Lovin' Molly (1974) User Reviews

Don't read the book first

[gerritbrand · 5/10 · 22 November 2014]

Maybe it's not such a bad movie if you haven't read the book. But after reading the book which has something muggy, something atmospheric around watching the movie is a boring and tedious business. Even the characters are miscast. How can you believe Anthony Perkins is Gid? Besides they should have made ONE story for the movie out of the three perspectives in the book. Following the book this closely for the movie was a mistake. Another thing is that the characters don't change age. They don't get visibly older. If you think that a movie like Chinatown was made around the same time you see what I mean with lack of quality. Lovin' Molly is too much a book filming in which they tried to stay faithful to the book. Anyway, maybe somebody who never read the book can enjoy it.

Texas in Their Rear View Mirror

[wes-connors · 4/10 · 18 January 2011]

In 1925 Texas, lanky farmer Anthony Perkins (as Gid Fry) and chubby chum Beau Bridges (as Johnny McCloud) both want to marry beautiful free-spirited Blythe Danner (as Molly Taylor). The trio crawl in and out of each other's beds for nearly forty years. If you don't believe this can get unexciting, just watch them from beginning to end. The three leads often seem intentionally made-up to look unattractive; however, Ms. Danner has a memorable nude scene in the early running...

You wouldn't know to look at it, but "Lovin' Molly" stemmed from a story by "The Last Picture Show" (1971) writer Larry McMurtry and was helmed by "Network" (1976) director Sidney Lumet. Dramatic television veteran Edward Binns plays Perkins' crotchety father. Watch for a couple of (then) daytime television stars in small, featured roles...

Future big-league actress and "Rocky Horror" participant Susan Sarandon plays Mr. Perkins' neglected other woman, and Conard Fowkes (as Eddie) is a third man involved with Danner. A "flashback" scene with Mr. Fowkes reveals he has more "chemistry" with Danner than either of her leading men. Those familiar with his "Dark Shadows" role as the New England lawyer who helped Victoria Winters find Laura Collins' coffin will realize Fowkes' is the film's outstanding performance.

**** Lovin' Molly (4/14/74) Sidney Lumet ~ Anthony Perkins, Beau Bridges, Blythe Danner, Conard Fowkes

Lovin' MollyLeaving Cheyenne

[kid-8 · 27 February 2005]

It's seems clear that Sidney Lumet was unfamiliar with the setting, the characters, the story...I mean, Gid is a cowboy wearing OVERALLS--Gid's NOT a farmer! He was afraid of Texas, and moved back east to New Jersey to shoot the remainder of the film--no wonder the film looks like a TV movie. It should have been directed by someone else, someone who understood the place, and written by a screenwriter who understood the characters and story, like McMurtry himself, perhaps??? Maybe someday it will be re-done, and done justly. It's a moving and complex story, one that deserves to be told in the affecting way it's written. Eastwood as director? It spans a 45-year period, and though challenging, with the appropriate writer and director and actors would make for a timeless, memorable film.

I liked this movie

[katie-202 · 10/10 · 3 May 2005]

This movie doesn't have the action and gun-toting violence (thank goodness) of modern-day movies, and I found the story compelling and the actors believable. It introduces us to an early and charming Blythe Danner; Anthony Perkins is stilted and unapproachable - as the character called for, and Beau Bridges is someone you just want to hug. It was interesting to see how the producer/director made the movie span about 30 years - both in the actors, and in the setting. The scenery was beautiful to me - but then I'm from Texas, so I know how beautiful Central Texas is. Produced before ratings, I would give this a GP because it deals with a beautiful lady and her love of two different men.

Two friends vie for the same woman through the years.

[scrutiny · 4 October 1999]

Coming on the heels of The Last Picture Show, this Larry McMurtry adaptation must've sounded like a sure thing with the likes of Beau Bridges, Anthony Perkins, and Blythe Danner before the cameras and the great Sidney Lumet behind but ultimately this film is a case of too much too soon. This story, which resembles last year's The Hi-Lo Country, could've been much more interesting in the hands of others. Bridges and Danner give their acting chops a good exercise but it's a case of bringing on newcomers before their time while Perkins is just miscast period. Even Lumet shows he's in unfamiliar territory by shooting the outdoor sequences in a flat, TV movie fashion while keeping the performances more in tune with the melodramatic films of yesteryear instead of being true to the times in which the film was made. Imagine what Sam Peckinpah or Martin Ritt could've done with the material. Neither being completely horrible or forgivably worthwhile, Lovin' Molly will remain an interesting footnote in the careers of all involved.

Touching and haunting

[HotToastyRag · 9/10 · 22 March 2024]

Based on the touching Larry McMurtry novel Leaving Cheyenne, this 1974 western romance is a gem. I loved it so much, I watched it twice in one week - an honor of mine reserved for very special movies. It's told in sections, like the novel, focusing on each of the three characters' perspectives. First is young Anthony Perkins. He's grown up working on the family farm and trying to be responsible and mature like his father. His best friend, Beau Bridges, is a cowboy. He doesn't want to settle down and own his own land someday; he just wants to be a hired hand and be free to go where the wind takes him. The two pals are extremely close, and their near brotherly relationship is the strongest in the story. Even when they both fall in love with the same girl, Blythe Danner, their friendship never wavers.

As the years pass, Blythe is forced to make a choice between the two. Her choice surprises everyone, and the rest of the film shows how they cope and move on with the rest of their lives. Romance and friendship are the leads of the story, but hard work, responsibility, consequences, and time are also given strong supporting roles. Lovin' Molly isn't just a movie; it feels like you're witnessing the characters' lives. They become so dear to your heart, you'll be anxious to get a copy of the novel to get to know them even better. I usually prefer the movie to the book, and even though McMurtry's words are full of poignancy, this adaptation is equally haunting. The characters are given faces and fleshed out extremely well. I've never seen Psycho, but even if Anthony Perkins has been ruined for you, you can still see him with fresh eyes in this role. Beau Bridges is lovable and puts a smile on your face with his playful attitude. And even Blythe Danner, whom I don't really like, is sufficiently careless to make her character believable.

Lovin' Molly is wonderful. Every time I watch it, the ending and final lines make me tear up. I highly recommend it. Released in a year when grandiose movies like The Great Gatsby, Chinatown, and Murder on the Orient Express overshadowed intimate films like this, it still makes an impression.

zzzzzzzzz

[vchimpanzee · 27 September 2005]

Molly was probably a likable character, and I got the impression Blythe Danner was giving a good performance. But somehow this movie never registered with me. I did like the old-time music (Ralph Stanley wouldn't want me to call it bluegrass) and the big-band music used in one scene in the 1940s.

My biggest problem was that I could never remember which of the male characters were which (and apparently Molly had the same problem seeing as how she couldn't make up her mind which one to like), and even though I like Beau Bridges, I never saw any of the men as resembling him until the 1960s.

This was probably a good movie to those who like novels such as 'Wuthering Heights'.

Among Lumet's most gently likeable movies

[philosopherjack · 14 October 2022]

One of Sidney Lumet's least-remembered movies (made between Serpico and Murder on the Orient Express), Lovin' Molly might be among his most gently likeable and delight-infused, entirely rooted in small-scale lives and expectations but quietly radical in its premise. The opening minutes of the first section, set in 1925, disorient us as to whether Blythe Danner's Molly is in love with Beau Bridges' Johnny or Anthony Perkins' Gideon, and about what the two men, who are also best friends, might think of the competition; over subsequent decades, Molly has a child (neither of which survives the war) with each of them, while marrying a third man (a decision she can't explain even to herself). By the time of the second section, set in 1945, Gideon has become a rich landowner, aridly married to Sarah (Susan Sarandon), who pointedly is mostly absent from the film, even as we hear of how she works to ruin Molly's reputation; the third section, in 1964, visits them near the end of their lives. The film always leaves open the possibility (nudged ahead in hindsight by the subsequent resonances surrounding Perkins, and by the involvement of Brokeback Mountain's Larry McMurtry) that the most significant love is that between the two men, an impression formed early on by the very physical nature of their competitiveness (intertwined with a certain sexual naivete) and reasserted near the end, when they're still playing silly jokes on one another, still hanging out together while musing about moving in with Molly. Certain aspects of the film, such as the device of allocating the voice over and primary perspective of each section to a different character, count for less than might be expected, given the largely unvarying tone; it's certainly a small film in all respects. But along with works like The Appointment and Last of the Mobile Hot-Shots, it also testifies to Lumet's under-appreciated eccentric streak.