Badlands

Badlands (Terrence Malick, 1973)

I've never understood the mystique attached to Terrence Malick. I assumed this was because the first Malick film I saw was his 1998 desecration of The Thin Red Line, to this day one of the worst films I have ever had the displeasure to sit through in a theater. I figured that in order to give the guy a fighting chance, I'd go back and watch his earlier movies. Badlands was his first, and hey, Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek playing Charles Starkweather and Caril Ann Fugate? Okay, I'm sold. And it is certainly a much better film than The Thin Red Line, though I'm still not quite sure I've figured out the whole "mystique" bit.

The movie is a loose (very loose; everything from the names of the protagonists to the locations is changed-- Starkweather and Fugate never made it to Montana) adaptation of the Charles Starkweather story. Starkweather, here called Kit (Sheen), a garbageman, meets Fugate, erm, Holly (Spacek), a schoolgirl ten years younger than he. He falls in love with her. Her father (Warren Oates) is dead set against it, not because of the age difference-- Holly is only fourteen-- but because of the class difference. When Kit loses his job, he arrives to take Holly away with him so he can go find another one; after her father adamantly refuses to let her leave, Kit shoots him. Holly shows some emotion at this but not a great deal; she leaves with him, and the two travel from South Dakota to Montana, leaving a trail of bodies for which Kit has very easy explanations. After all, if he left anyone alive, they might tell the police where the young lovers (though how much love there is between them is always in question) are. They flee for Canada, an ever-growing legion of law enforcement officers on their back.

It's hard to deny the power of the source material; people have been wondering for decades what on earth possessed Caril Ann Fugate to tag along on Starkweather's killing spree (she claimed she was held hostage, but that never really rang true). And what Malick has done with it here is interesting. Spacek and Sheen are, of course, excellent actors almost every time they hit a screen, and the cinematography is fantastic, all the more so because it seems to have been done by committee (three cinematographers are named in the credits). Perhaps the faint dislike I felt of it simply stems from my dislike of The Thin Red Line, because, short of nitpickiness that's not really appropriate for such a fictionalized narrative of the events, I can't find any other reason for it. Still, I'm not entirely sure it deserves all the raves it's gotten, but that doesn't make it any less a good movie. ***

Okay okay, these reviews and everything got me going. I have seen all TM's films but this one and I gave it a go, calibrating my screen and readying the headphones.

WHAT A WASTE.

I will chalk this films credibility as being the gift of a rabid fanbase. It is the guy's first film, but.... COME ON PEOPLE!

This film would be failing with critics if it came out today because, FOR ONE, the acting is terrible, the editing is average, and many of the film's best scenes reek of 70's 'cheese'.

And beyond that, these characters, based on the actual murders that are way more chilling if you care to read the true story (at crime library), are just not very well written, and even Malick is NOWHERE NEAR his best.

So whatever, this is no film classic and I was unbelievably disappointed after all these glowing reviews. This movie isn't average. I have seen films based on real events, such as the somewhat boring ZODIAC, do more than this movie does in one scene, with characters and script. The direction and cinematography, while sufficient, simply cannot mask the terrible writing and the way the actors approach the script.

I was, Honestly, much more frightened reading the straight account of the official story in the format at Crime Library.

Badlands is Terrence Malick's first feature film, and paved the way for his acclaimed career. Badlands is a meditation on the relationship between 15 year old Holly and her older boyfriend, Kit as they go on a crime spree throughout the Midwest, leaving a number of bodies in their wake. The film has a relatively low budget aesthetic, but is very well shot and scored. The performances from Sheen and Spacek are excellent, and contribute to the haunting nature of the film. Although this movie is unconventional, it is very entertaining and easy to watch. It is not a very difficult movie to comprehend, but it is a film that merits multiple viewings.

Picture of the jacket-cover for this movie says: Starring Martin Sheen & Sissy Spacek. But you look to the right of the cover it reads: Starring: Dona Baldwin, Ramon Bieri. What is one to deduce about this ????

Loosely based on the 1958 Starkweather-Fugate murder spree that left 10 dead in Nebraska, Malick's astonishingly beautiful and accomplished debut marked him as a filmmaker with a unique artistic vision. With Spacek's matter-of-fact voiceover and deliriously gorgeous natural imagery to go alongside the fervid subject matter, "Badlands" was a pastoral renegade epic unlike any other. Spacek is alien-odd and eerily child-like as Holly, but Malick's ace in the hole is Sheen, whose simmering, cock-strutting portrayal of Kit has a strange beauty all its own.