Sometimes serendipity finds you at the crossroads of ignorance and stubborness. I borrowed the Criterion copy of The Last Picture Show from the library and didn't know it was a double disc. The liner notes were on the left side of the case, so, last night, I pulled the disc from the right hand side as is the customary location. The dvd menu popped up as "Texasville", which I had glanced at on the case as being a bonus feature.
I shrugged and figured I might as well lean into that choice and see where this lesser known film goes. I chose the director's cut over the theatrical, because, why not? In for a pound - this is a Criterion collection, why would I want a normal experience. I learned two things in the opening titles: 1) that Texasville had Jeff Bridges and Cybill Shepherd as headliners, and (2) this version was in black and white.
What I did not know at the time was: 1) Texasville was a sequel to The Last Picture Show, released 19 years afterwards with substantially the same core cast list. 2) Both of these films were based on Larry McMurty novels, respectively. 3) the black and white photography of this cut was a new one from 2022, following the death of the director, but was in line with his reconsidered vision. As the first film was in black and white, the theatrical release of Texasville in color set them without a common visual niche to better tie them together.
Being ignorant of all of this at the time, I thought it was a distinct framing of future-past nostalgia motif and set it apart in a felt experience. References to the more famous, previous film's characters and key events were beyond my ability to fully know. But weirdly, it was very engaging and effective to me - I thought that the filmmaker was demonstrating trust with his audience to pick up context by those omissions, to be paid off through later revelations to these early hints.
After watching "The Last Picture Show" for the first time tonight, I think that I still prefer the sequel in some emotional ways, even as blind as I was to the full weight of the continuity. The Last Picture Show is a brilliant bridge, as has been raved about, between celebrating old Hollywood and advancing motifs of new Hollywood in a blend. "The Last Picture Show" is a coming of age in generational divide both in style and in the eyes of the characters. There is tension and melancholy loneliness in this new age, where potential is full and all these actors are young and hot, even the older adults in this film are quite striking and lovely to look at in contrast to the "high school" grads figuring out their lives and taking chances with consequences. The movie is shocking and sad in some consequential ways and moments as you feel with the characters in large and small moments.
But "Texasville" is meandering and overwhelmingly dense with small drama and moments. The core cast is older and more weathered. Everyone is bored and so tired of the monotony of life and make wildly bold impulsive choices to wreck Jeff Bridges' Duane's plans and force him to try to navigate and pick up the pieces in the wreckage, like everyone is expecting him to hurry up and do. Bridges is the straight man in most of his life, he has silver fox charisma with many hot and bothered moms, but is haunted by his oldest son who is a young buck and is a thoughtless horndog with enormous potential with his charisma and an even bigger libido, which sets him at odds in his schedule of having a fiancee, while also being a homewrecker to at least two of his dad's old friends' households. Duane has a daughter who is a single, hot mom with designs of getting a ring, as well as a set of twins who got kicked out of church camp for raising hell with prepubescent flirtation and attempted violence. For the first part of the movie, Duane is continuously being informed by other characters that two other townspeople are hooking up in a new configuration for the novelty of thinking it will fix their boring lives finally, and it now becomes Duane's assignment to either try to comfort the scorned and heartbroken lover who is having a breakdown AND/OR talk sense into the pair, as a pillar of the community, maybe they will listen to him and realize how stupid and inconvenient that that the new couple is being with their selfish and thoughtless chaos.
Duane is confused and exasperated, but ever accommodating, however bewildered and frustrated he is at being given these errands. Everyone else's lives must be put above his own, and he got so used to this being the status quo, that he is not present in his own life as a successful oil tycoon who is over leveraged in debt and needing to strike a new vein of oil to keep his life afloat. But whenever he has to consider whether he enjoys his life and wealth, he would have to pause rather than knowing a good reason other than "People are relying on me to provide and project this life to enable them to continue their reckless choices" Or, to be bailed out on his ability to show up and save them with his time and/or money to smooth it over." There is something Ecclesiastical about "Texasville", where life is going too fast and yet there is a responsibility to still try to chase it down for those you care about who need your help.
The later part of "Texasville" is like a repetitive oil derrick bobbing in the desert. A whole lot of nothing really except surface activity, but something eventually is hit deep in the bowels of the film, and this bubbling crudeness is valuable and useful in the right hands and situations. When these characters run out of surface diversions of chasing happiness, sometimes they are struck by vulnerable epiphanies of how sad, tired, and lonely they are. Even when surrounded by familiar trappings of luxury, comfort, and beauty, there is a longing for fulfillment and connection, of being seen, valued, and cherished. And this hunger consumes, even as beauty and energy fades, as old habits send people down familiar paths, wondering if their heart is in the destination, the pursuit, or the sheer routine of existence continuing.
The Last Picture Show is about potential and the tragedy of it being squandered by young fools and old romantics longing for that bit of nostalgia. "Texasville" is about being Atlas, knowing there are younger gods who will eventually supplant you and your generation. You are tired, oh so tired, but you have the weight of the world on your shoulders. Can you manage to keep it there a little longer, while the young fools caper about and learn to mature enough to maybe take your place and keep the community intact into a future? "Texasville" is the lesser film in dramatic arc, but in the aggregate mosaic of how it reshapes the characters from the first film to a new Hope only for a new tragedy of humanity to take place? It is relatable and beautifully rendered in its series of small moments of being alive, tired, and messy with one another.
