edwagreen They say that your best writing comes from experience. This is not the case by the ending of this dreadful 1975 film. The N.Y.C. film critics gave its best supporting actor award to Alan Arkin, who portrayed Bert Kessler, the director. With his high-pitched tone when he was angry, Arkin, as Kessler, utters the Yiddish phrase-"Ver Gerharget," meaning getting killed as he throws someone out of his office.With his boyish good looks, Jeff Bridges was a natural to play Lewis Tater, the young lad who sets out west as he feels that he is a western writer. Instead, he gets side tracked to making movies as he flees the guys who tried to fleece him into going to a writer's college in Nevada that really never existed.The film takes place in 1933, at the heart of the depression. Yet, we see little to no proof of this occurring. In fact, we're subjected to a party where smoked salmon and sturgeon are being served.With its dull color to reflect the period, the film is really a first-class stinker. Andy Griffith co-stars as Howard, a movie man who puts one over on Lewis, but saves him at picture's end. Sorry, but he couldn't save this film.

dougdoepke What a likable farm galoot Jeff Bridges makes. His Lewis Tater wants to be a Western writer and by golly neither pursuing crooks, nor double-crossing buddies, nor phony correspondence schools are going to stop him. Like his literary alter-ego The Kid, he's just too eager to get discouraged. Across burning deserts and thundering hoofs, he soldiers on toward fame and fortune and Hollywood and Vine.And what a hoot his purple prose is. Like an amiable Walter Mitty, minor events get spun into major events for "The Kid" in such deathless passages as, "Twirling, The Kid fired with all he had into the phantom riders", or " A Colt in either hand, he scattered lead at the retreating dust." What a great sleeper movie this is, thanks to the comical Bridges and some unerring light touches. Take for example the cheap Western they're filming. Catch how a groaning Lewis steps on the big romantic clinch, or how his curtain-chewing death throes put the director (Arkin) into a murderous tizzy. But I especially like that awkward little turn on the sidewalk where he brushes against the potted palm and wins the affection of Miss Trout (Danner).The movie's also a telling look at the making of matinée Westerns, a staple of kids' viewing in the 1930's and 40's. As a former Front Row kid, I viewed those parts with mixed emotions. I guess I still want those guys to be real cowboys and not the shrewd businessmen-actors they likely were.Anyhow, in my little book, this is a little gem from beginning to end, with scarcely a misstep along the way. It never ceases to amaze me that the Hollywood-bred Bridges (his dad was veteran actor Lloyd Bridges) can play such a convincing hayseed, but he can. Speaking of hayseeds, watch for a very unMayberry Andy Griffith, again showing what a fine, versatile actor he is. I'm just sorry this style of clever low-key comedy has given way to today's frantic bathroom kind. Maybe Hollywood needs to hire more Lewis Tater's, after all.

moonspinner55 Jeff Bridges plays a smiling farm boy in 1929 Iowa, harboring dreams of writing Western prose, who journeys to Nevada and inadvertently becomes involved with a movie troupe making talking pictures. Howard Zieff, a TV commercial director with one film (1973's wacky "Slither") behind him, was poised for great things, yet this second feature of his barely gets off the ground. Working from a wordy screenplay by new writer Rob Thompson, Zieff is able to add little bits and pieces of his eccentric style and personality, but the 'plot' (such as it is) fails to deliver on its promises. Opening with the 1930s-styled M-G-M lion, Zieff begins the picture with Bridges' screen test...and then jumps awkwardly back in time without explanation. It takes another 20 minutes for the film to get a big, juicy scene (Bridges volunteering to do a dangerous stunt--jumping onto a horse from a second story balcony); in the interim, the picture idles about dealing with two unsavory characters who are chasing after stolen money. The on-screen movie folk (featuring Alan Arkin as director, Blythe Danner as the script girl, and Andy Griffith as an aging cowboy actor) are a fun bunch, though Zieff allows this part of the film--which should have been the picture's meat and potatoes--to dribble away. Bridges gambles on his salary and gets himself fired, but we don't know if he was duped or simply given bad advice. Worse, the early-1930s atmosphere isn't well-captured, and Bridges at this point had little range. *1/2 from ****

aromatic-2 The interplay between Jeff Bridges and Andy Griffith alone is well worth the price of admission, but the entire supporting cast gets into the spirit of this film about writing western movies in the early 30's. Fun for the entire family. Richard B. Schull and Anthony James are marvelous as the Mutt & Jeff antecedents of the wet bandits.