The Getaway by Jim Thompson, adapted for the big screen, with Steve McQueen as Doc McCoy and Ali MacGraw as his wife, Carol http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-getaway-based-on-novel-by-jim.html - 9 out of 10

 

The Getaway by Jim Thompson, adapted for the big screen, with Steve McQueen as Doc McCoy and Ali MacGraw as his wife, Carol http://realini.blogspot.com/2018/02/the-getaway-based-on-novel-by-jim.html

9 out of 10

 

 

As I was reading some chapters of The Getaway, a sense of déjà vu descended, with the adagio that I have passed the point where too many novels have been read to remember much, if anything from many of them yes, I know, why keep at it…well, there is the Umberto Eco quote “The person who doesn't read lives only one life…The reader lives 5,000…Reading is immortality backwards’ and coupled with this insurance policy of going through infinity, there is the analysis of Malcolm Bradbury in To the Hermitage http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/09/to-hermitage-by-malcolm-bradbury-author.html

 

From to the Hermitage we find how much more captivating, intense, alert, clever, vivid the events happening in novels are – unless we are talking about Kafka or Beckett, which is such fine humor to include – how exquisite, wise, fabulous the characters are (as opposed to real life, where they often are boring, overwhelming, ghastly, think about the most powerful man in the world, until January last year) in fiction…in the words of the author ‘Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

However, to try and come back to a point left being many lines before this, there is a limit to reading and the plan now is to read fewer new entries and try to read again some classics that I have enjoyed (read encore une fois, provided I see that this is an encore) and recently there have been some comebacks, for instance to The History Man http://realini.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-history-man-by-malcolm-bradbury.html alas, I have just noticed that, albeit I had known of a previous encounter, it was just revealed by looking on the blog, that quite sadly, the new read was in fact the…third

 

The Getaway is one of the 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read (a list which you can find at the Guardian site, or you can ask me about it, find about 780 on my blog, where you should subscribe, share and like) and indeed, it has oomph, intensity, surprises aplenty, style, smart plot, what, everything you can expect from a thriller, with complex characters, yes, Doc is a killer, but he testifies to the fact that ‘he hates killing’ and when he has to do that at some point around the border, he adds that he hates it in that circumstance in particular, but he will not hesitate – the Robert De Niro line from the other quintessential motion picture, Heat, comes to mind ‘I will not hesitate, I will take you down, if you threaten my plan, my team’ http://realini.blogspot.com/2019/05/heat-written-and-directed-by-michael.html words to that effect

 

Indeed, Doc will be on edge and we do not know what will happen between him and his wife, Carol, we may have that doubt up to and perhaps beyond the end of the narrative, because if they love each other ( a big if, for if we take the Thomas Mann definition from one of his short stories, love means a lot, and we must not throw that word around, which is what most do, they love an ice-cream, a color of paint on a wall, and so much more…in a recent promotion for Qatar, and oppressive state, Beckham was silly in stating he loves about fifteen things in one minute, food, market, sand, all that was paid for with good money, to advertise a repugnant regime) they come to a clash.

A bank robbery is organized and the result is a few people are dead, the other, third partner, Rudy, has the notion that he can take control, keep Doc under threat, and eventually Getaway with the money from the bank, but the latter pulls a gun from his hat and shoots the enemy, however good the main character is in his shooting, his partner in crime escapes with a serious injury, later cared for by a vet.

 

The vet, Harold Clinton, saves the psychopath, but he is taken hostage with his freaky wife Fran Clinton, and the end is nigh (spoiler alert) for the unlucky veterinarian, whose spouse takes a fancy, has a passion, or even an obsession for the macho, violent, rude, cruel criminal – feminists would be outraged and I would be banned, if only I were to have an audience, especially this far into the note, there is likely nobody still looking at this…if you are still here, what do you say, have a go at this – and the drama unfolds.

Spoiler alert, at least for this part where poor Harold is concerned, they take to the road, and in order to keep them under supervision, Rudy has the couple staying with him in the same room – he can take time, because he has realized that Doc will be severely delayed, now that at this stage, his crimes have been advertised by the police – and Fran fornicates with the bandit, right next to her husband, who is so appalled by all this, being forced to help a killer who copulates with his spouse that…he slashes his own throat.

 

At least one other episode is magnificent, that where Carol has to wait with the bag containing in excess of 100k (was it 250, I can’t remember), which would be close to or more than one million today (and maybe two next year, what with inflation and all) at the train station, and when she tries to put the bag in the locker, a goodfella comes to her to explain the mechanism, he opens, puts the bag in and gives her the key…only we will learn from doc, when he arrives, that this is one of the oldest tricks, for she was given another key, to an empty box and the crook now has the whole stash with him.

We are facing here with the couple the end of the world, they have killed, risked their lives and/or interminable sentences, perhaps execution, and all they have done it for has just disappeared, and they have no means to continue their run from the law, they are left hopeless and desperate, unless doc finds the crook…

 

http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world