Moviecut—Nevada Smith

source: Nevada Smith

Nevada Smith

To be honest it should be a 5 for entertainment value as it's watchable as soon as you get over the middle aged man playing a boy. Problems magnified as he tries to act like a teenage boy would which just makes it look like he's educationally challenged. Also have to add on the ridiculous casting of age and the obvious fact that Steve McQueen looks and is, as half India as I am half cucumber. So apart from poor acting, shocking casting, whitewashing & and so ridiculously western style western soundtrack it's average!

....by Henry Hathaway who had a wonderful sense of space ("Niagara" "River of No return" "legend of the lost" ) .A very elaborate screenplay takes us to many places ,from the swamp where prisoners sweat to the Indian village "where Max should stay cause it's here that he belongs" .However, McQueen is not very plausible as a person of mixed -race ,Robert Blake would have been a better choice. The story is constantly absorbing (McQueen getting deliberately arrested recalls Truffaut/Irish's "the bride wore black" turned western)and the supporting characters give the movie substance:Karl Malden and Arthur Kennedy as the villains,Suzanne Pleshette as Pilar ,the gorgeous Mexican girl , Raf Vallone as the priest with a painful past;let's not forget Martin Landau ,the third villain,who works as a dealer in a saloon. Two hours+ and never a dull moment!

A naive half-Indian, half-white teenager (Steve McQueen) evolves into a hardened killer as he tracks down his parents' murderers. In the world of "revenge films", you have many that fall into the category of exploitation. This one rises above that and is much more nuanced, with some memorable characters. It also attempts to make comments on race and gender, though how successful it is on that is up to the viewer to decide. How much does our protagonist rise above the revenge inside him? Well, in some ways he is pretty set in his ways. When presented with the Bible (which, amazingly, he had never heard of), all he takes from it is the "eye for an eye" bit. Maybe he never got to the New Testament.

Henry Hathaway directs this successful, but lumpy, wayward western-drama scripted by John Michael Hayes, featuring a title character originally introduced in Harold Robbins' book "The Carpetbaggers" (making this film a prequel of sorts). Steve McQueen is the young half-breed avenging the deaths of his parents by heartless cowboys Karl Malden and Arthur Kennedy; Brian Keith plays a mentoring, sympathetic gun-salesman who teaches Steve how to shoot; Suzanne Pleshette is a love-interest from the backwoods. Overripe scenario gets big boost from charismatic McQueen, excellent as usual. The supporting work from the men is also strong, though attractive Pleshette hasn't gotten a handle on her role and remains a puzzlement. The story strays all over the place, but Hathaway's pacing never drags and it's quite a good show for both western-buffs and soap fans. **1/2 from ****

What I think is the biggest problem with Nevada Smith is casting a 40 year old blond with blue eyes to play a 16 year old half Native American. It is distracting throughout the whole story. Sometimes it is even ludicrous because a couple of times people seem to recognize on sight that he is Native American. Couldn't they have at least dyed his hair black and give him some contact lenses for Pete's sake? And what was supposed to be a sweet "coming of age" scene with the young Native American girl just looked WRONG. Steve McQueen was a good actor and all, but throughout the whole movie I was using my imagination replacing him with a young Bronson or someone a little more appropriate to the character he was playing.

This sidebar story from Harold Robbins THE CARPETBAGGERS was given class treatment by Paramount as a vehicle for McQueen, who lends some authenticity to a rather routine character motivated by a quest to avenge the brutal slaying of his parents at the beginning of the picture. Henry Hathaway lends visual elegance to what's basically a drawn-out, seedy revenge tale. Alfred Newman provides the rousing music. Moderately engaging.

Though there isn't much here that you haven't seen before in a western revenge drama, it's pretty well done. You can understand why the protagonist turns away at any chance of a normal life and instead concentrates on nothing but revenge. And it is undeniably satisfying to see him enact his revenge any chance he gets. It's good for what it is, though there are some problems, that if tweaked, could have made the movie even better. For one thing, casting McQueen as a half-Indian? And casting this mid-30s actor as a character that's supposed to be young enough to be called "Kid"!?!? Plus, the escape from the swamp doesn't seem finished; in fact, with the short sequence where one of McQueen's pursuers commenting on the bullets he has left makes me believe that several minutes were edited out before the movie was released.