They Shoot Horses, Don't They? (1969)

Plan: Gloria's (Jane Fonda) partner is immediately disqualified, so she enlists the aid of a drifter, Robert (Michael Sarrazin), to win a dance marathon during the Depression.

There are all sorts of other characters who are trying to win or draw attention to themselves for various reasons, but they all existed in relation to Gloria and Robert. It's almost as though they weren't characters at all, just reflections of the past and the future.

Hmmm.

Good work James Poe and Robert E. Thompson in your adaptation of Horace McCoy's novel of the same name. It's more difficult to involve your audience and hold them at arm's length simultaneously than to simply draw them in. Their screenplay was so cold. I find it odd when movies set in the Great Depression can seem so empty but never gritty. I always thought it would be a gritty time.

I will warn you that this is quite the mood piece. I was in the right mood just to sit and stare without having to spend much time thinking. Of course, I knew the ending before I started, so maybe I didn't have too much to think about it.

Even so, I loved watching Fonda and Sarrazin. Her Gloria was as tough as nails, so angry and frustrated. When she finally cries over a torn stocking, you don't even feel sorry for her. You just feel confused, and you wish Robert had some more change in his pocket. I suppose it wouldn't change a thing.

Sarrazin was something else entirely. He wanted to see the sun so much that he grew to hate it as the days passed by, as though it had betrayed him by staying outside. I went into the movie wondering how he could do it, and I know now that the question should be, "How could he not?"

Syndey Pollock (director) is downright ballsy. You suffer through this unrelenting movie right along side the contestants, all so you can see what is either the best or the worst movie ending of all time. It's so simple, so mysteriously obvious, so . . . natural? Can it be that it was natural?

Knit-picky point: Did mirror balls exist in the 30s?

Don't watch it if you don't have two solid hours to commit to it and many more yet to its lingering presence in the back of your mind. B+