The Rounders

So said the agreeable Henry Fonda to just about every suggestion Glenn Ford or other cast members made to him.

This the first of a series of very agreeable entertaining comic westerns that Burt Kennedy directed and/or wrote starring some of Hollywood's great but aging male stars. I think for the first and only time both Ford and Fonda play a pair of losers. They seem to forever be in financial bondage to their off-and-on employer Chill Wills. Wills just out-slickers Ford and Fonda just goes along with that line that must have been repeated about 8 times in The Rounders.

But their biggest problem comes from a white-faced roan horse that Wills has talked the gullible Ford into taking. The horse named "Old Fooler" has a streak of cunning malevolence that provides most of the laughs in this comedy. If there was a special award given to animals for performances Old Fooler should have won it in 1965. In fact that horse created his own acting genre, the animal anti-hero.

Burt Kennedy gave us a lot of good laughs starting in the mid60s with his films and this is one of the funniest.

This is truly the number 1, modern cowboy "cult" movie. The film captures the true life of a modern day working cowboy. All aspects of this film are the most realistic and true, day to day accounts of the REAL cowboy. The mundane, humor, drama, suspense and romance of the American Cowboy are captured in The Rounders. A must see!

I was quite surprised when I watched this, thinking it was a western when actually it wasn't. The picture is set in 1950s or 60s and the locations at times makes you wonder if it was set in 1800s.

The director makes some interesting comparisons between the lonely west and the modern town. The performances are good, especially the horse. The director made excellent use of the widescreen frame. This is unwatchable in pan and scan.

Not a great film but certainly worth watching for locations and direction. Could've done with a better screenplay.

Glenn Ford and Henry Fonda star in this slowly paced but amiable picture of two modern cowboys who just drift through life. They are older but only in a chronological sense--as they drink, bust broncos and party through life. At the same time, there are a couple of women who want to get them to settle down and grow up--and this is the main theme throughout the film.

What works best in the film is the dialog--particularly the repartee between the two leads. While the film itself never really seems to go anywhere, it seems enough just to sit back and watch this relationship unfold. An odd but satisfying film.

My husband and I saw this film when it was first released and all I remembered these many years later was that we had liked it, so I taped it when TCM reran it and loved it! The fellow from England who complained that it seems more like the 1880s just didn't know that in S. Texas, where we're from, and I guess AZ where the film was set, cowboying was still much the same. All of this, including the small town parade rang really true. I absolutely fell in love with the horse all over again; he should have had top billing. I wonder where there might be a bio of him...anybody know? And for the one who regrets they didn't show baby animals being killed...I thank them for that. I see movies for entertainment!