Following critic Robin Wood’s theory on Robert Altman, protagonist John McCabe (Warren Beatty) embarks on an endeavour that he thinks he can control. The alcoholic McCabe, who at first seems to be controlling the situation with finesse, finds out that his control is an illusion, as the unfolding events trap him in an increasingly difficult situation…
McCabe & Mrs Miller is a story of two entrepreneurs, their American dream – how it comes face to face with the expressionless greed of a larger corporation. Mrs. Miller (Julie Christie) sees potential in the growing town as the headquarters of her bordello, but McCabe faces trouble from tough guys sent by the larger business.
At this turning point in history, as historian Ralph Brauer observes, industry and wealth, decency, school and church tread on the frontier spirit. With Sam Peckingham’s work, the Western developed in a slightly more pessimistic direction. Altman, too, operates in a rough and realistic stylistic space. He situates his landmark, cool-as-snowfall modern Western in the melancholic mindscape of a developing, dishcloth-damp, dingy frontier town.
Vilmos Zsigmonds’s (e.g. The Long Goodbye, 1973) camera captures poetic, dimly naturalistic imagery as Leonard Cohen’s immortal ballad’s play. Altman has built a kinetic time portal into a lost time, an endlessly fascinating world.
Joonas Nykänen