Mrs. Sundance (1974)

I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Touches You

If you don't like this, we can't be friends.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

I noticed that some of the reviewers enjoyed this film. As for me, I really don't understand why it was made in the first place and cannot recommend it.The film is set after Butch and Sundance supposedly died in a shootout in Bolivia around 1900. However, there are rumors that the Sundance Kid somehow survived and the film is about a plot to find Sundance's girlfriend (not wife), Etta (Elizabeth Montgomery) and then use her to lead authorities to the other surviving members of the Hole in the Wall Gang. Jack Maddox (Robert Foxworth) is a guy who claims to have known Sundance and offers to help Etta return to the gang's old hideout--though he's actually working for folks trying to claim the various rewards. Believe it or not, there really isn't much more to the film than this. And, by the end of the film you realize that Sundance IS dead as is the rest of the gang....which makes me wonder why they bothered making the film in the first place. A slow, meandering film with only an exciting ending to make up for all the dull stuff that preceded it. It just seems like this made for TV film was made to cash in on the success of the famous film....and, if so, why not get Katharine Ross for the lead?

At times entertaining, this is a highly speculative work of fiction that presents a 'what if' on the saga of Etta Place, girlfriend, and some say wife of Harry 'The Sundance Kid' Longabaugh. The whereabouts and fate of the real Etta Place (even her real name is in dispute) are shrouded in mystery, one of the more compelling puzzles in the history of the Old West.So for what it is, the picture offers up a scenario in which Etta (Elizabeth Montgomery) remains on the run following her adventures with Butch and Sundance, staying a step ahead of the law and bounty hunters determined to take advantage of her capture. The only real attempt at a connection to the original 1969 movie occurred when Jack Maddox (Robert Foxworth) and Etta arrived at her former homestead, and the old 'Raindrops Keep Fallin' on my Head' bicycle showed up with the tune lightly playing in the background.It's probably a plus that the movie didn't try to subvert the legend of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, even if part of the story line dealt with the Kid's survival following the Bolivian ambush. More recent historical research suggests that Robert Leroy Parker might have made it, but if you go with that theory you probably also caught an Elvis sighting.One observation that came to me while watching was the striking resemblance Foxworth had to another legendary actor, Steve McQueen. I really never noticed it before, and I used to catch him all the time back in the day in shows like 'Falcon Crest' and made for TV flicks of the Eighties. Born roughly a decade later than McQueen, it might have made sense to cast him in the lead on the life of the celebrated actor, but I'd say that that clock has run out by now.

Elizabeth Montgomery was a fine actress, but she was hardly the frontier-type, and her refined, ladylike way of speaking (not to mention her painful bouncing in the horse's saddle) makes for an unlikely portrayal of Etta Place, girlfriend of notorious outlaw The Sundance Kid, herself wanted for robbery and treason. Director Marvin Chomsky attempts to set a dusty, dreamlike mood, and the opening (filmed in sepia tone) is promising. Unfortunately, the story really doesn't make much sense. Etta, tired of hiding out because of the bounty on her, tells a two-bit robber she's ready to turn herself in, yet he feeds her a lie about Sundance still being alive so that a legendary bounty hunter can capture her. Cheap, slim made-for-TV movie, mostly filmed on Fox's backlot, has a few scenes that work, but Chomsky doesn't fare too well with crowd scenes, and an opening moment where Etta watches her life portrayed on the stage is woefully slack. The picture is also not helped by poor editing and mediocre photography. Katharine Ross played Etta Place in 1969's "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid"; she returned to the role in 1976 with the TV-movie, "Wanted: The Sundance Woman".

I'm not a fan of Westerns; I saw this movie only for the lovely star of "Bewitched." Stepping temporarily into the role of Etta Place created by Katherine Ross, Ms. Montgomery gives a very good performance in this movie along with Robert Foxworth (her future husband) and Robert Donner. While this movie may not be a sequel per se to the Butch/Sundance flick, the script is hard to follow and meters along barely moving to an end. It can be said that the television witch does do her best work with the most meaty of characters, such as psychos like Lizzie Borden, or interesting individuals such as Edna Buchanan. Foxworth pulls his own in his role, but most of the my attention was for Liz. Perhaps an afficianado of Westerns can give a better critique of this movie than I.