At the Hamptons International Film Festival: Desperate Souls, Dark City, and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy

Entering its 4^th decade, the upcoming Hamptons International Film Festival features an impressive slate of offerings: Empire of Light, The Son, My Policeman, The Banshees of Inisherin, to name just a few that have wowed audiences at Toronto and other festivals. One documentary that premiered in Venice and played in Telluride is coming too: Nancy Buirski’s Desperate Souls, Dark City, and the Legend of Midnight Cowboy. 

Inspired by Glenn Frankel’s book, Shooting Midnight Cowboy: Art, Sex, Loneliness, Liberation, and the Making of a Dark Classic, Buirski had the idea to make a film focused on Midnight Cowboy’s “moment,” asking, what has made this 1969 film about two unlikely outcasts, adrift in NYC, so memorable and so life-changing to many viewers?

 The documentary delves into the late ‘60’s, how films were made then, providing a history of British director John Schlesinger’s upbringing and prior work, and using interviews with critics such as J. Hoberman, Lucy Sante, filmmaker Brian DiPalma, and actors who appeared in Midnight Cowboy: Jennifer Salt, Bob Balaban, and Jon Voight, the film provides a rich glimpse into American culture, opening with an in-your-face close-up of Jon Voight telling a story about how he had to convince John Schlesinger that this film was important and would make their careers. He was just trying to console his director at the time and seems genuinely surprised. He was right.