"Rafferty and the Gold Dust Twins" is a film that is not for everyone. It's practically plotless and has a very strange tone throughout. When you read through the reviews, you'll notice a lot of people love it and a lot hate it....that's just the sort of film it is.
Rafferty (Alan Arkin) is a bit of a mess. Since leaving the Marines, he's been living a meager existence....working as a driving instructor, driving a car that looks like it came off a junk heap AND drinking throughout much of the day. After he offers a ride to two very strange drifters (Sally Kellerman and Mackenzie Phillips), they kidnap him and demand he take them to New Orleans. He soon ditches them but realizes the gun didn't have real bullets and so, oddly, he goes back and picks them up and offers to take them anyway.
Nearly all of the film consists of the three of them going from Los Angeles towards New Orleans. Along the way, they steal, scam and argue...a lot. Of the three, Mackenzie Phillips plays the most tough to like character. She's a teen and acts like one who's been hurt badly...and hates the world and everything else as a result. She's simply surly and unlikable...sort of like a cobra with a toothache. The other two are trashy but not so mean. How much you enjoy watching these awful people as they make their ways across America and scam people will depend a lot on whether or not you'll like the film. In many ways, it plays like "Paper Moon" but with less comedy.
As far as road pictures go, this one is a very tough sell for me, as I kept looking for some reason to care about these people. But they were all sociopaths who hurt folks and didn't seem to mind. No, they weren't hardened criminals...more scammers and grifters...but sociopaths nonetheless...just low rent ones! While the film had a few nice moments, much of it seems directionless and tough to like.
Rafferty (Alan Arkin) is a bit of a mess. Since leaving the Marines, he's been living a meager existence....working as a driving instructor, driving a car that looks like it came off a junk heap AND drinking throughout much of the day. After he offers a ride to two very strange drifters (Sally Kellerman and Mackenzie Phillips), they kidnap him and demand he take them to New Orleans. He soon ditches them but realizes the gun didn't have real bullets and so, oddly, he goes back and picks them up and offers to take them anyway.
Nearly all of the film consists of the three of them going from Los Angeles towards New Orleans. Along the way, they steal, scam and argue...a lot. Of the three, Mackenzie Phillips plays the most tough to like character. She's a teen and acts like one who's been hurt badly...and hates the world and everything else as a result. She's simply surly and unlikable...sort of like a cobra with a toothache. The other two are trashy but not so mean. How much you enjoy watching these awful people as they make their ways across America and scam people will depend a lot on whether or not you'll like the film. In many ways, it plays like "Paper Moon" but with less comedy.
As far as road pictures go, this one is a very tough sell for me, as I kept looking for some reason to care about these people. But they were all sociopaths who hurt folks and didn't seem to mind. No, they weren't hardened criminals...more scammers and grifters...but sociopaths nonetheless...just low rent ones! While the film had a few nice moments, much of it seems directionless and tough to like.