Texasville

Unless you saw Peter Bogdanovich's classic The Last Picture Show, if you even start at the beginning of Texasville you'll feel like you've walked in on the film in the middle and have to catch up. I'm not sure the film is capable of standing on its feet so to speak.

Anarene, Texas in The Last Picture Show is about the passing away of the old values that gave Texas the culture it has, the small town looks like it's about to shrivel and blow away like a tumbleweed as that film ended. But in the intervening thirty years, the town seems to have experienced a renaissance due to oil and the high prices it commands for energy. If you remember in Urban Cowboy, John Travolta leaves home and hearth in a place that looks like Anarene for a job in the Houston petrochemical industry which was booming in 1980.

But if you also remember between those years the OPEC nations let loose a glut of oil on the world market which drove the price down worldwide. The bank that Jeff Bridges is now the head of is caught in a nice financial squeeze investing in some wells locally that better produce and soon. Sad to say that's another historical point that might even get lost on an audience 25 years later.

Still of the half a dozen or so cast members who repeated their roles from The Last Picture Show in Texasville, materially Bridges has made out the best. But he's also got a wife in Annie Potts who's bored with the marriage, half a dozen kids, including William McNamara who's having sex with half the women in the town. Just a chip off the old block. Bridges facing financial ruin just about caps things off for the Jackson family.

Cybill Shepherd the teen dream queen of the Fifties went to Europe and became an actress, but whose marriage to a continental fizzled and a son died. Rich and somewhat dissipated, she's just back to her roots.

Timothy Bottoms the other half of the running backs from the high school with Bridges has not done really well. He owns a greasy spoon eatery and he's getting by. But he's struck with a mysterious malady which could be anything from a brain tumor to early onset Alzheimer's. We never really find out in Texasville.

Texasville has ambitions to be a character study like Long Day's Journey Into Night and these people are interesting though not the same league as the Tyrone family. But the film, interesting in spots though it is, relies too much on its roots from The Last Picture Show to stand on its own.

Well, I want to know what the hell happened how can this movie be the sequel to the wonderful "Last Picture Show". "Picture Show" gave us an excellent story and compassionate characters. "Texasville" is awful, Cybil Shepard is so annoying as Jacy and who cares about her pathetic life now...she was a spoiled brat in "picture Show" and in this she is the same but now she is a lead character, in the "Last Picture Show" she was a side character as is Jeff Bridges character Duane. Timothy Bottoms was the star and in "Texasville" he is nothing, his story line is awful. He just wonders around with a tired head and a sad lonely life. Maybe Timothy Bottoms does do a good job looking sad, lonely and depressed I wonder why??. Sonny was so great in "Picture Show" why didn't he get a decent story?? Why is there no story in Texasville at all. The big thing is Duane is in debt and him and Jacy are in a stupid play together. I don't think they even mention that Jacy and Sonny ran off and got married or if they did mention any thing from the past it was short and sweet like the love story between sonny and cloris leachman character, Ruth Popper what happened there. She says "He loved me once" so now he stays in my trailer and she exercises all the time in the movie maybe because she once was married to a gym teacher who knows maybe somewhere there is symbolism but unfortunately I never cared enough to look. The movie has a small climax where I think Sonny might have attempted suicide well then jeff bridges suggest that they all go and get breakfast at the local DQ and everything will work out. Of course the viewer never finds out because that would have been to hard to put substance into this movie. So La DI Da it's over. I mean I know Cybil Shepard and Jeff Bridges are the most popular actors in the movie but to move so far away from the original and really just make a depressing sad little movie. Everybody is having affairs and all the kids are brats no wonder this is the most dysfunctional town in the world. I wasted two hours on this film and now I have to go rent the original to get this bad taste out of my mouth from Texasville.

Having never had the patience or the time of sitting through The Last Picture Show, I picked this movie up on a whim. I had seen once several years ago with my family and remembered it as being OK. For some unknown reason, I came across it at Amazon.com and decided to order it to watch it again. The second time I watched it, I enjoyed it, but some of the nuances of the movie seemed to be lacking. I suppose if I had seen the original movie I might have had more of an idea of what some of the plot twists meant. Annie Potts is at her best here playing the wife of the main character. Cybill Shepherd's character (Jaycee) while having just suffered the loss of a child seemed even more emotionless than one would expect after sustaining such a loss. I did enjoy the location of the movie (Texas) and the craziness of small town living.

Overall the ensemble cast is decent, but the movie is somewhat long and tends to drag. There's also not much resolution at the end which disappointed me (I liked my movies to end with a nice wrap up or a decent "pull-together" at the end). If you enjoy any of the actors, it's worth watching.

6/10

On first viewing I would have voted a 5. But something stuck with me and I've watched the movie - studied the movie - about 8 or 9 times now ... in three weeks. Texasville is brilliant. True to 80s American oil country livin', wonderfully shot to capture big-sky light, and so full of detail one or two or even three viewings are not enough. I'd say the density of nuance is easily twice the standard movie average. That many will dislike this movie is not surprising. Contrary to first impressions, Texasville is not popular culture. As a cut above, this movie will fly right on by most viewers - particularly those many who will not or cannot relate to anything in it. But for those of us who've lived some Texasville ... many thanks are owed Peter, Larry, Cybil, Jeff and the rest.

With the exception of Timothy Bottoms and Cloris Leachman, and the addition of Annie Potts, the acting fell far short of its predecessor, The Last Picture Show. I felt as if fading legends returned for one last curtain call, leaning upon greying memories of better times rather than reaching in and dusting off their talents. Bottoms and Leachman were, again, superb. Quaid was immediately tiresome.

Another note: the sound (not soundtrack) left something to be desired - many scenes had background levels that over-rode the centerpiece of attention. I watched it twice and still was distracted by it. Reviewing the Soundman's credits (over 300 items), I was unable to discern if this film was a fluke or if it was his trademark - because none of the listed items had I ever had the inclination to watch.

So, overall, this is a 3 of 10, unless you catch it for Bottoms, Leachman and Potts.. then an 8.