Le fantôme de Cat Dancing

A western that is equal or better than others westerns of its era. A strong cast with excellent performances by Jack Warren and Lee J. Cobb, it is the only Burt Reynolds movie I like. The scenery is outstanding and all the characters fit nicely in the roles and are believable. It reminds me of McCabe and Mrs. Miller but with more action The plot although not unique has its moments as the dynamics of the "gang" are played out. Burt has never been better and clearly missed his calling as a western hero, he plays the strong silent type much better than road he went down in his career.

John Wayne, Clint Eastwood, Humphry Bogart, James Coburn, Lee Marvin, Sean Connery, Harrison Ford -- well maybe not Harrison Ford -- created unique male personas on film and Burt Reynolds joins them. Cat Dancing is a 70's road film on horseback and Reynolds' performance shines with personal subtlety among other luminaries including Jack Warden, George Hamilton, Lee J. Cobb, and Jay Silverheels (AKA Tonto). The story line is not predictable and angst threads through the script. True love, what is it? The answer rolls down from the screen in Cat Dancing while Burt bites the dust and recovers. The Western by the 1970's was fading, but Cat Dancing proves the genre can be fresh in any decade.

This movie came up tonight on the television and though I had not seen it, I had certainly heard of it. The reviews almost scared me off, but happily I read some favourable ones and and took a chance.

Bert Reynolds gave a first class performance with subtlety, dignity and a quiet strength. His portrayal of a flawed but somewhat principled man with an unfortunate past was excellent and made me want to know more of the back story which I'm sure was in the book. Maybe it is that the book was written Marilyn Durham, and that the screenplay was by Eleanor Perry that gave the movie it's strength and tenderness ?

The treatment of the Shoshone and other First Nation people was very good; they spoke in full sentences with humour intelligence and wit. They came through as the three dimensional people they are instead of the mere shadows that most movies of the time showed them in; something long over due in Hollywood.

There were many good performances here, it is a movie worth seeing and deserves a serious place in the genre.

The most romantic Burt Reynolds I've ever seen is the Burt that heads the cast of The Man Who Loved Cat Dancing. He's also dangerous and deadly when he has to be.

Reynolds like James Garner is usually comic and cynical in his best remembered films. But in this one he becomes quite the romantic hero, almost like out of a romance novel especially to the object of his affection Sarah Miles.

Burt heads an outlaw gang that consists of Bo Hopkins, Jack Warden, and Jay Varela and one fine day while they're robbing a train Sarah Miles crosses their path. She's running away from her husband George Hamilton, her rich husband who's paying a lot of good wages for a personal posse. Caught in the middle of all this is Wells Fargo man Lee J. Cobb.

Reynolds and Miles make such a great romantic couple rarely seen in westerns. Jimmy Stewart and Debra Paget in Broken Arrow come closest to mind, but Stewart was an unabashed hero, not like Reynolds the outlaw.

The title refers to the name of Reynolds's Shoshone wife Cat Dancing who died years earlier. That story is essential to understanding how Reynolds's character developed as it did. Miles is a woman who finds true love, but also gets a lot of romantic notions knocked out of a silly head.

For fans of westerns and romance.

This exciting Western is a reasonable engaging tale in which a wealthy woman traveling by herself on horseback leaves her husband to take up riding with outlaws who have robbed a safe . At first , after a chance encounter , a beautiful lady called Catherine Crocker (Sarah Miles) recently escaped from her abusive hubby becomes involved with a band of train robbers led by Jay Grobart (Burt Reynolds , this was one of his first romantic love-stories on the screen) and three other men : Dawes (Jack Warden) , Billy Bowen (Bo Hopkins) and an Indian named Charlie Bent (Varela) who have carried out a robbing a train of its Wells Fargo cargo of $100,000 . In their escape from the crime scene they are chased by a motley group of bounty hunters . Jay has the ordinary problems of managing the three bandits , Dawes and Billy in particular who want to rape the attractive lady . In meantime , they are pursued by a posse led by the tough Harvey Lapchance (Lee J. Cobb), including a mining executive , Willard Crocker (George Hamilton) who results to be Catherine's husband . But the go-riding gets harder , as the bunch fall out among themselves and things go worse .

The plot is plain and simple , a dangerous gang on the lam are forced out of circumstance to take along an elegant lady -who holds a dark secret- , against her will , as she , like them , is running away ; while she is harassed and finally falls in love with the main star . As the picture reveals itself to be a romance and a throughly love story . The phrase "Cat Dancing" of the film and source novel's title refers to the name of the first wife of this movie's central character Jay performed by Burt Reynolds . It's a love on the run in which the protagonists , Jay/Burt and Catherine/Sarah , along the journey learn more about what is under the surface , and both of whom start to fall for each other ; as their tragic pasts coming close to making us care . Good interpretation all around . Burt Reynolds gives a passable acting as an outlaw on the run after avenging his spouse's murder and who has a posse on his trail . Burt Reynolds and Jack Warden apparently insisted on doing their own stunts for this movie . That's why the production filming was shut-down for a week when the movie's star Burt Reynolds was injured on the set from a stunt fight with Jack Warden . This movie is one of a number of screen westerns that Burt Reynolds made during the mid-late 1960s and early 1970s , these movie westerns include Navajo Joe (1966) ; 100 rifles (1969) ; Sam Whisky (1969) and this one . Sarah Miles is acceptable as Catherine Crocker , she was only cast in the lead role just a short time before production started shooting . Support cast is pretty good , such as : the good-looking George Hamilton as Willard Crocker , Lee J . Cobb as Harvey Lapchance , the investigator for Wells Fargo who has a posse of men on their command . Furthermore , Bo Hopkins , Robert Donner , Nancy Malone and Jay Silverheels who played several times the Indian role . Michel Legrand was originally hired to compose the musical score for the film but studio executives informed him that his score was not what they felt the film needed and that he was being dismissed, being replaced by the great John Williams . It packs a colorful and evocative cinematography by Harry Stradling Jr.

The motion picture was professionally directed by Richard C Sarafian , though Steven Spielberg William Norton and Brian G. Hutton both declined offers to direct this movie , as Sarafian became this movie's director after the original director left the project . Sarafian was a good craftsman . While employed as a reporter in Kansas City , he met the director, Robert Altman, who hired Sarafian as his assistant. Sarafian has a fruitful career making TV episodes and films and directing a classic iconic movie : Vanishing Point¨ (1971) , as his car chase sequence served as inspiration for Quentin Tarantino's Death Proof (2007) . Richard portrayed two real-life Mafia figures: Jack Dragna in ¨Bugsy¨ (1991) and Paul Castellano in ¨Gotti¨ (1996). And directed a lot of dramas and thrillers as ¨Gangster Wars¨ , ¨The next man¨, ¨Solar Crisis¨, ¨Run Wild , Run Free¨, ¨Terror at Black falls¨, ¨Fragment of Fear¨ , ¨Street Justice¨ and ¨Eye of the tiger¨