Rating: 
Summary: Greyhound trip to hell!
Review: leave Texas small town, go to NYC, finally end up in Miami! Great movie of a NY hustler from texas, as he struggles in NYC with his ill friend, on the mean streets.
Rating: 
Summary: Friendship in misery
Review: This film is a classic and a cult film. A young Dustin Hoffman cuts out a part that is so brilliant and so moving that the film will remain in our minds no matter how long ago we have seen it. The hustling cowboy in New York was a myth in the 60s, but the film does not only work on ambiguous situations in that business, but takes advantage of the situation to depict New York under a very sad and dark light. People are indifferent to their neighbors. A man can die in the middle of the sidewalk, yet no one will even stop to check upon him. New York has a tremendous amount of poverty, misery and suffering, and this film only speaks of the whites in New York. To the point that Rico, the main character, is living on a dream, the dream to go to Florida. His situation is so dramatic that his friend Joe will, thanks to violent stealing in a sexual situation that will prevent the victim from speaking, realize his dream and take him to Florida. Unluckily he will die when crossing the city limits of Miami. He will have seen Florida from his seat on a bus but never set one foot on the ground. This dream is of course a sour version of the American dream, a dream that turns into a death march. But it is also a testimony of what was happening in the US in the 60s : poverty was discovered, total solitude and absolute isolation was common place in these big cities, and some tragedies were looming behind. It is thus a film about the coming of age of America, of White America, and their discovery that their world is not entirely what advertising and propaganda say all the time. This will lead to riots, upheavals, social crises, and many other evils in a society that was finally understood as being unequal, unegalitarian. It was the time when Warhol shot his own films, « Flesh » and « Trash », and this one is following exactly the same line.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU
Rating:
Summary: Midnight Cowboy: A Classic.
Review: By way of starting this review, I want to say there's one reviewer who said that few adolescents or young adults will appreciate this film. Now, I can understand that (or can imagine that), but honestly, if you can relate at all with other people in a more than shallow way, Midnight Cowboy will be quite an experience, I think. I'm in my early twenties and would, according to present standards, qualify as an adult, but certainly I haven't myself been in the gutter yet, nor been to the pawn shop, nor etc., etc.. nevertheless, I consider this a very strong film. Of course I won't go into subject matter/themes/summary of MC, as that will be redundant and would rob you of half the fun. Most probably other reviewers have taken the liberty of being more informative. Rather I stain blank 'paper' with words urging you to rush out and buy MC. Repeat: watch MC. Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman are terrific here. Also I was led to believe that this film contained graphic you-know-what, and indeed MC was rated X upon release, but nothing of the sort occurred. Must have been the drug party that caused all the controversy; there's nothing shocking about it these days.
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Summary: One of my favourite movies ever ! A MASTERPIECE
Review: I will not tell about the story. I prefer you give it a try and see by yourself. What I can say, is it's like Easy Rider, this movie tells so much about the American society of the 70's. It's a masterpiece. Dustin Hoffman and John Voight are amazing.You will never forget the acting, the music, the unfortunate destiny of the 2 main individuals.Please buy or hire it.Watch it and see. It's certainly one of the movies I've been watching and watching again and again years to years. It's a masterpiece !
Rating:
Summary: Transcendent
Review: A movie about relationships during trying times in a trying city has become a cliche since the dawning of cinema. However, Midnight Cowboy essentially popularized this theme impeccably and immaculately. Winner of best picture in 1969, this was the first film of its subject matter which, originally rated X, reached the hearts and minds of millions. To date, the picture has yet failed to leave an emotional impact on its audiences. I recommend this to anybody who enjoys following the impulsive reality of the inexperienced individual who endeavours into unknown lands. The unpredictability of the film will leave you with a gulp in your throat as well as with a new appreciation for legendary acting. Enjoy.
Rating:
Summary: None Better
Review: I asked my mother to take me to this movie back in '69, I was only 16 or 17 and the movie was rated X. I've never seen a better combination of performance, story and music, in that order. Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman were both nominated for best actor that year, for Midnight Cowboy, and neither has ever had a better film. I know it by heart. It is the pride of a collection of more than 500 DVD's.
Rating:
Summary: A John Schlesinger Masterpiece
Review: One of several miraculous films directed by the late John Schlesinger, MIDNIGHT COWBOY has a power that is undiminished more than thirty years after it was made. This is one of the few US-produced films that is aimed exclusively at an intelligent, adult audience. In this way it is like some of the better European films, which did not worry about reaching a 'broad' audience. It's a beautifully made film in every way, using some techniques developed by the French New Wave: jump cuts, simultaneity of past and present, cinema-verite camera-work. These techniques serve to give the film a kind of harsh, poetic immediacy. Neither Voight nor Hoffman have ever surpassed their performances and were both Oscar-nominated. Waldo Salt's screenplay (based on the novel by sorely underrated James Leo Herlihy) is a brilliant look at the bonding of two seemingly incompatible personalities. A cold world of shame, disappointment and recrimination has isolated both men, and the film shows how they are drawn together out of common needs. On a broader scale, this is a study of the human need to be connected. Yet it avoids any sentimentality and remains emotionally committed throughout. The two main characters can be seen as somewhat symbolic: Joe (Voight) represents an American masculine ideal that does not exist. He himself knows this, as the flashbacks reveal with their images of emasculation. So he reduces himself to a stud, in an attempt to regain his sense of maleness. Ratso, on the other hand, has never really lived, only survived. He harbors illusions about a possible happy life buried deep within his damaged, tortured psyche. Joe's unflagging optimism allows Ratso to face his own fantasies. In the end, all these men have is each other. The MGM DVD of MIDNIGHT COWBOY is a minimal presentation of a great film. The transfer appears to be high-quality and the sound is 2-channel stereo. The film's original trailer is included. It is unfortunate that Schlesinger's commentary, made for the laserdisc issue, could be be included on the DVD. This should be essential for any film fan.
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Summary: One Of The Best Films From The Sixties!
Review: More than anything else, this moody, evocative, and intelligently well-scripted film is a modern coming-of-age film, one that follows a pilgrim's progress from naïve and self-absorption for country bumpkin Joe Buck, played to perfection by Jon Voight in his first major movie appearance. The opening sequences illustrate what a wild-eyed rube Joe is, off to the big city from the wide-open spaces of Texas to become rich and infamous as a stud for hire. And in a story as old as big cities, he is quickly disabused of his silly dreams and his open-armed naiveté and is rescued by a troubling and troubled street creature named Enrico " Ratso" Rizzo, played by Dustin Hoffman. Hoffman's Rizzo is a stirringly accurate portrayal of the kind of urban cretins that lurk in many of the allies and coffee shops along the boulevard of broken dreams that is Manhattan. What evolves along with their burgeoning friendship and mutual dependencies is a beautifully travelogue-type journey into the heart of the urban darkness modern man has created for himself, in all its native hues of gray, brown and the depressing, dirty shades of poverty, desperation, and squalor. We also find all of the petty meanness and well-polished indifference that only an outsider like Joe would even notice. In flashbacks harkening to his beloved grandmother who rescued from the abuse of his battering alcoholic father, we discover Joe is running away from the past while hoping for a better future, yet is not clever enough to figure out quite how to make the transition into a better adulthood. Rizzo helps learn the lessons of survival on the mean street, and educates Joe well enough for them to finally make an ironic escape that provides an emotional and provocative coda in the closing sequences. This is a wonderful film, one that never deserved an "X" rating since the only thing pornographic about it is the way it portrays people treating other people, and in that sense it is obscene indeed. This is a film that will make you squirm a bit on the couch as the totality of its director's vision plays out, but one you will be glad you sat to experience in its long (over two hours) length. Most of us avid film fans were shocked when neither Voight nor Hoffman won the Oscar for their performance, which went to John Wayne for "True Grit" in an emotional tribute to the Duke's long and illustrious career. This is an edifying and entertaining way to spend a wonderful Saturday evening. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: Now what, y'all?
Review: Winner of the Academy Award for best film in 1969 (the first X-rated film to do so), I both disliked and admired it when I first saw it and that initial reaction really hasn't changed in more than 30 years. What remains after so many years are the images evoked whenever I hear its ironic theme song, "Everybody's Talking." The street scenes, the awkward and incompetent grifting, and especially the scene on the bus to Miami. Voight as Joe Buck and Hoffman as "Ratzo" Rizzo really are the definitive odd couple as they pursue their illusive as well as elusive dreams amidst the squalid realities of the urban life they share. Films do not change but we do. For example, I was more amused and less sympathetic 39 years ago. Today, I am more inclined to view Rizzo and Buck as victims of natural selection, unable to overcome physical limitations (Rizzo) or mental limitations (Buck) in a society which consumes and then discards people as indifferently as it does whatever is tossed into trash cans in a dark alley, awaiting removal. Everybody isn't talking. In fact, no one notices. For so many in a city such as New York or Miami, it will always midnight. Today, it would not be X-rated which probably reveals more about our contemporary society than it does about this film. My guess (only a guess) is that this once "sensational" film will eventually be revered for archival rather than artistic reasons as future generations struggle to resolve the inherent contradiction of an urban cowboy.
Rating:
Summary: Doesn't Date
Review: I won't go over all of the wonderful things said about this great American film. However one thing that impresses me is how little it dates considering the era in which it was made. The party sequence could be 1960s but if you look at many of the current art magazines, particularly something like "Flash Art," the party can easily mirror that world and thus can have a contemporary feel to it. At the very least, there's an Andy Warhol-like feeling to the party sequence rescuing it from a strictly counter-culture sixties sensibility. Warhol is timeless and transcends his own era.
Midnight Cowboy is also about loyalty an idea which freaquently gets lost in the emotional pyrotechnics of Joe Buck's and Rico's relationship with each other and the city itself.
John McGiver's character O'Daniel is another example of what a first rate actor can do with a small part.
I've seen this film at least 8 times, and, like a great piece of music, it never grows stale.
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