Midnight Cowboy

I'm four-fifths of the way through the Best Picture nominees of 1969, and now turn to the winner, Midnight Cowboy. In terms of how it compared to previous Best Picture winners, it was sort of like Bob Beamon's smashing of the long jump record the year before--way ahead.

Midnight Cowboy was the first and will be the only X-rated film to win the top prize. The X rating has since disappeared, co-opted by the adult film industry, and the NC-17, which replaced it about thirty years ago, is almost never applied. Today the film merits an R, but it certainly has heavy sexual overtones, including homosexuality, which really put the film ahead of its time.

It is the story of an unlikely friendship, between Joe Buck, an innocent from Texas who comes to New York City to be a hustler (male prostitute) and Enrico "Ratso" Rizzo, a crippled con man. Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman both earned Oscar nominations for their work (ironically, they were beaten by John Wayne, who is mentioned in the film as an example of a cowboy who is not gay).

The first part of the film has Voight finding his way in the city. To the tune of "Everybody's Talkin' At Me," sung by Harry Nilsson, he walks the streets, looking for rich woman who might pay him for his time. A memorable shot of his cowboy-hat-clad head emerging from a crowd of people has become iconic. But Voight isn't a very good businessman, and his first assignation, with Sylvia Miles, ends up with him paying her. (Miles, who has only six minutes of screen time, also earned an Oscar nomination).

Voight then meets Hoffman, who says he will set him up with a pimp. He takes twenty of Voight's dollars and sends him to see John McGiver, who turns out to be a crazed evangelist. Voight tracks Hoffman down, but they make amends, and Voight, locked out of his hotel room, rooms with Hoffman in a condemned building, with no heat or electricity.

Midnight Cowboy is a celebration of grime, as that set (it was re-constructed from an actual building in New York) is enough to give a viewer the creepy crawlies. But to these two men it becomes home, and the two bond together. Hoffman is ill and yearns to go to Florida, which he sees as a paradise where his lungs will clear out. Voight, after realizing hustling is not his game (he resorts to selling himself to men, and has another bad experience with a very young Bob Balaban--he really should have learned to take the money up front).

While Midnight Cowboy, directed by John Schlesinger, is dated, with the kind of frenetic editing that '60s cinema is known for, with herky-jerky flashbacks and switching from color to black and white, the friendship at the core of the film still works, even though either man wouldn't be able to articulate why they stick together. Another memorable scene is when the two go to a party (which was cast with many of Andy Warhol's crowd). Hoffman parks himself at the buffet table, wolfing down salami, while Buck meets Brenda Vaccarro, who takes him home. He has his first bout of impotence, but when she accuses of him of being gay that kick starts him.

Schlesinger was gay and British, so he brings a unique perspective to this kind of American story. Joe Buck is not a cowboy, but he dresses like one, and Hoffman tells him that that look is now for gay men (the film wincingly uses the words "fag" and "faggot" numerous times). The cowboy gear will end up in a trash can, replaced with a candy-colored polo and a Hawaiian shirt for Hoffman.

This was Voight's first starring role, and he wasn't the first choice to play the part. Michael Sarrazin was cast, but was fired when he asked for more money. Hoffman took the role despite Mike Nichols telling him was crazy for doing it, as he had just become a star with a romantic lead in The Graduate, and was now playing someone completely scuzzy. Hoffman has the most famous line in the film, "I'm walking' here!" when a cab almost runs him down in the street. That line was improvised, as the scene was shot guerrilla style, and that cab almost did hit Hoffman, who stayed in character.

This is one those great films that would never be made today, and it's kind of hard to imagine it being made back then. While prostitutes had been a common character type in Hollywood for years (without them being explicitly called prostitutes) the male prostitute was unknown, especially one who has sex with another man. That Midnight Cowboy ended up being embraced by the critics, and by the Academy, seems a minor miracle.