Badlands (1973)

User Rating:

7.9/10   

Director:

Terrence Malick

Writer:

Terrence Malick (written by)

Release Date:

7 April 1975 (Sweden)

Genre:

Adventure | Crime | Drama | Romance | Thriller

Tagline:

He was 25 years old. He combed his hair like James Dean. She was 15. She took music lessons and could twirl a baton. For a while they lived together in a tree house. In 1959, she watched while he killed a lot of people.

Plot:

Dramatization of the Starkweather-Fugate killing spree of the 1950's, in which a teenage girl and her twenty-something boyfriend slaughtered her entire family and several others in the Dakota badlands.

Plot Keywords:

Killing Spree | Murder | Badlands | Montana | 1950s

Awards:

Nominated for BAFTA Film Award. Another 3 wins

Cast

Martin Sheen	...	Kit
Sissy Spacek	...	Holly
Warren Oates	...	Father
Ramon Bieri	...	Cato
Alan Vint	...	Deputy
Gary Littlejohn	...	Sheriff
John Carter	...	Rich Man
Bryan Montgomery	...	Boy
Gail Threlkeld	...	Girl
Charles Fitzpatrick	...	Clerk
Howard Ragsdale	...	Boss
John Womack Jr.	...	Trooper
Dona Baldwin	...	Maid
Ben Bravo	...	Gas attendant

Runtime:

94 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | Spanish

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

Singapore:PG | Australia:PG | UK:15 (re-rating) (2008) | UK:18 (video rating) | Australia:M (DVD rating) | New Zealand:R16 | Finland:K-15 (re-rating) (2003) | Finland:K-16 (re-rating) (1987) | Ireland:15 | Norway:15 | Sweden:15 | USA:PG | West Germany:16 | Finland:K-18 (1980) | Portugal:M/16 (DVD rating) | UK:X (original rating)

Filming Locations:

Colorado, USA

Company:

Badlands Company

Trivia:

Although Charlie Starkweather had been executed when the movie came up for production, Caril Fugate was still alive and facing parole, prompting the filmmakers to change the names of the principal characters to avoid a lawsuit.

Goofs:

Anachronisms: Even though this film takes place in 1959 the soldiers at the end of the movie can be seen with M14 rifles, which replaced the M1, and M16 rifles which replace the M14. First deliveries of the M14 were made to the US Army in July of 1959 and were not in wide circulation until 1961. It is unlikely that National Guard units in Montana would have been among the first recipients. The M16 wasn't put into service until 1964, five whole years after this movie took place. Also, the rifles carried lack any magazines - meaning the troops are carrying unloaded weapons.

Quotes:

Kit Carruthers: Hey, I found a toaster.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in Horror Business (2005) (V)

Soundtrack:

A BLOSSOM FELL

Badlands, you gotta live it everyday...

It's really a shame that Terrence Malick didn't have the brilliant career he deserved at Hollywood. Shot with a nearly shoestring budget, "Badlands" remains one of the most dazzling debut movies of all time. Malick's legend based on his (long) absence has helped it to become a cult-movie. Inspired by a tragic short news item which took place in 1959 (a young couple who decides to commit a series of free murders to leave a mark in history), the odds are that Malick's first feature-length movie inspired Oliver Stone and Quentin Tarantino for their dangerous and irresponsible "Natural Born Killers" (1994). Concerning Tarantino, I read an interview about him in which he expressed his admiration of Malick's work. It shows that the author of "Pulp Fiction" (1994) has a great esteem for this talented and mysterious film-maker. At the same time, we can also note down that Malick's work inspired Bruce "the Boss" Springsteen two songs: "Badlands" on his "darkness on the edge of town" album (1978) and "nebraska" on the eponymous LP(1982).

An American journalist had written that "Badlands" was the best mastered movie in the history of cinema since "Citizen Kane" (1941) by Orson Welles. One can judge this affirmation as exaggerated but it is nevertheless indisputable that Malick's opus strikes on numerous aspects: an assertive and opaque story, a fluid making, a relevant screenplay, an original photography which gives to the landscapes an image of desolation and lost paradise perturbed by a free violence. The work is also strongly steeped in a certain poetry.

Concerning the two main characters, a French critic had written that it was difficult to feel liking for these two irresponsible. I think that this critic badly analyzed the film. Terrence Malick doesn't try to make them likable to us. He describes them without kindness and condescension. They haven't got an imposing personality and live only through an intermediary myth. It is particularly obvious for the young man (Martin Sheen) who is obsessed with James Dean. One can also say that Sissi Spacek's voice-over which tells this dramatic story is of an amazing neutrality. Then, unlike many criminal lovers, Sheen and Spacek will live at the heart of this violence and the latter won't bring them together or take them away.

With "Badlands", Malick was judicious for the choice of the actors. In a way, his first movie enabled to put Sheen and Spacek on the map and it also launched their respective careers. Then, what happened to Terrence Malick after this sensational debut movie? A second movie, "Days of Heaven" (1978) starring Richard Gere as successful as "Badlands". After that, for twenty years, nothing. However, in 1998, Malick made a rather successful come-back with "the Thin Red Line" (1998). According to the latest news, he would currently shoot a movie about the first years of America's colonization in the beginning of the seventeenth century. If my memory serves me well, the movie will be released next year. Let's hope so...