With “Night Moves”, I think the genre was imploded. Heading the list was “Chinatown”, but there were also “The Long Goodbye”, “Klute”, “The Late Show”, and you could even include “Shaft” on this list. There was a lot of detective genre deconstruction in the ‘70’s. Now you’re asking, why did you choose this movie for your blog? I guess it comes under the heading, “It’s so weird that it’s cool, maybe even great”. I remember that the supporting cast was a tad weak, and there was a laugh-out-loud absurdist line when out of nowhere, Paula, Hackman’s love interest in the movie, blurts out, “Where were you when Kennedy was shot?” Hackman replies, “Which Kennedy?” Possibly blame it on the film and it’s convoluted narrative line. Blame it on my youth, blame it on whatever 1975 had me indulging in. I recall that I needed to see “Night Moves” a second time before I could really follow the story and understand the characters. So what could possibly go wrong here? Penn was famous for being an autocrat both on the shoot and behind the scenes. Hackman was coming off a great run including his brilliant turn as Jimmy Doyle in both “French Connection” movies, his signature role as Harry Caul in the Coppola’s masterpiece “The Conversation”, and his great actor pair with Al Pacino in “Scarecrow”. Penn had been hot during the intervening period (spanning 1968-1974) “Alice’s Restaurant” was a charmer based on the Arlo Guthrie counter-culture anthem, and “Little Big Man” was a big hit with the hippies and a breakthrough in its depiction of the Native American. It would seem to be a very easy sell to the moguls. Here was one of Hollywood’s guiding lights, directing one of filmdom’s hottest stars in Gene Hackman. Arthur Penn, who had helped foment the New Hollywood revolution with his unforgettable “Bonnie and Clyde”, and, in my mind at least, cemented his role as a great auteur with one of my favorite films then and now, “Little Big Man”, would not be interested in making a standard private dick flick. This was not your standard whodunit for certain. I saw this in the theater when it came out, and was a little befuddled.
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