Hud

Hud (1963)

**** (out of 4)

One of the bleakest films ever made, HUD centers on the title character played by Paul Newman who is about as ruthless as one can be. He cares for very little in this world and everything he does love is usually something bad. His father (Melvyn Douglas) has hated him for some time now but after their cattle grows sick they begin to butt heads.

HUD certainly isn't a very cheerful film and it's one of the darkest and in reality sadness movies ever made. While it's not always easy to watch there's no denying its impact plus the fact that it contains three of the greatest performances that you're ever going to see. HUD works on many levels but it's strength is certainly the performances as well as its honest character study of someone most people will find cool but when you get pass all the smoke you see a rather ugly human being.

The screenplay itself is extremely laid back and in fact the film is pretty quiet. There's not too much screaming or long speeches but instead there's just a very realistic tone that comes across quite natural and real. I think most people will be able to look at these main four characters and either be one of them are know someone like them. There's the young cool guy who hurts everything that he comes into contact with. There's the older wise man who stands by his morals. There's a broken house maid who is probably hiding some sadness. Then there's the young nephew who looks up to Hud not knowing or understanding his type of character.

Then, there are the terrific performances, which are among the best you'll ever see. Newman never had an issue playing cool but he always made it look so easy. He brings that quality to Hud but there's also that underlying dirty and dangerous part. There's just a certainly coldness that Newman brings to the character, which we never saw from him in his other roles. Douglas rightfully won the Best Supporting Actor Oscar for his deep and very sincere performance. Neal is a great big ball of sadness and her deep eyes just say so much without her having to speak a word. Even Brandon De Wilde is very impressive in his role and especially when you consider the major talent he was acting against.

HUD also features a terrific and haunting music score and the Oscar-winning cinematography perfectly captures the dusty dirt roads. The film manages to keep getting better with time as its messages are perhaps more true today than when the film was originally released.

Those are the nihilistic words of Hud Bannon, the swaggering antihero in the Martin Ritt directed film "Hud", set amid the vast, expansive high plains of West Texas. It's a somber affair.

Hud lives with his elderly father Homer (a wonderfully understated performance by Melvyn Douglas) and nephew Lonnie. Their small, struggling ranch serves not only as a livelihood, but also the source of Homer's ethical values. Another main character is Alma, the attractive housekeeper and cook. For all four of them it's a hard life, but a worthwhile life, at least as Homer sees it. Hud sees it differently. But then Hud is a product of modern times, with differing values from those of Homer and his generation. When a crisis occurs that puts their ranch in jeopardy, these differing values clash, resulting in tension between Hud and his father.

Hud's ongoing rebellion, rooted in heredity and environment, takes the form of booze, brawls, women, and anger. Hud is a heel, but a sympathetic heel. We understand his frustrations. Larry McMurtry's story presents a naturalistic interpretation of human character. Hud is constrained by forces over which he has no control. For him, like for many of us, freedom of choice is mostly an illusion. The morality of absolutes, as expressed by his father, does not work in Hud's favor.

But there's a fifth character in this morality tale ... the land. The bleak, desolate plains with its buzzards, ubiquitous dust, and lonesome vistas can depress the most optimistic spirit. In this film, the monochrome canvas accentuated by James Wong Howe's use of single source lighting makes the natural environment seem appropriately oppressive. And the film's sounds amplify the gritty realism of this unforgiving land.

I have a couple of minor criticisms. The screenplay puts too much emphasis on Alma, given that she is the housekeeper. Second, there's not enough music or humor. Others will disagree, but I would have preferred a more prominent role for the mournful sounds of Hank Williams type music, a la "The Last Picture Show".

Interestingly, Hud's comment on life is the same in meaning as the words spoken years later by a real-life nihilistic antihero, who said: "No one here gets out alive". While we think we know what happened to the real-life antihero, we don't know what became of Hud. Perhaps someday someone will make a credible sequel. Then they can add more music. Imagine the mood evoked by the sight of Hud riding off into the Texas sunset, to the sounds of "Riders On The Storm".

Intelligent semi-Western, well directed and wonderfully performed by Newman as a man with the barbed wire soul . Hud Bannon(Paul Newman who dubbed this one pretty good) is a ruthless young man who tarnishes everything and everyone he touches . Hud represents the perfect embodiment of alienated youth . Instead of helping his dad , Hud drunkenly chases the family's housekeeper (Patricia Neal) and establishes relationship with his hero-worshipping nephew (Brandon De Wilde , Shane) , both of whom emotionally involved with him . As the father-son conflict is deeply observed by other members of the household , the maid and the nephew . Then , a government order to slaughter the ranch's entire herd as a precaution leads to tragedy and the ranch owner siding the law .

Exciting and thought-provoking clear-eyed story of growing in Texas plenty of interesting drama , emotion and a strong antagonism between the free-drinking son and a sternly moralising patriarchal ranch owner , including elements of Greek tragedy . Various studio-characters furnish the basis for this Western-drama ; filmmaker Martin Ritt has got a big success in delineating their troublesome roles . Terrific Paul Newman in an enjoyable performance, though using the Stanislawski method , it results to be a superb piece of acting . Paul Newman played the part of Hud as a villain . He was later stunned that so many young moviegoers had a poster of Hud and viewed him as their hero. In preparation for his title role , Paul Newman worked on a Texas cattle ranch for several weeks acquiring genuine calluses and a cowboy's lope . Melvyn Douglas gives a superb acting as old rancher who has fallen on hard times and shows to mourn the old-free-ranging ways of the frontier days . Terrific interpretation by Patricia Neal as a mature woman to whom Hud pursues and she wants nothing to do with him . Interesting screenplay dealing with brooding themes such as the disintegration of a heritage , including engaging dialogs haunted by frames of decay and death ; being nicely written by Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank Jr. from a novel by Larry McMurtry . Evocative cinematography by James Wong Howe , he's a classic cameraman who won two Oscars (for Hud, and Rose tattoo), working from silent cinema . Elmer Bernstein's score for Hud runs approximately six minutes, making it one of the shortest film scores ever. But what a six minutes it is - in fact, it's perfection and just right for the film . The music is sparse, yes, but it's potent every time it appears. There's also some source music in the film - car radios, jukeboxes, records.

This understatement motion picture was well produced and directed by Martin Ritt, who worked with Paul Newman in two Westerns : ¨Hombre¨ and ¨Outrage¨. Ritt was an expert on dramas such as ¨Stanley and Iris¨ , ¨Nut¨ , ¨Norma Rae¨ , ¨The front¨, ¨The Sound and the Fury¨ , ¨Black orchid¨ , though also directed films of all kind of genres such as : ¨The Spy Who Came in from the Cold¨ , ¨The Great White Hope¨ , ¨Mafia¨ and ¨Molly McGuire¨ . This ¨Hud¨ film will appeal to drama enthusiasts and Paul Newman fans . Rating : Above average, well worth watching ; along with ¨Outrage¨ , being one of Ritt's best movie.

Not only a stark morality tale brimming with grit and substance, "Hud" is a vigorous character study replete with intelligent, Oscar-winning performances.

The vast, desolate "Lone Star" landscape has often inspired potent Hollywood screen-writing (witness "Giant," and "The Last Picture Show"). 1963's "Hud" is no exception. The story focuses around a bored, aimless, arrogant ne'er-do-well whose utter contempt for humanity threatens to denigrate and destroy all those exposed to it. Thrust in a dusty, dried-up, decaying Texas cattle town (awesomely photographed in black-and-white by Oscar-winning cinematographer James Wong Howe), the story bears down assertively on its straightforward themes of nihilistic youth and misguided hero worship.

Paul Newman was awarded an Oscar - but not for "Hud." He took home the award much later for his performance in 1987's "The Color of Money" but for me it was a restitutive pat on the back for his probing, higher-calibre work here in "Hud," among others. Newman gives an assured, excitingly reckless performance, the creme of the crop of earlier, jaunty perfs. All swagger and bluff, reeking with cocky sexuality, Hud Bannon is the personification of cool, callous cynicism at its most reprehensible...and alluring. The world is this cowboy stud's oyster. He takes what he wants, whenever he wants it - whether its coveting his father's land or coveting another man's wife, whether its peddling sick cattle on others or peddling his ethics on a susceptive boy - it's all at the core of a dangerously irresponsible life's dogma. A loser's warped vision of winning. It was a risky star performance for Newman as Hud has no redeeming qualities whatsoever, but the actor plays out his acting cards brilliantly and winds up with a royal flush.

Newman is bolstered by a choice cast. Dusky-voiced Patricia Neal, whose looks had begun to harden by this time, is fascinating as the forlorn, slovenly housekeeper Alma who has her careworn hands full just keeping the lustful, roving Hud in line. Hud (and the audience) is perked by her stifled but not yet snuffed out sensuality, as she wisely avoids the obvious come-ons tossed her way. Making relative peace with her lonely, desultory existence, Alma has overcome a difficult past and find a sense of being as the makeshift homemaker to an aging rancher/widower (Melvyn Douglas) while tending to his impressionable grandson (Brandon de Wilde), instilling in the boy some good old-fashioned sense and motherly attention when necessary. Neal is top-notch especially in her final scenes and quite deserved her Oscar.

Oscar-winning Douglas is superb as Hud's upstanding, uncompromising father, a cattle man in the twilight of his years. Chocked full of conventional wisdom and righteous indignation, the prideful old-timer may or may not have contributed to his son's acute moral letdown, having given up on him as a "bad seed" long ago. Their confrontational scenes are pocked with harsh accusations and bitter conflict - never to be resolved. De Wilde, in a coming-of-age extension of his memorable "Shane" role, again portrays the embodiment of idolizing youth as the teenage Lon. Drawn to the brawling, good-looking "outer package" of his older Uncle Hud, deWilde is touching as his character gradually wises up to the realization that this superficial "package" is damaged goods, while those nearest and dearest to him fall by the waste side.

A near-classic to be sure. The performances alone make this a not-to-be-missed item.

It's difficult to grasp that Melvyn Douglas spent most of his career sailing through light, romantic roles and emerged in old age as one of the greatest actors in cinema history. Knowing the talent he possessed, how did he keep from killing the heads of the studios? Paul Newman, Melvyn Douglas, Patricia Neal, and Brandon de Wilde star in "Hud," an unsparing 1963 morality story about a Texas rancher, Homer Bannon, his bastard son, Hud, his housekeeper, and his grandson. The bastard, of course, is Paul Newman, who doesn't have a decent bone in his body. People on this board have said it's his greatest performance. He's given so many great ones, it's hard to say for me. An astounding actor, and he gets a run for his money from Douglas, who plays the moral center of the story.

The two characters couldn't be more opposite, as one sees in their treatment of a potential run of hoof and mouth disease that could wipe out Homer's entire herd. Hud wants to ship the whole herd out and possibly infect other people's cattle - he couldn't care less. Homer won't hear of it.

If you love animals, this is a difficult film to watch, but it's worth it. Melvyn Douglas is absolutely gut-wrenching as Homer, a proud man who loves the land and his cattle and who has no use for his son, who smashed his car and killed Homer's other son. de Wilde is Hud's nephew who admires him and wants to emulate him but as time goes by, realizes that Hud is made of ice. de Wilde doesn't give an emotional performance - he's almost more of an observer. It works well here amidst the very contained Douglas and the free and easy Newman. You can see he's a good kid trying to grow up and decide what kind of man to be.

Patricia Neal is the housekeeper; she and Douglas both deservingly won Oscars. Her delivery is wry and knowing; she can't help being attracted to the virile Hud but she knows he's trouble and never gives in to her desires willingly.

As much as I love Newman and think he's one of the greatest actors ever to hit the movies, for me, Douglas' searing performance is the one that will stay with me. It's easy to see why in 1963 this was such a dramatic breakthrough for Newman, but 43 years and many roles later, we're more familiar with what he can do. We know he can play a cold bastard now. His greatest performances for me will always be those in the "The Verdict" and "The Hustler," both of which called for many more nuances of character. Hud represents '60s disillusionment - which as the decade went on was only going to get worse; this is one of the reasons it is an iconic role. For me, Newman had more surprises in store.

Brilliant performances, excellent direction, stark photography, Hud is a great American film, not easily forgotten once seen.