(or: Movie Review #7)
(Side note: it has been a while since I've written a movie review, and since many of you have suggested that I write about an older film instead of always writing about recent ones, I thought I would review a timeless classic. And thus begins a new series of movie reviews.)
"I ain't a f'real cowboy. But I am one helluva stud!"
Midnight Cowboy. If you haven't seen it, you probably know of it as the only X-rated movie to ever win Best Picture at the Oscars. But there's much more to it than its record-breaking film rating...
The film's plot is pretty simple, but it's delivered in a very compelling and powerful way. Joe Buck (Jon Voight) is a small town man from Texas who decides to leave his job as a dishwasher and hop on a bus heading to New York City. How does he plan on making a living there? By being a male prostitute, of course! He seems pretty confident that rich women are into that sort of thing and that he can make any one of them fall head over heels for his cowboy act. Typically, his dreams of living the easy life are crushed as he repeatedly fails at hustling or finding clients willing to pay for his services. In this downward spiral, he meets the sickly Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman)-- another outcast-- and together they build up their friendship and dreams as they struggle to survive in the Big Apple.
