McCabe & Mrs. Miller: The first anti-Western ever?

Not sure if you caught the late-night lineup on HBO recently, but they were throwing out some absolute classics. I managed to snag an old favorite—my first introduction to the anti-western genre—McCabe & Mrs. It’s got Warren Beatty and Julia Christ playing partners running a roadside inn out in the middle of nowhere, buried under the snow. There are a few other famous faces in there who made it big later, but those two carry the whole thing, backed by some genius Leonard Cohen tracks. A friend of mine actually told me she was going to go listen to the Sisters of Mercy... Well, let me tell you, that is definitely *not* the Sisters of Mercy from the Cohen soundtrack. Those songs are a lyrical ode to every working girl out there in that tough, necessary line of work—whereas the ones in this movie are actual saints and Sisters of Mercy.

What's your take on the flick?

It’s all garbage—Altman, this movie, those hacks, and Cohen with his mindless poetry. Honestly, the entire film industry, especially the American one, is just trash.

So, you think the film is good just because it’s an anti-western?!?!
I couldn't care less about westerns, let alone anti-westerns.

Actually... maybe I’m just blind and lack any aesthetic education. When most of the movies you people worship here are discussed, I see nothing more than ninety minutes of my life being wasted. If I even manage to find some popcorn nearby—then it's pure bliss...
Why am I even bothering to write anything here?😕

Robert Wood2 said:Why am I even bothering to write anything here at all?😕

Honestly, I’ve been asking myself that very same thing. 🙄

...
Emily Torres2 ... if you're looking for a little more demystifying of the Western genre,
I remember seeing an article over on the Guardian's website by Alex Cox arguing that all Westerns are actually secretly gay—but I just can't seem to track it down right now. 🤔

That movie is a classic, but honestly, it’s been way too long since I watched it, so my memory is a little fuzzy.
Personally, I’m much more of a fan of the term "post-western" over calling things "anti-western." To me, the whole vibe is cooler when they take certain parts of the myth and play with them without being totally bound by the rules of a "real" western.

mistyfox812 said:Law is a movie, but I saw it ages ago, so my memory's fuzzy. Personally, I dig "post-western" more than "anti-western." It feels better—like you can play with parts of the myth without being chained down by the rules of a "real" western.

Look, old-school westerns starring someone like John Wayne are total bullshit to me (could be gay too, if you believe Richard Hernandez13, thanks!). The whole thing is built on mystification and glorification—sugarcoating a brutal reality of lawlessness, killings, kidnappings, shootouts, and just plain filth.

In those old westerns, everyone’s cool, the lead is a hero instead of a killer, and the Wild West looks damn attractive...

That's why I think "anti-western" is a great term. It’s everything else: the opposite, the rejection of rose-colored glasses, the raw reality, the misery and poverty (which is great when you're talking about murder, land theft, or massacres, right?). In an anti-western like Unforgiven or my favorite, McCabe & Mrs. Miller, you get the grit. It describes the era, the conditions, and characters you might love or hate, but you see them in a real human light, stripped of the masks and the glory.

Richard Hernandez13, now that I think about it, considering how many dictators throughout history have loved the western, there’s probably a ton of homoeroticism in there—dominance, all those gun/penis associations, the obsession with weapons, killing, and seizing territory.

Why do people always feel the need to dump these totally random "cultural studies" theories on Westerns? If you actually sit down and pay attention to an old-school Western, it’s pretty clear that not everyone is some kind of icon. I mean, even McCabe is cool—at least in my book. Or look at someone like Cole Younger in Phil Kaufman's The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid (which, honestly, I think is way better than Altman's version). Take John Wayne in Stagecoach, where he's playing a bandit, versus Gary Cooper in High Noon, who's basically a coward. Then you've got the absolute powerhouse in Liberty Valance—the guy himself, Liberty Valance—who's just a thief, a bandit, a bully, a total sadist... basically a metaphor for all the violence baked into American society. And of course, Lee Marvin is the one playing him. Or in Fort Apache, you have Henry Fonda playing this stubborn militarist who stands absolutely no chance against the Apache because he's too stuck in his ways and can't wrap his head around "the other" civilization, so he ends up eating dust in the end. And don't even get me started on the personal tragedy of Ethan Edwards in The Searchers. He's probably only considered "cool" because he doesn't fit into civilization anymore—not theirs, and certainly not ours, if that's even a thing. He's a man who is "more of a stranger than a stranger," as Kafka once said about himself back in Prague. All these "theories" just don't hold water when you look at even a surface-level empirical analysis like this. As for that whole gay subtext argument in Westerns—you can find that in practically any genre if you really go looking for it.

Douglas Robinson12 said:It’s just like how Cole Younger comes across in Phil Kaufman's version of The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid—honestly, I think that one actually works better than Altman's take on the story.

Oh man, that one is just absolutely phenomenal. 👍

Emily Torres2 said:Look, personally, I think those old-school Westerns starring John Wayne are total bullshit (maybe they're even a bit gay, like Richard Hernandez13 was saying—thanks for that!). But the real issue is the myth-making and the glorification; it’s all just sugarcoating a brutal reality filled with lawlessness, killings, kidnappings, shootouts, and just general chaos.

In those old-school flicks, everyone is just so cool, the lead guy is a genuine hero rather than a killer, and the Wild West looks totally inviting...

That’s why I think "anti-Western" is such a perfect term—it's everything else. It’s the complete opposite, a rejection of those rose-colored glasses. It’s raw reality, misery, and grit (which, let's be honest, isn't exactly "fun" when you're talking about murder, land theft, or massacres). In an anti-Western like Unforgiven or my favorite, McCabe & Mrs., the harsh truth actually defines the era, the conditions, and the characters. You might love them or hate them, but you see them as actual humans, stripped of the masks and the glory.

Richard Hernandez13, now that I think about it, considering how many dictators throughout history have been obsessed with Westerns, there’s probably a ton of homoeroticism in there too—all that dominance, the constant gun/penis associations, the fascination with weapons, killing, and seizing territory.

Man, sounds like you haven't really seen enough of them. Seriously, go watch The Searchers on DVD. Dude, what a movie. Howard Hawks—who made a bunch of films with Wayne before that (including Rio Bravo, obviously)—once joked that he had no idea the guy could actually act!

mistyfox812 said:Man, it looks like you completely missed the mark on this one. Seriously, just grab *The Searchers* on DVD. What a movie! Howard Hawks—who made even more films with Wayne before that, including *Rio Bravo*—actually joked that he had no idea the guy could actually act.

Exactly. I remember Scorsese's *Guide through American film*—or something like that—where he breaks down how the American Western evolved. He shows how we gradually moved away from that classic superhero archetype, using Ford's and Duke's films like *Stagecoach*, *She Wore a Yellow Ribbon*, and *The Searchers* as the perfect examples.

Well, nobody (?) is actually claiming that "McCabe & Mrs. Miller" appeared out of thin air. But it wasn't quite as continuous a progression as some people would have us believe (?). There was more of a "quantum leap" involved here.
The only movie I can recall right now that even remotely resembles it is "Unforgiven."
As for "McCabe & Mrs. Miller," it’s an absolute five-star masterpiece. Pull up a chair, 5.

P.S. staying on topic: I don't think it really matters whether Altman intended to make a Western or an anti-Western. He probably had that in mind at the start, but later on, he likely just forgot all about those labels and simply made—a film.

Jason Morgan2 said:Look, nobody is actually out there claiming that *McCabe & Mrs.* just popped out of thin air, you know? But honestly, it didn't exactly evolve in one smooth, continuous line like some people try to make it sound. If you look at it closely, there was definitely this kind of "quantum leap" happening right there.
Honestly, the only movie I can wrap my head around right now that even remotely captures that same vibe is Unforgiven.

Honestly, I feel like the whole thing was way more continuous than you’re giving it credit for. If we're looking at the timeline, we really kicked things off with Ford. His whole "deconstruction" vibe starts as early as The Searchers back in '58 and basically hits its peak with Liberty Valance in '64. You might even want to throw Walsh's Pursued into the mix—if I remember my history right, that was the late '40s. Some people actually call that one the first psychoanalytical western. I wouldn't really drag Hawks into this specific conversation, though, because he’s definitely more of a traditionalist. On the flip side, you could argue Red River from '48 leans a little bit toward the revisionist side. But if we're talking about where things really shift, I’d point directly to High Noon. You've got that whole motif of the coward sheriff, plus that thick, almost Chaplinesque stupidity and small-town conformity; it’s obviously such a perfect metaphor for the fear gripping the country during the McCarthy madness. It’s that "Communist Western" that Hawks himself pointed out. After that, you really have to look at those B-Westerns from the '50s, especially those seven or eight gems directed by Budd Boetticher. And let's be real, Leone (and even Jarmusch) had seen all of this plenty of times before he finally decided to make For a Few Dollars More. The Tall T from '57 and Ride Lonesome from '59 are absolute, stone-cold classics. The whole concept of the West and what makes a hero was clearly shifting under our feet. Oh, and I can't forget Johnny Guitar from '54 by Nicholas Ray. Some folks call it total camp, while others see it as a feminist reading of the Western myth. Honestly, it’s probably both. Maybe also take a look at Delmer Daves' 3:10 to Yuma—it's like a "social" western centered around a pretty human outlaw.

People usually point to Arthur Penn's *The Left Handed Gun* from '58 as the first "official" anti-western—you know, that first real crack in the myth of Billy the Kid, played by Paul Newman. Honestly, the guy was clearly dealing with some serious sexual frustration, though maybe not quite as overtly as Warren Beatty and Clyde were in Penn's *Bonnie and Clyde* a decade later. Then you’ve got Leone stepping in, and of course, we have to talk about Peckinpah's masterpiece, *Ride the High Country*. That’s really when the 60s start to feel real—with JFK, Vietnam, the whole acid trip, the hippies... all that chaos. Some of the key "anti" westerns from that era include Monte Hellman's *The Shooting* and *Ride in the Whirlwind*, along with William Fraker's *Monte Walsh*, and obviously *The Wild Bunch* (which is great, don't get me wrong, but I don't think it hits quite as hard as some of Peckinpah's other stuff). Then there's Eastwood's *Hang 'Em High*, and Leone doing his trilogy run between '64 and '66, plus that wild Henry Fonda performance in *Once Upon a Time in the West*. I'd bet my life savings that Altman watched Hellman's and Fraker's films at least ten times before he ever sat down to make his own western. And by the way, looking at *McCabe & Mrs.*... compared to those other movies, it feels like a total positive utopia. It's practically a romance.

The sixties wrap up for me with Penn's Little Big Man—which, honestly, feels like such an ambitious masterpiece in my eyes, and clearly served as a lifelong source of inspiration for Jarmusch—and then there's my own personal Top 10 The Ballad of Cable Hogue by Sam Peckinpah.

So, we hit the 70s, and suddenly this whole "New Hollywood" crowd starts competing to see who can tear down Western myths the most effectively. Of course, the smartest ones among them realized that just smashing a myth using whatever trendy postmodern method was in vogue at the time—psychoanalysis being the big darling back then—wasn't enough. They figured you had to simultaneously build a new "myth" in its place, but this time, you had to ground it in actual historical reality. The absolute best of this bunch has to be Phil Kaufman (which honestly makes sense, given he actually studied history at Harvard), especially with *The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid*. In that flick, he basically breaks the legend of Jesse James down into subatomic particles; Duvall plays him as this totally impotent, dim-witted, frustrated, cold-blooded maniac. Meanwhile, Cole Younger, played by Cliff Robertson, is this sharp, cheerful, Dionysian type who’s actually embracing the 20th century and understands what you might call "progress." Then you've got that brilliant metaphor for America in Vietnam with Robert Aldrich's *Ulzana's Raid*, the hippie Western vibe following *Easy Rider*, Peter Fonda's *Hired Hand*, and that underrated gem from Dick Richards, *The Cullpepper Cattle Company*—I mean, cowboys on strike?! Then there's that wild portrayal of Billy the Kid in *Little Billy* by Stan Dragoti (if I remember the old legendary local translation right, they used to say Billy the Kid was just a total punk), which leaves absolutely nothing left of the Billy the Kid mythos, not to mention Eastwood's *High Plains Drifter*. All these films are popping up right around the same time as Altman's work, and personally, I think almost all of them are better than his stuff. And don't even get me started on *Unforgiven*—to me, that movie is a total miss. It feels way too forced, overly bombastic, heavy-handed, and just one of those "films with a message" that tries way too hard.

Pouka: Look, if you want to actually become a better person, just dive into Westerns—everything from the absolute classics to those gritty "anti-westerns." It really does work.

When you lay everything out so beautifully and systematically like this, I have to admit that it feels like you might actually be "more right" than I thought 😁. Even though I’ve seen most of the films you mentioned, I don't think I ever really dove deep into the subject matter. But still—my heart just pulls me in a different direction: "McCabe & Mrs." is one of my absolute favorite films, and I just can't help myself.
🙂

I won't even get started on Unforgiven, which I found to be a complete miss. It feels incredibly heavy-handed, overly literal, and just too strained—this sort of "preachy" film trying way too hard to deliver a message.

Whoa! We might actually have to have a disagreement over this one. Are you perhaps more a fan of Westerns in general rather than actual filmmaking?

What strikes me as particularly fascinating about Unforgiven is that it is an Eastwood film—specifically, the same Eastwood who played Dirty Harry and all those iconic characters in Spaghetti Westerns. It’s only within that specific context that you can truly appreciate how good Unforgiven actually is.

Because, when you look at what William Munny does in Unforgiven, he's doing the exact same thing as Dirty Harry—walking around and shooting people he doesn't like (though Harry does have a badge, much like Gene Hackman's Little Bill). What elevates Unforgiven to greatness is the realization that Dirty Harry is essentially the same man as Munny—a hard-edged individual who simply cannot suppress the darker parts of his nature, driven by vengeance and irrational rage.

Clint Eastwood has matured so significantly (which is an incredibly rare thing to witness) that he realized Harry and Munny are fundamentally the same character. That is how I interpret it, and I suppose that is why I find the film so compelling.
🙂

Douglas Robinson12 said:...whereas Cole Younger (Cliff Robertson) is this smart, cheerful, Dionysian type who actually embraces the 20th century and understands what he’d call "progress."

Kaufman (wherever he ended up, by the way 😢) uses what I personally think is the absolute best way to demystify the Western.
It isn't about portraying cowboys as these filthy, greedy, corrupt, ugly thugs just shooting each other in the back (though there is some progress in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid—I’ll never forget that scene where Duvall is dressed up like a little old lady 😁). Nor is it about any sort of gay subtext. I really have to set the record straight regarding Emily Torres when she claims that's my stance 😉—to me, trying to find gay subtext in every single movie or genre always felt like a bit of a stretch.

Kaufman simply lets us know that it was a mythic era, just like any other... one that passed. Dammit, new times came along, new people arrived, and new things happened.
Like in The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid, at the end, when we see Cole Younger in that cage, the narrator explains how he survived his wounds and witnessed "a new era".
In Cable Hogue's (which happens to be Peckinpah's favorite film), the director does the exact same thing with a heavy dose of irony: Robards gets run over by a car at the end; that musical number didn't quite hit the mark for me. 😁

Good grief, now that I'm typing this out, I just remembered Andrija Maurović and his masterpiece Trio in the Dark, where technology also plays a huge role for the hero (the telegraph is way faster than his elusive horse 😉).
When was that comic even published? Honestly, you could probably argue that Maurović was the very first person to deconstruct the Western. 😁😁😁

...
By the way, Douglas Robinson12, since you're across the pond... have you had a chance to check out HBO's 🤔Deadwood
? Has that even started yet?

Douglas Robinson12 said:most are better than him, not to mention Unforgiven which was a total miss for me. Very predictable, overly dramatic, strained, a "heavy" film "with a message."

I get the feeling you feel the exact same way about Mystic River. 😉

So, *Deadwood* has finally kicked off, but I’ll be honest, I haven't really been able to find my rhythm with it yet. It's coming right on the heels of *The Sopranos*, which have been absolutely crushing it lately and getting back into that incredible groove. Just from a quick glance at the vibe, it feels like this weird, beautiful blend of Clint Eastwood's post-*Pale Rider* era mixed with the aesthetics of *Dead Man*—visually speaking, at least. I just haven't quite latched onto it personally. I still haven't sat down to watch *Mystic River* either. Honestly, I just couldn't bring myself to get into it.

George Cruz65 said:Exactly! I can still vividly recall that Scorsese's Guide through American film—or something along those lines—where he breaks down that massive shift in the American Western landscape, specifically how we started moving away from that classic superhero archetype. He uses the evolution of the genre to show how we drifted from the traditional heroics found in the works of Ford and Duke, using films like Stagecoach, She Wore a Yellow Ribbon, and The Searchers as the perfect benchmarks for that transition.

The absolute highlight of that entire documentary has to be the anecdote... you know, that moment when they actually asked Fritz Lang what he thought about the then-new CinemaScope film format, and his response was just pure gold: It’s perfectly suited for filming snakes and funerals. 😂

It’s a revisionist western rather than an anti-western; you don't see that "anti" sentiment even in the work of Altman or Kaufman, and certainly not with Arthur Penn. The New Hollywood era of the seventies wasn't inherently "anti" anything, despite what the armchair intellectuals usually prefer to believe. It was simply, as the name implies, *new*. It offered a fresh, different perspective on the status quo—a revisionist lens, if you will.

I’m not sure if you can even call it an anti-Western—whatever—but it’s a hell of a movie. Easily one of Altman's best. Plus, you've got that L. Cohen score. You'd be crazy not to watch it...

Truly one of the finest pieces of American cinema from the seventies.

wiredbison82 said:Truly one of the best American films from the seventies.

🙂