The Hi-Lo Country (1998)

HI-LOW's characters, with Big Boy and Pete central, and Mona as the obsessive lure for both, were perfectly developed and portrayed. Big Boy was a prototypical strutting, macho "stud duck" in a remote west-Texas grain farming and cattle region, along the base of the sharp, towering escarpment which splits the LOW and HIGH PLAINS. Big Boy and Pete were among the WWII combat veterans returning home to find draft dodgers acquiring property and wealth by any means -- most often questionable legal tactics. This happened throughout the Western U.S., even the Mid-West and South East. Many of these accumulated great wealth, but without respect within their communities or region. That lack of respect continues for many of their wealthy families to this date among "natives." Mona represented forbidden fruit, not because of anything she controlled, because she was a lost soul out of control, trapped in a miserable marriage to one of the despised prototypes of the era, a WWII draft dodger, who was foreman for the villain's growing ranch. Sam Elliott's villain earned the scorn by becoming a totally unscrupulous wealthy draft dodger. Mona was a poor, ill-educated nearly starving woman during the war years, forced to make a choice between abject poverty and creature comforts in a loveless marriage as trophy wife to a cowardly excuse of a man. "Draft Dodging" was the one unforgivable sin for any man of that era. Sleeping with his wife, and taking her, was "morally right." The Cruz character could not have more perfectly developed and portrayed as a young Latina woman, a "Mexican" in that culture. English was not her primary language. Attractive, and especially "available" Latinas were welcome to dance in the "whites' tonks", while in most communities, "Mexican" males might be permitted to stand along a back wall. At the end, while loving her, Pete still walked away because mixed marriage was unacceptable. In remote 1940s western areas, "dime vending machines' were common.

Big Boy Matson and Pete Calder are friends who go off to fight in WW2. On their return they continue to farm in their old ways, however this way is challenged by Jim Ed Love, who has a huge ranch and employs many of the old land owners. To complicate this Big Boy is having an affair with Mona, the wife of Love's foreman, Les Birk. However Mona not only threatens to inflame the dangerous relationship between Big Boy and Birk but also between Pete (who loves Mona despite the attentions of Josepha O'Neil) and Big Boy.Despite the poor box office that comes with a modern western (generally) I had heard reasonable reviews and wanted to give it a look. To call this sprawling is a bit of an understatement, it covers many themes and interrelating stories. The plots all spin around Big Boy and Pete and they hold together quite well on the whole. Only Pete's relationship with Josepha didn't get expanded as well as I'd have liked but the sweeping coverage of the main themes just about worked. Aside from the fact that it might have been very slow, the film could have used another 30 minutes to open itself out a bit more into the side plots. It is not as slow as it sounds but it does require a bit of patience and grace, so I suspect many will get bored.Harrelson is really good in this. Some films he seems to work and others he doesn't. Here his cocky act fits the character real well. Crudup is more understated as Pete but is good in a different way. He provides more mystery that kept me interested. Elliot and Diehl are both strong characters. Cruz is pretty and interesting but criminally not used as well as I'd like simply because the film turns to focus on Mona. This is a shame because Arquette is bland and poor throughout the film. At one point she is talking about the blinking neon lights and says `I hate things that go on and on without changing', Yes! I screamed at my TV - like your tone of voice and your dull, droning performances! I hate to be cruel but since the film was focused around Mona as opposed to the other strands, Mona needed to be a strong performance – and Arquette just can't cut it. Her weakness is the weakness of the film – she is the reason that the film doesn't work at times.Aside from this I did enjoy the film. It was involving and thoughtful without being too slow. The performances of the majority of the cast really help the film but Arquette is simply not able to deliver in the pivotal role of Mona and the film suffers as a result.

Utterly boring soft-western about a bunch of `real' cowboys on a `modern' farm after World War II. In some old black-and-white films I have problems telling the various female characters apart. In this movie, it's the men. Big Boy, Little Boy, Pete, Steve, now and then one of them dies, but nobody really cares. Sorry, this movie didn't keep me awake at all. I can't imagine that Sam Peckinpah would have been able to make a better movie out of a story of such poor interest.

I have to admit it, The Hi-Lo Country is not the best movie ever made. However I did have a very good time watching it and it left me with that strange feeling that you sometimes get when a movie strikes you right in the heart.By the way, there is something else: the music, I mean I've read a lot of comments about this movie and I can't remember of any mentioning the music! I may be the only one but I really loved that deep powerful instrumental song.