SEA are among the better examples of the man against nature and man theme in film.
It is a mark of how great I think this film is that it violates one of my prime rules about this sort of story and I still love it.
April 8th, 2023 at 2:23 am
This theme is actually pretty common in modern Westerns with the hero usually not much smarter than Douglas character, JUNIOR BONNER, THE LUSTY MEN, ALL THE PRETTY HORSES, POCKET MONEY, and THE ROUNDERS (the last two comically) all celebrate and examine the tragedy of the throwback to a time that no longer exists in a time that no longer tolerates them.
April 8th, 2023 at 8:46 am
No wonder TIME reviewed this alongside RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY.
April 8th, 2023 at 10:07 pm
I can hardly chime in any better than the remarks provided above.
But I feel it’s safe to say ‘Brave’ deserves a look whether the viewing experience turns out good or bad. With that cast of actors …I’d watch it from a hospital bed.
What I remember about it is the brutal conflict between Kirk Douglas and George Kennedy. It’s a marvel for that alone.
It is a strange story, I admit. But Kirk Douglas in his prime, with him stupidly gritting his jaw like he does, and refusing to back down. It’s Homeric.
April 13th, 2023 at 9:42 am
David,
I will not refute anything you say about the qualities and intention of production, other than they are all wet. Monstrously stupid in conception. Make that stupid and destructive, clearly a principle point as our hero is killed by a toilet bowl.
April 13th, 2023 at 11:57 am
Clarification.
Nothing David wrote is monstrous or stupid, but the film and its essence seem to qualify, despite excellent production and performance.
Talented people, somewhat misguided.