You get a sense that both men were taking advantage of success when they decided to collaborate on a Western \u2013 a genre that was much harder to make on the shoestring budgets afforded to Black filmmakers than the urban crime pictures they\u2019d made their names with. But Julien, who also co-produced and penned the screenplay, wasn\u2019t trying to make another Super Fly <\/em>or Mack<\/em>; his transparent inspiration was Bonnie and Clyde<\/em>. As with Arthur Penn\u2019s 1967 groundbreaker, Thomasine & Bushrod <\/em>concerns a <\/em>good-looking, bank-robbing couple who become sensations of early media, embarking on a crime spree while taunting the lawman in pursuit. Both are period movies with contemporary sensibilities; just as Penn\u2019s film explored the anti-authoritarian undercurrents of the late 1960s, Thomasine<\/em> mines the fertile soil of race relations in the post-Civil War era (and how, in many ways, little had changed by the mid-1970s). Both films conclude with \u2013 spoiler \u2013 the shockingly bloody deaths of their attractive protagonists. Even the title is an echo, down to the ladies-first ordering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n You can tell Julien wrote it, and wrote himself the juiciest possible role: gets to act tough, be cool, romance Vonetta McGee, and look great in his cowboy duds. But it\u2019s not a one-man show; we meet McGee\u2019s Thomasine first, and she gets a great entrance, luring a scuzzy white criminal into a honey trap before revealing she\u2019s a bounty hunter. And he builds in a smooth fake-out, staging the initial action to make it seem that Julien\u2019s H.T. Bushrod, a wanted man, is her next target \u2013 when, in fact, he\u2019s her long-time love. Julien gives her a fully-formed character, and she plays it to the hilt, with real complexity and flaws. (The bounty hunter angle is, in addition to the tone and look of the picture, a clear influence on a certain Blaxpoitation-championing filmmaker; if Tarantino didn\u2019t screen this while prepping Django Unchained<\/em>, I\u2019ll eat my hat.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n Julien and McGee are a great-looking couple with easy-breezy chemistry, and it\u2019s unsurprising to learn that they were off-screen lovers as well. Their relationship is the foundation upon which the movie is built \u2013 the idea that they\u2019re not just robbing banks for thrills or notoriety (as Bonnie and Clyde were), but that they\u2019re building a life together. \u201cWhatever we have to do to stay alive, we\u2019ll do it,\u201d he assures her. \u201cNo matter what it is.\u201d So there\u2019s a warmth here that\u2019s genuine, and carries the story through its rockier passages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n But there\u2019s much more going on here, obviously. As the Criterion program makes clear, there were not a lot of Black Westerns; when Bushrod encounters another Black man early in the film, he takes pains to get his name, because \u201cThere aren\u2019t too many of us around.\u201d And the extra dimension of race gives additional layers of danger and subversion to the couple\u2019s crime spree; as the snooty white woman photographer explains, \u201cThey\u2019re so bold! Look at what they did! Negroes don\u2019t do things like that. Negroes sing and dance and steal chickens. They don\u2019t rob banks!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Thomasine & Bushrod <\/em>occasionally shows the seams of its meager budget \u2013 low-rent sets, low-wattage supporting players, a few draggy scenes, etc. But the wide open spaces of this corner of the West are nicely showcased, and no wonder; the cinematographer is Lucien Ballard, whose extensive Western CV included The Wild Bunch, True Grit, The Sons of Katie Elder, Ride the High Country<\/em>, and Buchanan Rides Alone<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n And most importantly, it\u2019s a stellar showcase for Max Julien, one of the most enigmatic actors of the era. His career is a bit of a puzzle: augmenting his distinguished stage work (including Papp\u2019s Shakespeare in the Park) with small roles in exploitation movies and television in the late 1960s and early 1970s, he graduated into leading roles, and cinema immortality, with The Mack <\/em>in 1973. He wrote and produced Cleopatra Jones<\/em> the same year (reportedly for McGee, though Tamara Dobson was ultimately cast), wrote, produced, and starred in Thomasine & Bushrod<\/em> in 1974\u2026 and then, basically, disappeared. He wasn\u2019t seen in a single film between 1974 and 1997, when he made a winking cameo in Def Jam\u2019s How to Be a Player<\/em>, and he hasn\u2019t appeared in a feature film since.<\/p>\n\n\n\n From the limitless charisma and offhand naturalism showcased in his precious few films, he clearly could\u2019ve been a major mainstream star; he also could\u2019ve gone the Fred Williamson route, creating his own projects as a writer, producer, and actor. Instead, he made Thomasine & Bushrod<\/em> and then, appropriately enough, simply rode off into the sunset. \u201cThomasine & Bushrod\u201d is currently streaming on the Criterion Channel<\/a> and on Amazon Prime Video<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/thomasine2-1024x768.jpg\")
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