Midnight Cowboy

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Midnight Cowboy

Directed by	John Schlesinger
Produced by	Jerome Hellman
Written by	James Leo Herlihy (novel) Waldo Salt (screenplay)
Starring	Jon Voight Dustin Hoffman Brenda Vaccaro John McGiver Ruth White Sylvia Miles Barnard Hughes
Music by	John Barry Theme "Everybody's Talkin'" Nilsson
Distributed by	United Artists
Release date(s)	May 25, 1969 (US premiere)
Running time	113 min
Language	English
Budget	$3,600,000 USD (est.)
All Movie Guide profile
IMDb profile

This article is about the 1969 film. For the novel upon which this film is based, see Midnight Cowboy (novel).

Midnight Cowboy is an Academy Award winning 1969 film based on the 1965 novel of the same name by James Leo Herlihy. It was written by Waldo Salt, directed by John Schlesinger, and stars Dustin Hoffman and then-newcomer Jon Voight in the title role. Notable smaller roles are filled by Sylvia Miles, John McGiver, Brenda Vaccaro, Barnard Hughes, Ruth White, Jennifer Salt (the screenwriter's daughter) and Bob Balaban.

1 Plot
2 Production
3 Controversy
4 Awards
5 Legacy
6 External links

[edit] Plot

The film follows the story of a young Texan named Joe Buck (Jon Voight), who works washing dishes in a seedy restaurant. He wishes to leave the restaurant, declaring to a workmate, "What the hell have I got to sat around here for?" As the movie opens, Joe dresses himself like a rodeo cowboy, packs a suitcase, and quits his job. He heads to New York City in the hope of leading the life of a "kept" man. He tells people he meets, "I ain't a for-real cowboy, but I am a hell of a stud!"

Joe's naivete becomes evident as quickly as his cash disappears upon his arrival in New York. He is hilariously, yet sadly, unsuccessful in his attempts to be hired as a "stud" for wealthy women. The naive Joe meets the crippled Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman), a third-rate con man who easily tricks Joe out of twenty dollars by offering to introduce him to a well-known pimp, who instead turns out to be a religious fanatic. Joe flees the scene in pursuit of Ratso, but he is long gone. As Joe's money quickly runs out, he finally attempts to make money by sleeping with another man, but even this plan goes awry. (The novel does refer to previous homosexual activity by Joe, but explains that he'd pursued it more in hopes to please a male friend than out of desire.)

When Joe and Rizzo cross paths a second time, Joe is homeless, and sleeping in all-night movie theaters and bus stations. Joe shakes Ratso down for every penny he has, and Ratso surprisingly offers to help Joe, by sharing his "place"; an apartment in a condemned building. Joe takes him up, and they begin a "business" relationship, helping each other pick-pocket, steal, and further attempting to get Joe hired as a "stud".

The events of Joe's life are told in mostly chronological order, interspersed by flashbacks. He had been to church and baptized as a boy, but had only frightening memories of the experience, and he related religion with disappointment. The only two people Joe loved were his grandmother Sally, and his onetime girlfriend "Crazy Annie" (called "Chalkline Annie" in the novel). His grandmother raised Joe after his mother abandoned him, but often left him alone to go off with men friends. (One of them, a wrangler named Woodsy Niles, was Joe's only father figure.) Sally died while Joe was away serving in the Army. Annie had been a promiscuous girl, who changed her ways after meeting Joe, which didn't sit well with the men of their hometown. After the two were caught together having sex in a car, Annie was sent to a mental institution. She remains a constant presence in Joe's mind.

Ratso's story comes mostly through things he tells Joe. His father was an illiterate shoeshiner who worked in a subway station, developed a bad back, and "coughed his lungs out breathin' in that wax every day!" Ratso learned shining from his father, but he refused to follow (such as he could, after polio crippled one leg) in the old man's footsteps.

Joe and Ratso also steal things as they need them, and pull minor scams like loading up on saltine crackers and ketchup at diners, and checking every coin slot they see for change. They are both completely alone without each other, and a genuine bond develops between the two men. Ratso had a cough when the two first met during the summer, and as the story progresses, his health becomes steadily worse. His symptoms indicate a likely case of tuberculosis, but Ratso refuses to see a doctor, professing that he'll be fine "when I get to Florida!" In the meantime he consumes cough medicines.

Joe and Enrico

At one point, a bizarre-looking couple approach Joe and Ratso in a diner and hand Joe a flyer inviting him to a party. The two men go together and enter into a Warhol-esque party scene (with some of the Warhol superstars in cameo appearances). The naive Joe smokes an entire marijuana joint, then takes a pill offered to him. He leaves the party with a socialite (Vaccaro), with Ratso in tow, who falls down a flight of stairs. He insists he is fine, and makes his own way home.

Joe and the socialite attempt sex, but he suffers from temporary impotence. After some sleep, they play a puzzle game together. She suggests that Joe may be gay, then continues to mildly tease him. Joe is suddenly able to perform, and the two have rough, enthusiastic sex.

When Joe returns home later, Ratso is in bed, sweating and feverish, and admits to Joe that he is unable to walk. Joe wants to take Ratso to a doctor, but Ratso adamantly refuses, saying he does not wanting to end up in Bellevue Hospital or someplace worse. He wants to leave New York for Miami; this has been his goal the whole time. Meanwhile, he is clearly gravely ill. A frightened Joe is determined to take care of his friend, and leaves the apartment.

Joe picks up a male customer (Hughes), who guiltily tries to send him away at the last minute. Joe becomes enraged when the customer gives him a religious medallion, instead of cash when Joe says he needs it. He beats and robs the man, stuffing the telephone into his mouth when he tries to call for help.

Leaving on a Florida-bound bus, Joe stops to buy new clothing for Ratso and himself. Joe throws away his cowboy outfit, and declares "I ain't no kinda hustler." Ratso's physical condition is clearly serious, and the point is driven home by a bus scene in which Ratso awakens to find he has urinated on himself. When he tells Joe, Joe makes light of it and they laugh together, but their powerful denial is evident. As they reach Florida and near Miami, Joe talks about their plans, only to ultimately realize that Ratso has died sitting beside him.

After Joe informs the bus driver, the driver tells him that there is nothing else to do but leave him there until they arrive in Miami. The final scene is of a horrified Joe seated beside his dead friend, placing his arm around him, with several of the other passengers standing up and turning around in their seats to stare.

[edit] Production

The opening scenes were filmed in Big Spring, Texas.

The line "I'm walkin' here!", which reached #27 on AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes, is often said to have been improvised, but producer Jerome Hellman disputes this account on the 2-disc DVD set of Midnight Cowboy. The cab was driven by a hired actor during a scripted take, and production team filmed it to look like an ad-lib. However, Hoffman told it differently on an installment of Bravo's Inside the Actors Studio. He stated that there were many takes to hit that traffic light just right so they didn't have to pause while walking. That take, the timing was perfect and the cab came out of nowhere and nearly hit them. Hoffman wanted to say "We're filming a movie here!" But from brain to mouth, it came out in the now famous line.

Before Dustin Hoffman auditioned for this film, he knew that his all-American image could easily cost him the job. To prove he could do it, he asked the auditioning film executive to meet him on a street corner in Manhattan, and in the meantime, dressed himself in filthy rags. The executive arrived at the appointed corner and waited, barely noticing the "beggar" less than ten feet away who was accosting people for spare change. At last, the beggar walked up to him and revealed his true identity.

Schlesinger chose the song "Everybody's Talkin'" (written by Fred Neil and performed by Harry Nilsson) as its theme, and the song reappears throughout the movie. (Other songs considered for the movie included Nilsson's own "I Guess the Lord Must Be in New York City", Randy Newman's "Cowboy", and reportedly Bob Dylan's "Lay Lady Lay".) The song "He Quit Me" was also on the soundtrack; it was written by Warren Zevon, who also included it (as "She Quit Me") on his debut album Wanted Dead or Alive.

[edit] Controversy

The sex scenes in this movie were considered shocking in 1969. There were only bare breasts and buttocks shown, though there are brief, but horrifying, gang rape scenes of both "Crazy Annie" and Joe. While the MPAA was prepared to give the film an R rating upon their initial viewing, the co-chairman of United Artists, Arthur Krim, insisted upon self-applying an X rating on the advice of psychiatrist Aaron Stern, later to become an official MPAA ratings board consultant. It soon became the first X-rated film to win an Academy Award. At the time, X ratings had not yet become associated with the pornography industry. (Farber, Stephen (1972). The Movie Ratings Game. Washington, D.C.: Public Affairs Press. )

Late in 1970 United Artists had the film re-submitted to the ratings board in order to change the rating to R, increasing the number of screens it could play on in re-release, since many theaters would not play X-rated films, and many newspapers would not accept advertising for them.

Some modern critics assume an unstated homosexual relationship between the main characters, and at the 2006 Academy Awards, host Jon Stewart joked about Brokeback Mountain being an Oscar contender despite its subject matter, saying "It's been more than 35 years when people would watch Midnight Cowboy and say 'What the hell was that all about?' Well, now we have fully accepted this new genre of cinema: gay westerns!"

[edit] Awards

The film won Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Adapted Screenplay; it is the only X-rated film to win an Oscar in any category. (Coincidentally, the previous year had seen the sole G-rated Best Picture winner, Oliver!) Both Hoffman and Voight were nominated for Best Actor awards.

The film won six BAFTA Awards.

John Barry, who supervised the music for the film, won a Grammy for Best Instrumental Theme. "Everybody's Talkin'" also won a Grammy Award for Best Male Pop Vocal Performance, for Harry Nilsson.

In 1994, this film was deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant" by the Library of Congress and selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry.

[edit] Legacy

For Hoffman, the role enabled him to avoid any typecasting due to his previous role in The Graduate and started his career as an actor of considerable dramatic range. Voight went on to have a long, respectable acting career himself, with roles in Catch-22, Deliverance, Conrack, The Champ, and other movies.

[edit] External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Midnight Cowboy

Midnight Cowboy at the Internet Movie Database
Midnight Cowboy at Filmsite.org

Awards
Preceded by Oliver!	Academy Award for Best Picture 1969	Succeeded by Patton
Preceded by The Graduate	BAFTA Award for Best Film 1970	Succeeded by Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid