LGM Film Club, Part 500: Scarecrow

When I discovered that Scarecrow exists, i.e. a movie starring Al Pacino and Gene Hackman from 1973 that I had never even heard of before, I had two thoughts. First, I had to watch it. Second, if it was any good, I’d have heard of it before. And that’s not totally wrong. The film is a mess. But not because of Pacino or Hackman. The writing and direction by Jerry Schatzberg isn’t great. The script is shockingly obvious and on the nose. But it’s great to watch these two guys work just after they had both gotten huge in a project they obviously did before they were so huge, especially Pacino.

Basically, this is like a lot of late 60s and 70s films in that it covers two guys who are living a bit rough and enjoying it. This could be Jack Nicholson in The Last Detail or Five Easy Pieces, for example. Or Jon Voight in Midnight Cowboy. Men wanting their freedom and behaving pretty badly was so common in the New Hollywood films as to become a complete cliche. Hackman is a guy who just got of prison after a 6 year stint. He’s a violent man, who loves to fight. Pacino is a sailor just off his boat after 5 years. He has a child he’s never met. He doesn’t even know if the kid is a boy or girl. But he wants to see it. Hackman is the dominant personality, Pacino is the lovable goofball who wants to make everyone laugh. Pacino is great in the scenes when he’s not a goofball, but he’s not the best goofball in the world, especially since the script and direction has him do all sorts of ridiculous antics. The film ends really maudlin as well and that tone doesn’t work at all with where this has gone.

So, yeah, it’s not a very good film. But it’s a kind of interesting film, in the way that lots of bad 70s films are interesting. Schatzberg had previously directed Pacino in his breakout role in Panic of Needle Park, which is how he got cast as Michael Corleone. So it’s weird to see such poor direction here. But he did come back to direct Honeysuckle Rose, the weird and pretty questionable attempt to make Willie Nelson a film star.

Also, I was reading a review of Al Pacino’s new memoir, which actually sounds pretty interesting. Evidently, he was offered the role of Han Solo, but he turned it down because the Star Wars script was so awful. Fair enough, that is a bad script. But also, I have a really hard time seeing Al in that role.

Also….while I can’t say I ever was much of a fan, a word for Michael Madsen’s passing. Certainly feel free to discuss him here.