Peter Bogdanovich's 1971 "The Last Picture Show" remains one of the masterpieces of the American new wave. It impressed pretty much everyone (including me) when it was released, and looks at least as good a third of a century later.

It is one of three masterpiece movies based on and/or scripted by Larry McMurtry (the other two are the 1963 "Hud" and the 2005 Brokeback Mountain; one of the best tv mini-series ever was also based on his Lonesome Dove). I don't know how autobiographical McMurtry's novel is, but the West Texas town called Anarene is definitely a version of his hometown or Archer City, and the era (the movie is set in 1951-52) is the one in which he grew up.

The movie centers on two high-school seniors, Sonny (Timothy Bottoms) and Duane (Jeff Bridges) who are best friends. Duane's "steady", Jacey (Cybill Shepherd) is none too steady, more than a little headstrong, and more innocent than she thinks she is. She causes trouble between Sonny and Duane, and elsewhere (poaching her mother's boyfriend).

Other major characters include Sam "the Lion" (Ben Johnson) who is a surrogate father to Sonny and Duane, Jasey's restive mother Lois (Ellen Burstyn), and a painfully neglected wife of the boys' football and basketball coach (Cloris Leachman) who latches onto Duane (in some sense he is supplied by her husband). Sam Bottoms plays Sonny's feeble-minded (to use a 1951 label) brother Billy, Randy Quaid plays a slimy, sneering Lester, and Eileen Brennan plays a wise and compassionate diner waitress (foreshadowing that in which Burstyn's character emerges in "Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore").

Along with the end of high school and the demise of Sam, the town's movie theater goes out of business (the last picture of the title is Howard Hawks's great western "Red River", though given Bogdanovich's and Johnson's connections to John Ford, it is something of a surprise that it is not a John Ford western).

The performances are uniformly excellent. There are some snappy lines, but a whole lot of meaning is conveyed nonverbally.

The deep-focus black-and-white cinematography of Robert Surtees (The Sting, Ben-Hur and fourteen others for which he received Oscar nominations) is admirable (he received two Oscar nominations that year, the other for "The Summer of '42," so it was a big year for movies looking back at boys grappling with hormonal surges for him). Like "Rear Window," the movie has no soundtrack. The music is entirely what the characters play or hear on jukeboxes and radios (Hank Williams songs predominating).

There are a number of insightful Epinions on the movie, and the movies' accomplishments have been pretty uniformly recognized since its relase. Instead of attempting to add anything about the excellences of the movie I want to focus on the oustdtanding 64-minute 1999 documentary on its making, "The Last Picture Show: A Look Back" (produced, written, and directed by Laurent Bouzereau, who has supervised hundreds of making-of documentaries) which is included on the "Last Picture Show:" DVD. It removes any doubt (if anyone had any!) that Bogdanovich was very focused on the ensemble of actors. Ellen Burstyn, Jeff Bridges, Cybill Shepherd , and Cloris Leachman all recall ways in which Bogdanovich helped them in big scenes; Bogdanovich discusses the making of big scenes of Ben Johnson's and Timothy Bottoms, and a number of participants recall that crew members were less than thrilled by Bogdanovich's nearly exclusive focus on the actors and his monopolization of contact with them during filming in Archer City, Texas, Larry McMurtry's hometown. They also recall a lack of enthusiasm from the locals in having local dirty laundry aired in McMurtry's novel and in making a movie of it.

The choice of clips is impeccable, and the montages of talking heads have insights and interesting stories to tell. Bogdanovich tells how reluctant Ben Johnson was to sign on to a part with so many lines. (He recalls that he told Johnson he would get at least an Oscar nomination in the role. Disappointingly, he does not relate how Johnson reacted to this promise being more than redeemed.) It took the intervention of John Ford to get Johnson into the part for which he will be best remembered. Bogdanovich also recalls why he wanted to shoot in black-and-white, and how this was approved (with less than anticipated opposition). He has a very poignant final story.

Ellen Burstyn also has a poignant post-production story. Burstyn and Bogdanovich recall that she was brought in to read for the part that Cloris Leacham eventually played (and for which Leacham won a best-supporting-actress Oscar), but wanted to play Lois. She also read the waitress part Eileen Brennan played (for which Brennan was nominated for a BAFTA). Bogdanovich gave her a choice among the three parts. When I first saw the movie, I thought Burstyn gave the best performance in the movie. I still think so. The New York Film Critics' best-supporting-actress went to her.

At the time, I thought that Timothy Bottoms should have received an Oscar nomination in addition to or instead of Jeff Bridges. I've revised that opinion only in that I think that it should be "in addition to." I completely fail to understand the nomination for Roy Scheider in "The French Connection" (and the awards to "The French Connection" as best picture and to William Friedkin as best director for it are among the many, many Oscar mistakes. This was the year not only of "The Last Picture Show," but of "McCabe and Mrs. Miller," "The Conformist," and "Clockwork Orange." That "The Conformist" was not the winner of best foreign-language film should be another embarrassment—if the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences were capable of embarrassment.)

Bridges, Burstyn, and Shepherd are the stars from among the cast of the movie in the documentary. (the movie's Associate Producer, Frank Marshall, has much of interest to say supplementing Bogdanovich.) Bottoms' career fizzled out, whereas Bridges has produced a considerable body of impressive work. (I don't know if Bottoms refused to participate in the documentary; Johnson couldn't, having died in 1996.) Burstyn and Shepherd consider the movie high points of their career, though both went on to other successes (including a best-actress Oscar-winning performance by Burstyn, and Golden Globe-awarded leading roles in two television series for Shepherd; both have been under-recognized in other outstanding performances, including (especially) Shepherd's second Bogdanovich-directed movie, Daisy Miller, in which Leacham and Brennan also played).

Bogdanovich relates that he had to cut about 25 minutes. The initial release was 119 minutes. He used reviews to restore one one-minute Eileen Brennan scene. There is a director's (un)cut DVD that restores another six. I'd love to see the rest and explanations of the why Bogdanovich put back what he did and why he kept out the rest. I'd also have liked to hear from Larry McMurtry and Timothy Bottoms, but what there is a very rich supplement to a great film.

The digitally remastered (audio and video) DVD also has trailers, talent files, production notes, and subtitled available in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Chinese, Korean, and Thai. I have no hesitation in rating the movie, the "look back" documentary, and the DVD 5 stars.



Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD