Tracks (1977)

What a strange little trip this one turned out to be.  Dennis Hopper plays a soldier in-charge of ensuring the safe transport of his fallen friend's body back home to be buried.  He accompanies the body back home by train.  Virtually the entire film take place on a train which is always a fun experiment.

The movie at times radiates that raw naturalistic style so often used in the 70's, but at other times is dreamlike and surreal.  Hopper is great in the film as usual.  My only real complaint I suppose stems from the final scene, which seems to be almost improvised.  That aspect of it is not what bothered me as much as the fact that the scene just stops and the credits roll without really allowing the story to resolve one way or the other.  Normally that sort of thing doesn't bother me because it leaves me with the feeling that there was much more going on in the film, but with "Tracks," I felt that the lack of resolution signified that the was actually less.  I felt that the creative did not have a resolution in mind and couldn't come up with one.  Maybe I'm wrong, but I'll probably never know.

--Popkoff