I saw the preview last year when this movie came out and I knew I had to check it out. The ‘urban cowboy’ concept, what transpired as the essence of the movie from the preview, is an attractive one for me. The idea that old west rules might apply in one way or another in the modern west creates all sorts of possibilities to play with. (I found this fascinating, because I live in the ‘modern west’ in multiple ways: I moved from Eastern Europe to the Western world, I lived the last 11 years in the historic Wild West/gold rush country and I work in the ‘modern’ tech industry.)
What I wasn’t aware in advance, that this movie is as delusional as the romantic image novels and movies paint of the honorable, rugged, individualistic old west. These very adjectives could be used to describe what’s at the heart of the movie. (Spoiler alert) The movie’s antihero acts as if he would be a simple farmhand in the suburb (San Fernando Valley) of the big city (of Los Angeles). He puts on a facade of being honorable. This aspect of his act shows the most, when he is defending his intentions to the damsel’s father. However by then we know that he played with the girl as no honorable person would do before wedding bells. Similarly, he acts as a real tough guy. He keeps up this pretense under almost every circumstances, but then we see he how he practices the act in his sleazy room, against himself in the mirror. (This scene is an almost replica of Robert De Niro’s famous scene in the Taxi Driver.) In other words he is not inherently tough, but works himself up to the level of ruggedness he envisions necessary for the character.
A word about individualism: Harlan is a loner, living in a world he built in his head. It is a defense mechanism, just like (I think) men in the old west decided to become individualistic, because they believed (and had good reasons to do so) that is the best chance for their survival in a harsh world. Our protagonist, however, comes from a middle-class family and lives in the highly interdependent modern world, where–except for hardcore survivalists–nobody can be 100% self-reliant. He defends himself against alienation with his show.
I wonder thought, and this might be a point of the movie to what extent the pretense works on himself. I am undecided whether this ambiguity is a strong point of the movie or a mistake. Norton’s acting is smooth, but his character was not depicted devilishly enough for my taste. He is more then a misguided soul, as it is clear not just from the tragic ending, but from the way he handles his relationships. It was hard for me to disassociate the actor playing the girl’s father (David Morse) from the role he plays on the current TV series, House MD. There he is a hard driving cop who is trying to balance and justify his vengefulness with the rule of the law. There the viewer initially had to hate him, because he was out to get the doctor, the real hero of the series. But there is an ethical dilemma, because technically he is right to do so, as the doctor is a sociopath and an addict. In this movie Morse, was playing a cop again, whose manners were callous and his parenting style direct and overprotecting. There the similarities end, so in the movie I eventually accepted that it is a different character.
My overall assessment is that the movie (i.e. the plot, the directing, and the acting) was disturbing enough to be engaging and interesting, but not charged enough to be a great one.
I would like to close with a question. I had the eerie feeling that the synagogue scene was shot in the same one where The Believer‘s desecration episode was done. Can somebody confirm this suspicion?