Another Man, Another Chance (1977)

Great Film overall

Good movie but grossly overrated

If the ambition is to provide two hours of instantly forgettable, popcorn-munching escapism, it succeeds.

All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

Well, call it a western or historical fiction, but this film definitely has both of those elements. Claude Lelouch excellently directed this film, which i believe was his first English-speaking or bilingual film. James Caan shines as Dr. David Williams, a widowed American vet, and Genevieve Bujold's performance as Jeanne, a widowed photographer's assistant, is equally impressive. After David's wife, Mary, is found brutally beaten to death, he takes his infant son and moves south where he places him in the care of Alice, an inept schoolteacher, wonderfully played by Susan Tyrrell. Jeanne and her photographer boyfriend, Francis, played by Francis Huster, flee France and come to America for a better life. They set up a photography studio in the West, and get married. But then tragedy strikes, and Jeanne becomes a widow with a baby girl. It's not until several years later that her and David's paths cross. Beautiful love story.

I saw this movie when I was in the army back in the 1970s. Along with Murder on the Orient Express and Cactus Flower, this is the only other movie I ever walked out of the theater on. My wife came with me to see the movie for something to do. She agreed that it sucked and that we should leave the theater, to do more important things, such as watch the linoleum curl on the kitchen floor. Hey, at least that had some suspense in it. Do yourself a favor, and rent Road Trip or Harold and Kumar instead, they were funny and entertaining, this was artsy stupid crap. Since I have nothing else to say and there is a ten line minimum, I just want to say that this thing stunk.

I am studying sound design and this movie blew me away. Watched it late night only because of the excellent James C. The most striking thing is when ever there is a violent scene, the director choose to fade out and loose all natural sound and simply play a simple but striking piece of piano. It distances you from the horror of the violence, it seemed to me to be as if I was being sheltered from the full effect. Powerful and poetic this was a revisionist western way ahead of its peers and only to be matched by Clint Eastwood's High plains drifter and Beguiled.

This is not a western, this is a dramatic love story set in the Old West. If you think Sergio Leone's "Once Upon A Time In The West" is slow and artsy you won't enjoy this film because it is even slower and more artistic. Good performances by Caan and Bujold can't help speed the pace of this drawn out love story. The only action takes place in the first 20 minutes of the film. The rest is pure love story which is okay but we've seen it all before in Lelouch's "A Man and a Woman."