| Cutter's Way | | Cast : | Jeff Bridges, John Heard | | Director : | Ivan Passer | | Studio : | Mgm/Ua Studios | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen | | Released Date : | January 01, 1981 | | DVD Released Date : | January 11, 2005 | | Language : | Spanish (Dubbed), French (Subtitled), Spanish (Subtitled), English (Original Language), French (Original Language) | | Audience Rating : | R (Restricted) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | July 28, 2005 | | Summary | Extremely Slow Moving......Overall a Disappointment..... | Content
 | I am a great fan of Jeff Bridges and would have said that he has never appeared in a bad movie....until I saw this one. Bridges plays a gigolo-boat salesman who really never works or commits to anything, which becomes both maddening and tiresome as the movie progresses.
John Heard, appearing rather young and slim (compared to now) is simply loud and obnoxious as the title character, Cutter: a badly injured Viet Nam vet who uses his disabilities as an excuse whenever his foul, drunken mouth gets him in trouble (which is often). Shouting and cursing is simply not acting...if it were, we could all be stars, and in this case I really believe that we are meant to find Cutter to be an amusing character. He is simply repugnant.
The only good characterization is by Lisa Eichorn, as Heard/Cutter's long suffering, alcoholic (who could blame her?) wife, who seems strangely amused and tolerant of his boisterous, annoying behavior. Perhaps she knows a side of him that is simply not presented in the movie. She presents a powerful, touching performance....the only redeeming virtue in this otherwise unremarkable movie.
The plot is extremely slow moving, centering around the brief and indistinct witnessing by Bridges' character of the disposal of a murder victim. The very next day (what a coincidence !!!), while attending a parade, he believes that he sees the murderer, who happens to be a rich and powerful man. Rather than go to the police with their hunch, Cutter hatches a hair-brained plot to blackmail the rich guy....if he pays, then he must be guilty. He also enlists the help of the murder victim's sister, who seems totally unemotional, considering that her sister was brutally murdered two days before, and acts like she is along on a field trip to the zoo....which is no real problem, since she simply disappears from the cast long before the conclusion.
The characters spend what seems like hours arguing, harranging, shoving, and degrading each other while they try to hatch their flimsy plot. Several times, my finger was poised over the "open" button on my DVD control, itching to put an end to this increasingly annoying shout-fest. I stuck it out to the climax, which is so unlikely that it leaves you shaking your head in disbelief, and swore that I would try to prevent others from suffering my fate. Skip this turkey....other than watching Lisa Eichorn, it really, really, really isn't worth the time or effort. |
| Rating | | | Date | July 03, 2005 | | Summary | Dated and dull | Content
| Uncut magazine from England rated this 5 stars and DVD of the month. They also claimed the Coen Brothers paid tribute to it Big Lebowski. This was enough to make me shell out the bucks and buy it.
Imagine my dissapointment. The picture and sound quality were dire. Too much contrast in the video and the sound had to be turned up super loud to follow the dialogue.
The movie came across as just another viet vet/counter culture exploitation movie with a trite plot that hardly went anywhere and never engaged me or made me feel any suspense. Dialogue was dated and cliched.
I'll never trust an Uncut Reviewer again. Don't waste your money on this one. |
| Rating | | | Date | September 25, 2004 | | Summary | Cuts through nothing. | Content
| I read some great reviews that got me interested and excited about this film, but it just never happened. I had trouble following the story and the characters. I will admit, Heard's Cutter was outstanding. I was surprised that he was not up for an award for his role in this film, but Bridges just seemed to lack on every level. Unless he is handed an exceptional script, Bridges plays the same sort of character over and over again. I also had trouble with the female character of Mo in this film. It was never really understood what her relationship was to everyone until I read some reviews, which then made sense.
I also had trouble with Cutter's physical condition. It seemed like he was fully able to do everything, except sleep with his wife, as a normal person would. I guess that was the point. Create a character that is so believable that you don't see the physical condition. Too bad I did. I really wanted him to lift up his eye-patch to reveal to us that perhaps he was none other than One-Eyed Willy himself. That would have been a perfect twist.
There were gaping holes in this film as well. The plot seemed to jump around without any explanation. I needed more story on who the friend was and his connection to J.J. Cord. The girl that follows Bone and Cutter around seems to have disappeared midway through the film and it was her battle they were fighting. The only redeeming aspect of this film was the ending. My decent review of this film was dependent on the ending and it succeeded. The ending leaves all of it up to the viewer. The imagination can play wonders with this and I think it can be interpreted in anyway. I especially loved reading about the Hamlet reference that I didn't see it until now, but it makes perfect sense. That is why I watch these films. I want to see how other people see life and their representation on camera.
Overall, Cutter's Way was not a great film, but the ending redeemed itself in someway that I will never be able to explain.
Grade: *** out of ***** |
| Rating | | | Date | June 20, 2003 | | Summary | an engrossing murder mystery | Content
| When Cutter's Way was first released in theatres in 1981, it tanked at the box office thanks to bad press from The New York Times and a nervous studio still smarting from the bath it took on Heaven's Gate. A good film almost disappeared from sight. Fortunately, the advent of video, and now its debut on DVD, has given this unusual film a second chance that it so richly deserves. Jeff Bridges proves once again that he is one of the best American actors working in film today. He portrays Bone as a man afraid of commitment, content to do little, but fall back on his pretty boy looks to bed any woman who crosses his path. As one character tells him, "Sooner or later you're going to have to make a decision about something." This could be the underlying thesis of the whole film: making decisions, taking a stand about something. John Heard's Alex Cutter is on the opposite end of the spectrum. He desperately wants to get involved in something, anything to stop living life in a bottle of alcohol. And so, he latches on to the murder mystery with the ferocious tenacity of a pitbull. Heard plays Cutter like a character straight out of a Tom Waits song. His performance, complete with raspy voice and cynical outlook on life, recalls many of Waits' down-on-their-luck losers that populate his songs. The actors vividly breathe life into their respective characters creating the impression that they exist beyond what we see on the screen, that in some way we already know them and that they'll continue to exist after the film ends. Director Ivan Passer also deserves credit for creating this world. From the haunting opening shot of a parade, caught in dreamy slow motion (thanks to Jordan Cronenweth's superb cinematography), filmed at first in black and white and then as the credits fade in and out it gradually becomes colour, Passer draws the audience into his absorbing drama. Cutter's Way contains strong visuals to contrast the ambiguous story. Nothing is spelled out for the audience, even right up to its conclusion. Do we support Cutter's obsessive conspiracy theories or Bone's refusal to get involved? Following in the grand tradition of short changing this movie, MGM has decided to include only the theatrical trailer on the DVD. What about a retrospective featurette? All the principals are still alive and I'm sure would love to talk about this movie. Or an audio commentary? Jeff Bridges contributed an excellent one on the Against All Odds DVD so he's hip to the format. A lot of missed opportunities here. |
| Rating | | | Date | December 25, 2002 | | Summary | Sometimes funny, rather poignant psychological thriller | Content
| I was interested in this film because may years ago I had read the book, "Cutter and Bone" on which it was based. I remembered it took place in the post-Vietnam era and one of the characters was a hard-drinking, foul-mouthed, crippled Vietnam vet. I had forgotten that the book had depressed me then. But viewing this video brought it all back to me. And I was depressed all over again. The film is set in Santa Barbara and stars Jeff Bridges, as a drifter with an eye for women. John Heard plays his best friend, the Vietnam vet, and Lisa Eichhorn plays the vet's alcoholic wife. John Heard's makeup is great as it really looks like he has only one leg, one arm and one eye. He's a sorrowful sight but he's quite unlikable as he's an angry, scheming character with a sense of high drama. Some of his dialog is brilliant and opens a lot of cans of worms about what happened in Vietnam. When Jeff Bridges stumbles upon a murder by an "upright citizen", John Heard convinces his friend to blackmail the murderer with the help of the victim's sister, played by Ann Dusenberry. What follows is a sometimes funny and rather poignant psychological thriller, with an underlying sense of tragedy. It's fast paced, well acted and deals with an interesting theme. I should have loved it. Right? Wrong! I just didn't like it. It wasn't because the film wasn't good. I just didn't like the sense of anger and hopelessness throughout. And I didn't like any of the characters. The film ran a mere 105 minutes but I couldn't wait for it to end. I won't give it a poor recommendation though, because the film it did have its good points. I just couldn't get it to it. |
|
|
|
|
