MIDNIGHT COWBOY **** OF **** grade is A+
Midnight Cowboy is one of the best films ever made. It is depressing and exciting, and it crackles with visual excesses and brilliance. It is also the only X-rated film to win best picture at the Oscars. The content was very controversial when Midnight Cowboy was released in 1969, and now seems like a flat R, and less shocking.
Midnight Cowboy tells a great stories that seems forever-recycled into original material. A small town kid, Joe Buck (Jon Voight) a cowboy from Texas, enters a big city with high hopes that become deflated as he tries to dodge the sharks. He is looked after by Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) a con with a loser with a bum leg and heart. Rizzo helps Buck with his dream of becoming a hustler and Buck offer a friend.
The characters are seen so clearly and uncompromisingly that they put most film characters to shame. Buck as the ignorant kid who has a bad temper and Rizzo as the pathetic con. Both men try so hard to create a good environment for themselves and each other that they end up cold and desperate. All actions in the film are character driven and Midnight Cowboy never insults the audience by being presumptuous.
Instead we get Ratso Rizzo one of the best tragic heroes of all time. You can't help feel sorry for this guy who may be bad on the surface but really cares for his friend Buck and has the feeble hope of one day getting to visit Florida and one day not being called Ratso but Enrico, the name he was given.
Rizzo and Buck combine to make one of the best screen couples of all time. We watch as their relationship grows from nothing to wonderful love and mutual respect. When I say "LOVE" I'm not talking about the easy way out love, but a friendship that will break wall and protect them as far as it can take them.
Midnight Cowboy, which I just recently saw for the first time, doesn't feel dated at all. It holds it's own with freshness and excitement few films today possess. I would say this is a great companion piece to Boogie Nights, the wonderful film of last year, which is now out on video. Midnight Cowboy's director John Schlesinger should receive most of the credit for the film's still powerful impact and undated qualities.
**A flat out wonderful film that should not be seen on Network Television.
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