This Property Is Condemned
Director: Sydney Pollack
Year Released: 1966
Rating: 2.5
Robert Redford's Job Eliminator rolls into a dinky town to shut down the railway and fire some blue collar workers; he also happens to fall for a local girl (Natalie Wood) that has gotten a bit of a 'reputation.' Redford and Wood don't have much chemistry together and the story crawls to its grim - and abrupt - conclusion, where Tennessee Williams' typical dourness decimates yet another wayward heroine: Mom (Kate Reid) thinks nothing of exploiting her daughter by 'selling' her to a significantly older 'gentleman' and the town's males are a bunch of savages, so when someone shows Wood some actual love and kindness, it can only mean disaster. In Williams' original one-act play it's only two children discussing the story on a train track so he cannot be blamed for the uninspired 'fleshing out' of the story (by writers Coppola, Coe and Sommer).
