CUTTER'S WAY (1981) * What do you get when you mix poor acting, a dumb and lazy script that must surely be based on a dumber novel (and you're too afraid to do further research), a concept loosely based on the "gray area" between amorality and immorality, a director who can't even shoot coastal California to look interesting, a bunch of dark drinking (if you resemble *any* of these characters turn yourself in to detox immediately), inconsequential music for scenes that are supposed to be of consequence, cinematography bereft of any redeeming quality if you dismiss the horse...you get the idea, and the answer is all of slight nausea, extreme boredom, and a portion of life wasted. Don't do it. Jeff Bridges is a, well not a beach dude so much as a...just a dude. John Heard masters his complex Vietnam amputee character at times, but even then you wish he hadn't. The abysmal quality of Jack Nitzsche's music makes you wonder how much "help" he got with the fabulously proletarian poignant stuff that he fasioned at other times with Neil Young. Of course I recall hearing that Jack had issues, similar in substance and consequence to those of the characters depicted here, and this stuff is more acceptable (not just music, entire film) if it could somehow be clothed in the respectability of rehab. But if they're getting better, how come they have to pass it on to the audience?
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