Hannie Caulder (Kennedy, 1971) & Extreme Prejudice (Hill, 1987):
Cinema Museum, 6pm
This is a Lost Reels 16mm double-bill. Full details here.
Chicago Reader review of Extreme Prejudice:
Walter Hill (48 HRS.) returns to familiar action turf (and almost to top
form after bottoming out with Brewster’s Millions and Crossroads) with
this story of an old-fashioned Texas lawman (Nick Nolte) who clashes
with a special forces unit assigned to eliminate a Mexican drug dealer
(Powers Boothe). Hill intends a familiar values-in-conflict story line
(flattering, as usual, to tradition at the expense of unscrupulous
modernity), but the real line of tension is the relation between Nolte
and Boothe, once close friends, now sexual and moral rivals. Boothe
comes on as pure 40s archetype, a brooding John Ford apparition in white
suit and Stetson (the moral/visual paradox is obvious but mythically
effective); he’s an odd, commanding figure, and Nolte, shrinking into
his ranger outfit (huh?), really can’t compete. Still, the character
interactions are strong, especially for this depleted genre, and Hill’s
tight, efficient styling recovers a lot of lost formal ground: his
framing and crosscutting are as sharp as ever, and the bloodbath finale
is, improbably, a model of intelligent restraint, the classicist’s
answer to Peckinpah baroque. With Michael Ironside. Maria Conchita
Alonso, and Rip Torn in a scene-stealing cracker-barrel turn.
Pat Graham
Here (and above) is the trailer for Extreme Prejudice.
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