''Boxcar Bertha'' is a 1972 American
romantic crime drama
Crime film is a film belonging to the crime fiction genre. Films of this genre generally involve various aspects of crime and fiction. Stylistically, the genre may overlap and combine with many other genres, such as Drama (film and television), dr ...
film directed by
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November17, 1942) is an American filmmaker. One of the major figures of the New Hollywood era, he has received List of awards and nominations received by Martin Scorsese, many accolades, including an Academ ...
and produced by
Roger Corman
Roger William Corman (April 5, 1926 – May 9, 2024) was an American film director, producer, and actor. Known under various monikers such as "The Pope of Pop Cinema", "The Spiritual Godfather of the New Hollywood", and "The King of Cult", he w ...
, from a screenplay by
Joyce H. Corrington and
John William Corrington.
Made on a
low budget, the film is a loose adaptation of ''
Sister of the Road'', a pseudo-autobiographical account of the fictional character Bertha Thompson. It was Scorsese's second feature film.
Plot
Boxcar Bertha Thompson, a poor southern girl, is orphaned when her father's crop-dusting airplane crashes. The
Great Depression
The Great Depression was a severe global economic downturn from 1929 to 1939. The period was characterized by high rates of unemployment and poverty, drastic reductions in industrial production and international trade, and widespread bank and ...
hits, and she soon takes to
freighthopping. A few years later, she meets Big Bill Shelly, a union organizer, and they become lovers. Together with Rake Brown, a gambler, and Von Morton, who worked for Bertha's father, they accidentally start train and bank robberies. Eventually, they face off against the railway boss H. Buckram Sartoris in the American South. The group becomes notorious fugitives of the law and is hunted down by the railway company.
During the pursuit, Rake is gunned down, and Bill and Von are sent to a chain gang. Bertha escapes but is lured into prostitution. She unexpectedly meets Von in a tavern for blacks and learns that Bill broke out of jail and is now in hiding. Von leads Bertha to the hiding place where she experiences a sweet reunion with Bill before Sartoris's henchmen break in and crucify Bill.
Before they can leave, Von appears, eliminates the henchmen, and releases Bertha from bondage.
Cast
*
Barbara Hershey as Boxcar Bertha
*
David Carradine as Big Bill Shelly
*
Barry Primus as Rake Brown
*
Bernie Casey as Von Morton
*
Harry Northup as Deputy Sheriff Harvey Hall
*
John Carradine
John Carradine ( ; born Richmond Reed Carradine; February 5, 1906 – November 27, 1988) was an American actor, considered one of the greatest character actors in American cinema. He was a member of Cecil B. DeMille's stock company and later J ...
as Sartoris
*
Victor Argo as McIver #1
* David Osterhout as McIver #2
Production
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November17, 1942) is an American filmmaker. One of the major figures of the New Hollywood era, he has received List of awards and nominations received by Martin Scorsese, many accolades, including an Academ ...
met Corman after coming to Hollywood to edit ''Medicine Ball Caravan''. Corman, who had seen and liked ''
Who's That Knocking at My Door
''Who's That Knocking at My Door'', originally titled ''I Call First'', is a 1967 American independent drama film written and directed by Martin Scorsese which stars Harvey Keitel and Zina Bethune. It was Scorsese's feature film directorial de ...
'' during its 1970 run in Los Angeles, asked Scorsese to make a sequel to ''
Bloody Mama''. This was reworked into ''Boxcar Bertha'' after
Julie Corman discovered ''Sister of the Road''. He was given the lead actors, including Barbara Hershey, David Carradine, and Barry Primus, and a shooting schedule of 24 days in Arkansas.
[Chris Nashawaty, ''Crab Monsters, Teenage Cavemen and Candy Stripe Nurses – Roger Corman: King of the B Movie'', Abrams, 2013, p. 120.] The
Reader Railroad was used for the train scenes.
The limited budget of $600,000 forced Scorsese to reduce the size of the script and made him unable to film in
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
Baton Rouge ( ; , ) is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Louisiana. It had a population of 227,470 at the 2020 United States census, making it List of municipalities in Louisiana, Louisiana's second-m ...
and Texarkana. Scorsese stated that he completely rewrote Rake Brown to the point that Brown represented Scorsese. The film was originally meant to end with Bertha dancing at a funeral in New Orleans surrounded by black people. Filming was done over the course of 24 days in Arkansas.
''Boxcar Bertha'' contains many references to ''
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz''. Hershey has the same hair style as Dorothy in the opening and is told to not pay attention to the man behind the curtain in the brothel. A joke on the set was the
David Carradine was the Scarecrow,
Bernie Casey was the Tin Man, and
Barry Primus was the Cowardly Lion.
The locomotive in those scenes was 1920
Baldwin 2-6-2 No. 108, which later saw service on the
Conway Scenic Railroad in the late 1970s.
The engine is currently at the
Blacklands Railroad yard in
Sulphur Springs, Texas, awaiting restoration. Locomotive No.
1702
In the Swedish calendar it was a common year starting on Wednesday, one day ahead of the Julian and ten days behind the Gregorian calendar.
Events
January–March
* January 2 – A total solar eclipse is visible from the southern ...
, a
USATC S160 2-8-0 built by Baldwin in 1942, was seen in the film as well. The locomotive is now operational at the
Great Smoky Mountains Railroad.
Scorsese makes a cameo in the film as one of Bertha's clients during the brothel montage.
[Gary A. Smith, ''The American International Pictures Video Guide'', McFarland 2009, p. 33]
Barbara Hershey later called the film "a lot of fun even though it's terribly crippled by Roger Corman and the violence and sex. But between the actors and Marty Scorsese the director, we had a lot of fun. We really had characters down but one tends to not see all that, because you end up seeing all the blood and sex." She controversially announced they had filmed the movie's sex scenes "without having to fake anything".
Distribution
A pictorial recreating sexually explicit scenes from the movie appeared in ''
Playboy
''Playboy'' (stylized in all caps) is an American men's Lifestyle journalism, lifestyle and entertainment magazine, available both online and in print. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, funded in part by a $ ...
'' magazine in August 1972.
Turner Classic Movies
Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie channel, movie-oriented pay television, pay-TV television network, network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcas ...
Notes
Boxcar Bertha
/ref>[''Playboy'' August 1972, Vol. 19, Iss. 8, pg. 82–85, by: Ron Thal, "Boxcar Bertha"]
Reception
''Boxcar Bertha'' received mixed reviews from critics. It holds an approval rating of 54% on review aggregator
A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews and ratings of products and services, such as films, books, video games, music, software, hardware, or cars. This system then stores the reviews to be used for supporting a website where user ...
website Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is an American review aggregator, review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee ...
based on 26 reviews, with an average rating of 5.2/10. The website's critical consensus says, "Too derivative of other Roger Corman
Roger William Corman (April 5, 1926 – May 9, 2024) was an American film director, producer, and actor. Known under various monikers such as "The Pope of Pop Cinema", "The Spiritual Godfather of the New Hollywood", and "The King of Cult", he w ...
crime pictures to stand out, ''Boxcar Bertha'' feels more like a training exercise for a fledgling Martin Scorsese than a fully formed picture in its own right."
Scorsese screened a rough cut of the film for John Cassavetes
John Nicholas Cassavetes (December 9, 1929 – February 3, 1989) was an American filmmaker and actor. He began as an actor in film and television before helping to pioneer modern American independent cinema as a writer and director, often self- ...
. Cassavetes took him into his office and told him, "Marty, you've just spent a whole year of your life making a piece of shit. It's a good picture, but you're better than the people who make this kind of movie. Don't get hooked into the exploitation market, just try and do something different." This advice inspired Scorsese in working on his next film, '' Mean Streets''.
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert ( ; June 18, 1942 – April 4, 2013) was an American Film criticism, film critic, film historian, journalist, essayist, screenwriter and author. He wrote for the ''Chicago Sun-Times'' from 1967 until his death in 2013. Eber ...
of the ''Chicago Sun-Times
The ''Chicago Sun-Times'' is a daily nonprofit newspaper published in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Since 2022, it is the flagship paper of Chicago Public Media, and has long held the second largest circulation among Chicago newspaper ...
'' gave the film three stars out of four and called it "a weirdly interesting movie ... Director Martin Scorsese has gone for mood and atmosphere more than for action, and his violence is always blunt and unpleasant — never liberating and exhilarating, as the New Violence is supposed to be. We get the feeling we're inhabiting the dark night of a soul." ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' Howard Thompson found the film to be an "interesting surprise", praising Carradine's "excellent" performance and the "beautiful" direction by Scorsese, "who really comes into his own here." Kevin Thomas of the ''Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
'' wrote, "What is most impressive about ''Boxcar Bertha'' ... is how 28-year old director Martin Scorsese, in his first Hollywood venture, has managed to shape such familiar material into a viable film."
Arthur D. Murphy of '' Variety'' gave the film a negative review, writing, "Whatever its intentions, ''Boxcar Bertha'' is not much more than an excuse to slaughter a lot of people ... The final cut has stripped away whatever mood and motivation may have been in the script, leaving little more than fights, shotgun blasts, beatings and aimless movement." Gene Siskel
Eugene Kal Siskel (January 26, 1946 – February 20, 1999) was an American film critic and journalist for the ''Chicago Tribune'' who co-hosted a movie review television series alongside colleague Roger Ebert.
Siskel started writing for the '' ...
of the ''Chicago Tribune
The ''Chicago Tribune'' is an American daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States. Founded in 1847, it was formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper", a slogan from which its once integrated WGN (AM), WGN radio and ...
'' gave the film one star out of four and called it a "trashy movie" with violence that "does not shock. It merely depresses." Tom Milne of ''The Monthly Film Bulletin
The ''Monthly Film Bulletin'' was a periodical of the British Film Institute published monthly from February 1934 until April 1991, when it merged with '' Sight & Sound''. It reviewed all films on release in the United Kingdom, including those wi ...
'' declared: "Abrasively scripted, stunningly shot, and beautifully acted by David Carradine, Barbara Hershey and Barry Primus in particular, ''Boxcar Bertha'' is much more than the exploitation picture it has been written off as (by ''Variety'', for instance) and makes a worthy companion piece to both '' Bloody Mama'' and '' Bonnie and Clyde.''"
See also
* List of American films of 1972
This is a list of American films released in 1972.
Box office
The highest-grossing American films released in 1972, by domestic box office gross revenue as estimated by '' The Numbers'', are as follows:
January–March
April–June is
...
References
Works cited
*
External links
*
*
*
*
{{Roger Corman
1972 films
1972 crime drama films
1970s American films
1972 crime thriller films
1970s drama road movies
1970s English-language films
American crime drama films
American crime thriller films
American drama road movies
American International Pictures films
American romance films
Biographical films about American gangsters of the interwar period
Films about the labor movement
Films directed by Martin Scorsese
Films produced by Roger Corman
Films set in Arkansas
Films shot in Arkansas
Great Depression films
Industrial Workers of the World in fiction
Rail transport films
Romantic crime films
English-language crime drama films
English-language crime thriller films