Saturday, August 10, 2024

The Last Picture Show (1971)

IMDb plot summary: In 1951, a group of high schoolers come of age in a bleak, isolated, atrophied North Texas town that is slowly dying, both culturally and economically.
Directed by Peter Bogdanovich. Starring Timothy Bottoms, Jeff Bridges, and Cybill Shepherd.

The Last Picture Show is a coming-of-age story by Peter Bogdanovich about a young adult graduating high school in a tiny Texas town. We follow him and a few of his peers as he tries to navigate life and relationships, including an affair with an older married woman. This is an extremely atmospheric movie, to the point where it made me deeply, almost viscerally claustrophobic. The choice to film in sepia-tinted black and white keeps the whole film feeling closed in, even in scenes featuring the sprawling Western desert that *should* feel more open. I admit some of this may come from my own growing up in a small town (though not nearly as small as this one) and having absolutely zero desire to return to it, so some of this might be a personal response. But I just couldn't get myself terribly interested in these people's lives that just seemed doomed to the same cycle over and over. There's clearly deliberate thought put into all the choices to make the movie. It just doesn't do much for me.

How it entered my Flickchart:
The Last Picture Show < Le voyage au Groenland
The Last Picture Show < Obvious Child
The Last Picture Show < Annie (1982)
The Last Picture Show > Hidalgo
The Last Picture Show > The Story of the Weeping Camel
The Last Picture Show > Sahara
The Last Picture Show > The Country Bears
The Last Picture Show > Fun With Dick and Jane (2005)
The Last Picture Show > The Passion of Joan of Arc
The Last Picture Show > Cocktail
The Last Picture Show > No More Baths
The Last Picture Show > Mission to Mars
Final spot: #3445 out of 3936, or 12%.

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