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By Root 589 0

I like offbeat little comedies. Since that time, a number of people connected with it have gone on to greater success and recognition, which gives the movie marquee value it didn’t possess the first time around. That list begins with Paul Giamatti, who’d made a big impression in Howard Stern’s Private Parts the year before, and was on his way to becoming a major player. Here he plays a racketeer’s henchman called Veal Chop, and takes a backseat to the movie’s well-cast stars, Sam Rockwell and Steve Zahn. Mark Ruffalo also makes an appearance as a safecracker, two years before he became a so-called overnight sensation in You Can Count on Me opposite Laura Linney.

Then there’s Safe Men’s writer and director, John Hamburg. This was his first feature film, and while it was made on a small budget, it’s clearly the work of a skillful comedic mind. Hamburg went on to write Meet the Parents and its sequel Meet the Fockers, two of the most successful comedies of all time.

But I still prefer the quiet sensibility of Safe Men, the story of two show-business wannabes who are mistaken for burglars and drafted into the mob life in Providence, Rhode Island. How anyone could think these goofballs are professional anythings—let alone burglars—is not quite clear, but local Jewish mobster Michael Lerner (who wears a warm-up suit most of the time) is convinced, and so is his archrival, played by Harvey Fierstein. With such characters making nonstop threats, our two heroes have no choice but to try to carry out three robberies, even though they’re utterly incapable of doing anything right.

I can only recommend this film if you share my weakness for quirky, off-kilter comedies that produce smiles and chuckles rather than belly laughs. I especially like this cast, from top to bottom. Any one of them brightens up a movie; having them all in the same film is an embarrassment of riches.

117. SCARECROW

(1973)

Directed by Jerry Schatzberg

Screenplay by Garry Michael White

Actors:

GENE HACKMAN

AL PACINO

DOROTHY TRISTAN

EILEEN BRENNAN

ANN WEDGEWORTH

RICHARD LYNCH

One of the problems with mainstream Hollywood movies is that they’re afraid of taking their time or lingering on an image. Stillness is verboten. Perhaps that’s why the opening scene of Scarecrow stands out in sharp relief. Director Jerry Schatzberg holds the camera on a continuing shot of a hill along the side of the road as a character (whom we don’t yet know) makes his way toward us. The sky is dramatic, the composition of the shot (by the great cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond) is compelling, and we can’t help wonder what’s about to happen.

What happens is that we meet our main characters, who are hoping to hitch a ride on that road: Lion, played by Al Pacino, and Max, played by Gene Hackman. They’re drifters who wind up traveling together, learning about each other and uncovering a variety of peccadilloes as they hit the road. Max has recently completed a prison stretch and is saving his money to buy a car wash, which represents his ticket to success. Lion is a sailor who yearns to see the child who was born while he was away at sea. Max is the dominant character who’s always ready to pick a fight—and does—while Lion is a natural clown who has a knack for disarming tension and confrontations. The two misfits forge a prickly friendship that ultimately is based on mutual need.

Remember that both Pacino and Hackman were still fairly new to moviegoers when this film came out. Both were New York stage actors who got their big breaks during an amazing period in American cinema. Hackman had been working in television and films without much notice when he galvanized audiences in Bonnie and Clyde (1967). His performance as Buck Barrow earned him his first Academy Award nomination as Best Supporting Actor, and his career was off and running. Pacino had only appeared in three movies before Scarecrow, but the second was The Godfather (1972), which changed the lives of everyone connected with it.

Scarecrow is a road movie crossed with a character study, and the two stars catch