Movie Type: Psychological Western, Revisionist Western
Themes: Lone Wolves, Redemption, Lovers Reunited
Main Cast: Peter Fonda, Warren Oates, Verna Bloom, Robert Pratt, Severn Darden
Release Year: 1971
Country: US
Run Time: 90 minutes
Plot
Meeting largely mixed reviews during its first run in 1971, counterculture icon Peter Fonda's directorial debut was restored and remastered for its 30-year anniversary. The film opens with three drifters greeting the morning by cavorting in a sun-dabbled mountain river. Harry Collings (Fonda) catches a fish and gives it to Arch Harris (Warren Oates) who grills it over a low fire, while Dan (Robert Pratt) -- the youngest of the three -- bathes in the swift moving current. Later, as they head into Del Norte, a small town in the middle of nowhere, Dan talks breathlessly about going to California while Collings suddenly decides to return home after a seven-year absence. After Dan runs afoul of a group of unsavory characters lead by McVey (Severn Darden), Collings vows vengeance for the lad's death and blows off McVey's feet. Collings and Harris bury Dan and flee from the town riding hundreds of miles to Collings' homestead. His wife Hannah (Verna Bloom) -- now called "Widow Collings" by the local townsfolk -- is none too pleased to see her wayward husband at her doorstep. Taking his wife's anger in stride, he asks only to be allowed to work as a hired hand. Just as Hannah and Collings start to move beyond the years of anger and estrangement, disaster strikes. This film was screened at the 2001 Toronto Film Festival. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Review
Following up on the spectacularly successful Easy Rider, Peter Fonda's languid Western is certainly a feast for the eyes. The film's opening, a lyrical five-minute montage of superimposition layered upon superimposition, a virtuosic display of optical printing prowess if there was one, is jaw-droppingly gorgeous. Much of the rest of the film, while never quite reaching the artistic heights of the opening, is filled with lush landscapes and abundant cinematic tricks. Performances are uniformly nuanced and understated, particularly Warren Oates as Arch Harris, who plays the role with remarkable naturalness. Unfortunately, Fonda's film never quite gels into the revisionist masterpiece it threatens to become. In a scene newly restored to the print, Hannah brazenly -- shockingly for the time it was made -- admits to Harris that she has taken numerous lovers. Yet the film never quite forms into a feminist critique of Westerns. The montage of Western landscapes seen during Collings' and Harris' flight from Del Norte seems to push the film towards a environmental reverie, but again Hired never quite follows through. The Hired Hand is an ambitious, beautiful work and an exemplar of anti-establishment filmmaking during the early '70s that never quite lives up to its potential. ~ Jonathan Crow, All Movie Guide
Ann Doran - Mrs. Sorenson; Larry Hagman; Al Hopson - Bartender; Ted Markland - Luke; Michael McClure - Plummer; Owen Orr - Mace; Gray Johnson - Will; Rita Rogers - Mexican Woman
Credit
Lawrence G. Paull - Art Director, Richard Bruno - Costume Designer, Howard W. Koch - First Assistant Director, Peter Fonda - Director, Frank Mazzola - Editor, Bruce Langhorne - Composer (Music Score), Frank Griffin - Makeup, Vilmos Zsigmond - Cinematographer, William Hayward - Producer, Robert de Vestel - Set Designer, Richard Portman - Sound/Sound Designer, LeRoy Robbins - Sound/Sound Designer, Alan Sharp - Screenwriter
