The Whole Shootin' Match.

The Whole Shootin' Match, described by the Walter Reade, where it'll be screening from tomorrow through November 21, as a "lost classic of American independent cinema," is said to have inspired Robert Redford to launch Sundance. Among the other filmmakers it made an impression on was Richard Linklater, who talks with the Reeler's ST VanAirsdale about the early promise of filmmaker Eagle Pennell - and the eventual disappointment.

"It's no revolution, but comic-pastoral traditionalism refined to its essence," writes Nick Pinkerton in the Voice. "Knowing and indulgent about lower-middle-class white life, the film lives on talk: Vignettes of Frank cracking Lone Stars at the drive-in with his family, making a never-to-be-fulfilled list of home fix-ups in a moment of temporarily flush euphoria, or settling back to watch a Cowboys game are absolute bull's-eyes."

Earlier: Daniel Stuyck in Film Comment.

Posted by dwhudson at November 15, 2007 2:47 PM