Brewster McCloud

You can tell this movie is from the early 70s from a mile away. Experimental, cynical, satirical, and overtly left-wing: cops are dumb, capitalism stinks, and subtle preaching against anti-Communism and racism being scattered all over. Actually, to be fair, considering when it was made - and by whom (Altman was one of those incorrigible Reds) - it isn't even that political or critical of (Western) society. As it could have been. The movie has rather wild, quick editing, which aids the timing of the gags - of which quite a few are funny. The unpredictability and zaniness of the fast-paced and fun first half unfortunately is followed by a weaker second half, which gets bogged down in weak/unfunny resolutions (like Murphy committing suicide - what the hell was that?!). Even the very funny bird-dropping gags started to wear a bit thin. Toward the end, there is even a car-chase in which Duvall - for some strange reason - decides to have a cat-and-mouse game with the cops. This was stupid. Even dumber was Duvall suddenly informing the police of Cort. The obligatory (for this movie) end-of-movie flying sequence looks pretty good, but ultimately only the first half remains in good memory. I consider Altman to be one of the best directors of all time, in spite of him being a silly little hypocritical leftist. He has made a number of crappy movies, but there are also some that are terrific, like "3 Women", "Images", "M*A*S*H", "Vincent & Theo", and even "Short Cuts". "B. M." belongs to neither category. Overall, it's solid.

Robert Altman directs "Brewster McCloud". The plot? Brewster is an eccentric inventor who lives beneath the Houston Astrodome. He spends his days working on a pair of man-powered wings which he hopes will enable him to fly. But while he is busy collecting materials to build his contraption, mysterious deaths occur throughout his city. Altman's running joke is that "Brewster McCloud" is essentially a giant birdwatching film. Indeed, the film is narrated by Rene Auberjonois, who treats the picture as a grand safari, Altman planting bird references everywhere in the form of food, signs, clothes, license plates, characters, costumes, dialogue etc etc. Why Brewster wishes to fly is given a neat twist. Rather than some kind of Icarus complex, Brewster seems to be acting upon suppressed memories. He was born to fly. His entire race was born to fly. He belongs in the skies. It's all in his DNA! Brewster is aided in his quest by Louise, a sort of guardian angel. She has scars down her back, which suggests she once had wings herself. She's like a God or guardian angel, who descends to teach Brewster the mysteries of man's ancient wings. It's all pretty odd, particularly when Altman likens flying to sex, and Brewster's avian urges to psychosexual lusts. Later in the film, Louise is dismayed to learn that Brewster slept with a girl he barely knew (Shelly Duvall). The once pure and naive Brewster thus becomes tainted by the "sins of the flesh". He's contaminated, his earthly sins affixing him to the ground. They seal his mortality and prevent him from entering the angel world up above. To redeem himself, Brewster must therefore seek forgiveness from Louise, who now appears in the guise of Dorothy from "Wizard of Oz". From here on, Altman swathes the film in "Oz" references. Flying monkeys, red slippers, golden roads, they're all subtly woven into the crazy plot. This being Altman, chunks of the film then become covert commentaries on major aspects of American life (sexuality, class-struggle, race, ambition, bigotry, success, economics, crime, politics, religion). These themes are then bound to a plot which is really about the loss of virginity, or rather, idealism. During its climax, Brewster's broken wings and crumpled, twisted body, point toward the climax of Altman's "Nashville", in which characters sing "It Don't Worry Me" after an assassination. Both films take place in cities yearning for economic power, both use large structures as metaphors for America (The Astrodome, the Parthenon), and both posit the creative spirit and personal conscience as being overrun by corporate American, capitalism and commercialism in general. 8.5/10 - Worth two viewings.

It's hard to talk about a film as unparalleled as Brewster McCloud. It creates its own world out of element from the world we know so well. It plays with everything, including its self-consciousness about being a movie. It weaves together many threads into a lovely, heart-breaking snapshot of a moment in America. The situation: The world has gone mad. The wicked witch is wearing the Ruby slippers, and has become a beloved social icon. Who wouldn't want to fly away? Enter Brewster McCloud, a young man who plans to do just that. He is hiding out in the basement of the Astrodome in Houston, working on building his wings. The kind you wear. Like Icarus did. His plan is all feeling, very focused, but doesn't take him past the immediate "How?" He is under the tutelage and protection of a sort of Bird-Goddess/Angel (played by Sally Kellerman) who walks around wearing absolutely nothing but a red plastic raincoat. When she takes it off, you can see the long, curving scars where her wings were removed. She also drives around in a small red car whose license-plate reads "BRDSHT". Lest you think I've given away too much, let me assure you this barely scratches the surface. Who is responsible for the wave of mysterious murders? What of the presidential candidate who's all over town, is he an assassination target? What is the connection with the horny young girl (Shelly Duvall, in her first movie role - I believe she was discovered by Altman when he attended a party at her house during the location shoot in Houston) who comes to visit Brewster but can't ever really get his attention? A wonderful, under-rated film worth seeing.

For some reason people have a hard time accepting how great this movie really is. It contains one of the best car-chase sequences ever. It features a boy who lives in the Astrodome. It has a hipster San Fran cop out to break the rules. It has shoplifting. It has diarrhoea jokes. It has Sally Kellerman splashing naked in a fountain. It has Stacey Keach in an outstanding cameo as the meanest man in the world. It has gallons of peanut butter, hundreds of pull-ups, bird-poop, a BEAUTIFUL Shelley Duvall, Bud Cort, great film editing, lots of imagination, tons of style, smack-in-the-face symbolism, and the best closing credits sequence ever! What's not to like?!

It's obvious that director Robert Altman was out to make something different, but the mystery of the bird poop killer is an odd experience. Bud Cort, of "Harold and Maude" fame, plays an eccentric young man desperate to grow wings like a bird, being stalked by the sultry Sally Kellerman (barely saying a word) and all of a sudden involved with the zany Shelley Duvall as evil people all over Houston are mysteriously killed after getting a faceful of bird doo doo. There's stupid cops, car chases and an assortment of weird characters including Rene Auberjonois as a creepy bird expert. Don't expect a knee slapper here. The comic moments are more ironic than funny. John Schuck, preparing to play Rock Hudson's sidekick on "McMillan and Wife", puts on his cops uniform for the first time, and veteran character actress Margaret Hamilton sings a delightfully off-key rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner" with a particularly amusing wardrobe reference to a famous prop from her most famous movie. In fact, this film has several references to that classic, references that may be funny to some but forced to others. I did get a few laughs out of this, but overall, it's way too forced to completely work, even as a black comedy.

Folks must have been very stoned when they made this .... It is such a "playful" film with so many great characters (and actors) riding on a very wild and surreal mixed up mythology. The film should be re-released (maybe since Altman got an Oscar they will). I don't know how he got away with making this... but thank God he did! In many ways Robert Altman except for his hands off approach to his actors has created many films that are at the equal to Fredrico Fellini in satire and whimsically profound sequences that baffle the audience -= but ain't it nice to home from a movie and remember it because you just can't get the ideas and images out of your head. This is a very funny film. It has the Star Spangle Banner, Ruby Slippers, Bird Do-Do, Mustard pumps, un-principled law enforcers, and wings that try very hard to fly away.

This movie is a million things at once. Some may find that as a bit of a turn-off, but then that's what a cult classic film is really about, isn't it? Brewster McCloud is a reclusive boy who lives in the basement of the Houston Astrodome. He has a short job as chauffeur for a miserly old man. He is looked down upon for his meek appearance and his quiet manner. He dreams of building himself a set of wings and using those to fly away from all this suffering. That's how the film starts, anyway. There are three basic stories in the movie: (1) Brewster McCloud's coming-of-age story, (2) the parallel metaphor of Brewster McCloud's dream of flying away from worldly sorrow, and (3) the murders of people who mistreat Brewster and who all die with raven droppings on their faces. The real irony of this film is how the character of the Lecturer keeps pointing out similarities between the characters and certain birds, and yet the ending comes around, and we learn how unlike birds we are. There is so much information about birds, you wonder if this was an adult remake of an after-school special. Overall, I'll have to use the word most of the other reviewers have used: quirky. There are things which are very different. There is the Pythonesque beginning where, as a woman sings the National Anthem and the credits roll, she stops, tells the band to try again in the right key, and the credits restart as well as the singing. There are small bits such as when a police officer holds up a lighter when his partner says there's only one way to know for sure if there's marijuana in a cigarette. And there is my favorite character, the Lecturer, who lectures the audience about the behavior of birds while he himself starts making strange noises and begins pecking at seeds...

Very strange movie about a boy working on wings and planning to fly away. Or at least about the Houston Astrodome. Oh yeah, there's some murder and sex. And some sort of Oedipal thing. Also, Margaret Hamilton (the Wicked Witch) appears in a cameo, sounding like her character from 1939. And there's some sort of Wizard of Oz statement being made. Ruby slippers, girls dressed up like Dorothy. Whatever. A waste of time. Some will pretend to like this eccentric mess, I suppose, but trust me, nobody is popping this in the VCR after seeing it once.

This is the worst movie I've ever seen..It totally disgusts me to think about it. Agh, why does this horrible thing exist. Um, anyhow, the main character, Brewster is the "misunderstood genius" type. He's horrible to look at. And what kind of name is Brewster McCloud? The place where he lives looks like an underground laboratory. There's a girl that visits him there who is apparently in love with him, but he doesn't really respond to her attempts to turn him on and is dating someone else. For some reason the relationship does not end when he lets on that he is obsessed with flying. Yes, he has built an enormous pair of wings. The movie ends with some lame music over a scene where he flies around a stadium..and doesn't crash or get shot down. Eh, maybe I'm being unfair--but to me it came off as stupid and pretentious. I hope it's destroyed in a fire, or stolen or something.

Bud Cort plays Brewster McCloud. He's a very strange young man who lives in the Houston Astrodome and is building a huge set of wings so he can fly. The movie is about him and his VERY odd assortment of friends and family. And how about the killer running around Houston strangling people and leaving bird droppings on them? As you can see this is a very strange film. It's unlike anything director Robert Altman has ever done. The film isn't perfect--it's too long, the weirdness wears you down at times, some of the humor is real sick and there are characters that are just disgusting (Stacy Keach) or too flat out weird, even for this movie (Jennifer Salt)! And what's with the circus ending (entertaining as it is)? Still I love this film. The story rambles all over the place but I was able to keep track of it. Altman packs the movie with plenty of bird imagery and references. He also pays homage to other films also--most notably "The Wizard of Oz" (right up to having Margaret Hamilton in the cast and check out how Salt is dressed at times). This really doesn't pull together in any way but it IS fascinating to watch. Also the cast is great--with one exception--Michael Murphy. He's miscast and looks miserable. But everybody else is perfect. Particular standouts are Cort (very good in a difficult role), Shelley Duvall (who usually annoys me to no end) and Sally Kirkland (looking absolutely stunning). Also there's a very cute injoke--there's a quick shot of the poster for "MASH" in Duvall's apartment! This film was overshadowed by Altman's "MASH" in 1970. Also, the studio hated it and threw it away. Now, however, it is rightfully considered one of the best films of its decade. I highly recommend this--but not for everybody. If you like a linear plot and easily defined characters, stay away.