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The Ending of The Gal Who Got Rattled (MAJOR SPOILERS)

posted 6 years ago by ecarle (14979)
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With all due respect to the rollicking musical-comedy-violence of the opening short about Buster Scraggs himself, and the deadpan accumulating darkness of Meal Ticket, the best short in "The Ballard of Buster Scraggs" for me is the fifth, "The Gal Who Got Rattled."

Whereas the other films play for violence and humor and range between the cartoonish and the surreal, "The Gal" plays as an old-fashioned ode to the People Who Won the West(or didn't.) It has a amazing, unique central performance from Zoe Kazan(grandaugther of Elia "On the Waterfront" Kazan), that shows up her plainness and her beauty at the same time, Kazan has a great way with a line(listen to how she says, "No, I do not" when her beau asks her if she knows a particular Oregon law) and an amazingly expressive face that shows the impact of the tale on this poor girl every step of the way -- including a short-lived interlude of happiness before the REAL ending arrives.

The acceleration of action in this final sequence is, to me, the stuff of a great movie. The "old" wagon master has said very little in this movie, his younger charge is clearly the more articulate and feeling man, it seems. And yet, when the wagon master realizes the girl is too far from the wagon train, he leaps into action and becomes an entirely different man, and we realize: this is his calling. Action. Suddenly capable of talking, a lot and yet not too much. Forceful. Knowing the land (the prarie dog holes have cute creatures in them, but are dangerous to horses). Being able to outshoot the raiding Indians. Being able to spell out -- immediately -- to Alice the fate awaiting her if she is captured alive. And surviving.

As for Alice, we've spent enough time with this shy, timid yet surprisingly pragmatic young woman to like her very much -- maybe love her a little (as her beau does; once he realizes that "she has no people", he steps up to become such with an offer of marriage; her open-mouthed reaction is priceless)

The fact that the prairie dogs interaction with President Pierce give Alice reason to giggle uncontrollably means in her final minutes before the horror intruded, she was very happy -- a new husband in hand, immediate pleasure giggling at the prairie dogs -- and then things went brutally wrong. The ever-changing facial expressions of Zoe Kazan provide us with every note of the story.

Its enormously affecting, and -- with an enormously affecting final suite of music -- closes out on an image of The Old West(a man on foot, a dog at his side, another man on horseback in the distance) that feels as classic as classic can be. And raises tears.

YouTube has about a minute-and-one-half clip that puts Carter Burwell's music over the entire "Gal" story (less what happens to her) and ends on that great final shot. Its the movie, for me.

[–] MichaelJPollock (751) 6 years ago

Potent stuff, that sequence... Potent stuff...

It's also a piece that manages to achieve something so very difficult and so very rare in cinema -and in an area up to then fairly alien to the Cohen Brother's cinema- and that is to show the EXACT, precise moment when a character becomes aware he/she has fallen in love with the other party.

That whole "Uncertainty, that is appropriate for matters of this world..." dialogue sequence...
...the slow traveling on Kazan's authentic face, half-lit by the flickering flames of the camp fire also echoed in the glimmer in the depth of her eyes, coupled with Burwell's score...
"Straight is the gate... and narrow the way. Indeed... indeed...".
This is anthropological-grade stuff in my book. It would certainly earn its place in a Museum of Natural History, played in a continuous loop on a flat screen framed and hung over the title "Female Homo Sapiens Falling in Love While Becoming Aware of It (2018)".

The only other successful attempt that comes to mind is the silent seduction scene in Kubrick's 'Barry Lyndon', with Lady Lyndon and Redmond around the card table, exchanging glances.
But then again, this particular scene is more about desire and lust, than the kind of complete intellectual and emotional love that lets you gaze into the other's eyes with no feeling of self-awareness other than the nature of this newfound bound.

And of course by the moment the segment ends, we've already been conditioned by the four previous short stories to expect the bookending codas, and when that initially cryptic "Mr. Arthur had no idea what he would say to Billy Knapp." comes around the second time, it hits so. very. hard.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Potent stuff, that sequence... Potent stuff...

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I've seen this particular story about six times now, and it holds up as a small classic for me, each time -- even knowing exactly what's coming, it is still affecting at the end. To me, that is great filmmaking. And here we have that perfect combination of writing, acting, music(so good in this sequence among all of them) and cinematography(especially the prairie horizons at sunset, and the loneliness that emphasizes of this wagon train grop)...that is very rare these days.

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It's also a piece that manages to achieve something so very difficult and so very rare in cinema -and in an area up to then fairly alien to the Cohen Brother's cinema- and that is to show the EXACT, precise moment when a character becomes aware he/she has fallen in love with the other party.
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I kind of followed this very decent couple falling in love as a "general matter" in their scenes together. What starts out rather as gesture of compassion on Billy Knapp's part(this poor girl is now an orphan with no siblings, no "people") , and also has elements of a business proposition(a married couple can obtain double the acreage in Oregon of single persons)...becomes love in a matter of three or four conversations.

But I can't say I quite saw the precision of the scene you have in mind until I read your remarks:

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That whole "Uncertainty, that is appropriate for matters of this world..." dialogue sequence...
...the slow traveling on Kazan's authentic face, half-lit by the flickering flames of the camp fire also echoed in the glimmer in the depth of her eyes, coupled with Burwell's score...
"Straight is the gate... and narrow the way. Indeed... indeed...".
This is anthropological-grade stuff in my book. It would certainly earn its place in a Museum of Natural History, played in a continuous loop on a flat screen framed and hung over the title "Female Homo Sapiens Falling in Love While Becoming Aware of It (2018)".

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Yes.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

Given the nature of the multiple tales, the Coens couldn't particularly cast a lot of "names" in this anthology. I'd say that Liam Neeson and James Franco are the biggest...and Franco's a bit on the fade. (I'll also "reach" for Brendon Gleeson as a known character actor of reknown.)

Thus, I am very moved by the three actors the Coens cast for the key roles in "The Gal Who Got Rattled." Zoe Kazan centers it , but Bill Heck as her gentle, business-like suitor was quite fine too(in the scheme of things, he's a bit too handsome for her, but she wins him over with her plight and her politeness.) And Grainger Hines as the "old trail boss" was a flat-out revelation. The man he becomes in the climactic Native American raid is perhaps the most charismatic character in the entire show. Kazan, Heck, and Hines gave very good performances...aided and abetted by very good, over-articulate lines(for Heck and Kazan) that remind one in a favorable way of the dialogue crafted from Charles Portis' novel for "True Grit" by the Coens.

And I'd like to offer some praise for the collection of folks at the boarding house dinner table in the first scene in the tale. Perfectly written in the True Grit manner(isn't the silent, near-dead looking Grandma FROM True Grit) the compassionate but tough female boarding house owner ("It was a nervous cough, not a contagious cough -- I wouldn't rent to someone with a contagious cough"), even the rather odd looking male boarder who looks like Young Raymond Burr with a ducktail haircut. More "unknown casting coups" from the Coens(or their casting agent.)

The boarding house scene properly launches the tale in full Coen-esque eccentricity...and then we are off to the prairie for a touching tale of tragically thwarted happiness on the trail to Oregon.

[–] ecarle (14979) 6 years ago

And of course by the moment the segment ends, we've already been conditioned by the four previous short stories to expect the bookending codas, and when that initially cryptic "Mr. Arthur had no idea what he would say to Billy Knapp." comes around the second time, it hits so. very. hard.

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Absolutely. The turning pages "with color plates" is a marvelously old-fashioned framing device for the film, complete with music to fit each color plate. But THIS color plate, when it arrives again, arrives with devastating power. We had no idea what "Mr Arthur had no idea what he would say to Billy Knapp" meant at the beginning of the tale. Now we do. And it hurts.

And we wonder just how Billy Knapp is going to react.

And I(for one) figure: Billy is now probably doomed to a life without a wife, without children, "sleeping on the ground" as the next trailmaster.

[–] DaveBowman2001 (518) 4 years ago

All these comments were great and far better than I could articulate. Watched this 2nd time tonight and same as before, this was the best story by far of all of them. I forget exactly how it ended, so I still had a surprise and was still fresh.

[–] PoolOfZenda (90) 4 months ago

And here is me thinking it was just a good old-fashioned portmanteau meet death story in the style of the Amicus films of the 1970s like Vault of Horror and From Beyond the Grave.