A valediction to the western and American heroism, a beautiful
daguerrotype of frontier life, and Altman's first truly great movie.
Beatty is the shambolic entrepreneur McCabe who sets up a whorehouse in
a snowy Northwestern mining town, Christie the madam with a head for
business who coerces him into partnership. When delegates from a
corporation arrive to buy them out, McCabe – groping for dignity and
self-sufficiency – tells them where to go. They switch tack, and three
gunmen ride into town to resolve the matter. The flashed film stock
gives it a perfectly washed-out period look, Leonard Cohen's on the
soundtrack, and the doomed Beatty / Christie pairing breaks your
heart.
