(note : this blog was begun Sunday night, August 11, 2019, and finished this morning)
Tonight's movie was "Emperor Of The North" (1973), a story set during the Great Depression about train-hopping hobos and the brutal conductor who tries to stop them. Lee Marvin stars as "A #1", a legendary vagabond who is said to be able to ride any train undetected. The nemesis of all the hobos is "Shack", the sadistic railroad enforcer who carries a hand-sized sledgehammer in his belt to use on any 'bos he finds hiding in his boxcars. " 'Bos" (pronounced as the plural of "boe") is slang for hobos, who during the Depression counted on surreptitious train travel as a means of survival. They road the rails to avoid arrest or detention and also just to keep moving, in search of food or money somewhere down the line. Like today's homeless, they found safety in numbers and cooperation. The railroad owners wanted them off the trains, though, and hired aggressive, near homicidal captains to constantly search the cars (and under the cars) for any hidden tramps. Upon discovering one, a conductor like "Shack" would either pitch him off the train, maybe to land beneath it's iron wheels, or split his skull with the sledgehammer.
Sorry to be so graphic, but this is what is depicted in the movie.
A little aside about how I came to watch it :
Long ago, either in the late 80s or early 90s, my good friend Mr. D raved to me about "Emperor Of The North". He loved it, and I remember one time when he gave me a scene-by-scene description of almost the entire movie. He mentioned it several times over the years and I never forgot the title. I've been doing occasional library searches for it for the last ten years or so, but it's never turned up in the database.
Today, however, I stopped in at West Valley Libe - one of only two area libraries that are open on Sunday - because I needed movies and I was headed in the general direction of the West Valley anyway, to hike at El Scorpion Park and then a few miles south to see the Pink Floyd tribute band "Which One's Pink" play a free concert at Warner Park. While scanning the dvd racks at West Valley Libe, I spied a copy of "Emperor Of The North", which apparently has never been entered into the citywide search engine. But I thought, "Eureka"!, I finally found this movie after all these years. Tonight I would watch it in honor of Mr. D (actual name Dave S.) who passed away in 2008.
I can see what he loved about this film. It's a rollicking adventure that celebrates the life of freedom lived by the Hobos, and their defiance of authority. Dave lived his life in an almost opposite way, rarely free to do what he wanted, always doing as he was told. Consequently I think he had some of the Hobo spirit in him. Not in any desire to be poverty stricken of course, but just to be his own man. Dave had a saying that I've always remembered : "As soon as anybody uses the phrase 'you should', I stop listening". He was talking about unsolicited advice from people who "know best", telling him "You should do this" or "you should do that".
That was Dave's inner rebellious side. It was in his thinking that he was as free as a Hobo. He also loved the outdoors, and was even given the nickname "Yosemite" by one of our friends, in honor of his favorite place in the world. Dave would have been perfectly happy spending all of his time there, and maybe even living outdoors like the Hobos did, except perhaps with a few more modern conveniences and certainly some recorded music.
Finally there are the trains. Dave never mentioned trains specifically and had no obsession with them that I am aware of, but he loved to be "on the go" - he worked as a professional driver for the movie business - and, to me at least, there is something beautiful about trains. Their form, their length, their massive engines and wheels, and the way they travel through the hidden parts of the country, through the backwoods and riversides. If you were a hobo, you could climb on and jump off wherever you pleased, free as a bird in the middle of nowhere, as long as you had a bedroll and something to eat.
For me personally, I could never live that way. For one thing I'd be way too scared. But I think Dave had a little, or maybe a lot, of that spirit inside of him.
Now, in the movie, getting around by train is not all that simple for the hobos. They have to face the constant fear of discovery. The more skilled train-hoppers have mastered the skills of riding undetected on most of the lines, but there is one that none of them will chance : Line #19, which is controlled by Shack (played by Ernest Borgnine). Throwing you off the train would be his second option. He'd likely kill you first. When they are gathered round the campfire at night, the hobos speak furtively of Shack, and how none will dare test him. Someone, though, brings up the name of one man who has supposedly ridden Shack's train and gotten away with it. He is known as "A. Number One" (Lee Marvin). He usually travels alone, but soon he will appear in camp to make good on his boast.
And that is what the movie is basically about. There is no grand plot, nor any social moralizing on the hobo life or the larger context of the Depression. Director Aldrich just gets down into the hobo camps to show you what their life was like, with no editorial comment. It's a buddy movie too. A young Keith Carradine nearly steals the show as an excitable young wannabe named "Cigaret". "Cigaret" constantly brags about his train skills, about how he is the best in the business. He fancies himself as really tough too, but he's skinny enough to blow away in a strong wind, and his hands are a little too clean. He desperately wants to be "A. Number One"'s partner, but Marvin sees him as more of a punk, a fast talking criminal, than a real hobo. But Carradine persists throughout the movie, which provides the story with a light comedic element in the contrasts between the two characters.
Marvin will reluctantly take Carradine under his wing, and now they will go up against Shack together, which might prove more deadly for Marvin than if he had gone it alone.
"Emperor Of The North" is pure 70s adventure with an outlaw flavor, anarchic in it's own way just like "Easy Rider" or "Bonnie & Clyde". It has the look of a Western, shot almost entirely outdoors in the Pacific Northwest by the great Joseph Biroc. It's what you could call a great 70s-style "tough guy" movie, the kind that starred guys like Lee Marvin or Charles Bronson. As "Shack", the deadly conductor, Ernest Borgnine is as frightening as if he had been the guy in real life.
It's also one of the great "train movies" of all time, I think.
I give it Two Big Thumbs Up. When you watch it, tip a glass of homemade campfire hooch in honor of Dave, or maybe roll yourself a stogie. /////
This is yet another movie review I am finishing up the following day. Sigh......(and lol, too). I'm hopeless about staying up too late and then getting too tired to finish, haha, but I swear I will correct the problem! ("yeah right, Ad")......
Well, that's all for now. I am still off work, until Thursday, so I will head out on a hike in a little while. Do ya wanna come with me? Where should we go? I was thinking about going to Disneyland tomorrow, but that would be by myself, and I just don't know if I can do it. I do everything by myself (which sucks "on wheels" as the kids say), but I don't know if D-Land is doable alone.
I guess I'll find out though, sooner or later. Unless you wanna go with me. :):)
See you tonight at the Usual Time. Tons of love until then. Trainloads of love! xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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