Randy Quaid and Harry Dean Stanton

(On Cable TV, June 2022) While I’ll never deny the appeal of an intriguing cast, it’s not a guarantee of success. If you know about 1970s Hollywood, the top-line cast and crew of The Missouri Breaks sounds like a wonder:   Director Arthur Penn! Stars Marlon Brando, Jack Nicholson, Randy Quaid and Harry Dean Stanton! What’s not to like? Well, plenty:  With Brando in the cast and a script intent on being a downbeat revisionist western, this is one film where the making-of stories are far more interesting than the film itself. According to legend, Brando was almost uncontrollable on set, going in his own bizarre eccentricities at the expense of the film’s tonal integrity. The production was plagued by bad weather, harsh on-location shooting, and a horse died while filming. Much of this is imperceptible in the finished product… except for Brando’s eccentricities, which are enough to make anyone wonder what was going on there. The rest of The Missouri Breaks doesn’t fly particularly high: intent on rejecting decades of Western tradition, the film doesn’t have much to offer instead. It plays like dull wallpaper whenever Brando is off-screen, never quite fulfilling the promise of its marquee names.