THE OUTLAW JOSEY WALES (1976) ¢ ¢ ¢ ¢ 1/2
D: Clint Eastwood
Clint Eastwood, Chief Dan George, Sam Bottoms,
John Vernon, Sondra Locke, Will Sampson,
Bill McKinney, Paula Trueman, Geraldine Kearns,
Matt Clark, Joyce Jameson, Royal Dano, John Quade,
Woodrow Parfrey, Sheb Wooley, William O'Connell
A Confederate outlaw refuses to surrender at the end of the Civil War and heads west into Indian Territory and then Texas, leaving a trail of corpses in his wake. He picks up a surrogate family along the way, this being a Clint Eastwood road movie, and eventually the cutthroats dispatched to enforce Yankee justice track him down. There is a reckoning. This is one of Clint's great westerns - long, episodic, violent, comical and full of memorable characters, some of them on screen for only a minute or two. There are shots straight out of John Ford, a brilliant Civil War montage, and a distinctive way of ending scenes with a character in closeup moving slowly off the edge of the frame. The Eastwood stock company figures prominently in the supporting cast, and getting Native Americans - Will Sampson, Geraldine Kearns and Chief Dan George - to play Native Americans is a definite plus. The pace is almost leisurely, but there's a point to that, and nothing in the movie feels wasted. Somewhere in here is where craft becomes art. Also, Josey Wales chews tobacco. You don't want to be within range when he spits.
