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Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (film)
Encyclopedia
Even Cowgirls Get the Blues is a 1993
American
comedy-drama-romance film
based on the 1976 Tom Robbins
novel of the same name. The film was directed by Gus Van Sant, Jr.
and starred Uma Thurman
, Lorraine Bracco
, Pat Morita
, Angie Dickinson
, Keanu Reeves
, John Hurt
, Rain Phoenix
, and Grace Zabriskie
. Tom Robbins himself was the narrator. The soundtrack was sung entirely by k.d. lang
. The film was dedicated to the late River Phoenix
.
The film was a critical and commercial failure. After its world premiere in September 1993 at the Toronto Film Festival, the film was set to open, but due to the incredibly negative response, the film was delayed for more editing. The United States
wide release
was May 20, 1994. It was given two Razzie Award nominations: Worst Actress (Uma Thurman) and Worst Supporting Actress (Sean Young
). This movie holds a 24% rating on Rotten Tomatoes
.
The film's credits refer to Gus Van Sant as Gus Van Sant, Jr.
), a woman born with a mutation
(she would not call it a defect
) giving her enormously large thumb
s. The film is a transgressive romp, covering topics from homosexuality
and free love
to drug use
and political rebellion
to animal rights
and body odor
and religions. Sissy makes the most of her thumbs by becoming a hitchhiker. Her travels take her to New York, where she becomes a model for a transvestite
feminine hygiene products mogul who introduces her to the man whom she will marry, a staid Mohawk
named Julian Gitche (Keanu Reeves
). In her later travels, she encounters, among many others, a sexually open cowgirl named Bonanza Jellybean (Rain Phoenix
) and an itinerant escapee from the Japanese internment camp
s happily mislabeled "The Chink" (Pat Morita
).
performed the music. The album was composed by k.d. lang and Ben Mink
.
1993 in film
The year 1993 in film involved many significant films, including the blockbuster hits Jurassic Park, The Fugitive and The Firm. -Events:...
American
Cinema of the United States
The cinema of the United States, also known as Hollywood, has had a profound effect on cinema across the world since the early 20th century. Its history is sometimes separated into four main periods: the silent film era, classical Hollywood cinema, New Hollywood, and the contemporary period...
comedy-drama-romance film
Romance film
Romance films are love stories that focus on passion, emotion, and the affectionate involvement of the main characters and the journey that their love takes through courtship or marriage. Romance films make the love story or the search for love the main plot focus...
based on the 1976 Tom Robbins
Tom Robbins
Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins (born July 22, 1936 is an American author. His best-selling novels are serio-comic, often wildly poetic stories with a strong social and philosophical undercurrent, an irreverent bent, and scenes extrapolated from...
novel of the same name. The film was directed by Gus Van Sant, Jr.
Gus Van Sant
Gus Green Van Sant, Jr. is an American director, screenwriter, painter, photographer, musician, and author. He is a two time nominee of the Academy Award for Best Director for his 1997 film Good Will Hunting and his 2008 film Milk, both of which were also nominated for Best Picture, and won the...
and starred Uma Thurman
Uma Thurman
Uma Karuna Thurman is an American actress and model. She has performed in leading roles in a variety of films, ranging from romantic comedies and dramas to science fiction and action movies. Among her best-known roles are those in the Quentin Tarantino films Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill...
, Lorraine Bracco
Lorraine Bracco
Lorraine Bracco is an American actress. She is best known for her TV roles as Dr. Jennifer Melfi on HBO series, The Sopranos, and Angela Rizzoli on the TNT series, Rizzoli & Isles...
, Pat Morita
Pat Morita
Noriyuki "Pat" Morita was an American actor of Japanese descent who was well-known for playing the roles of Matsuo "Arnold" Takahashi on Happy Days and Mr. Miyagi in the The Karate Kid movie series, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1984.-Early life:Pat...
, Angie Dickinson
Angie Dickinson
Angie Dickinson is an American actress. She has appeared in more than fifty films, including Rio Bravo, Ocean's Eleven, Dressed to Kill and Pay It Forward, and starred on television as Sergeant Suzanne "Pepper" Anderson on the 1970s crime series Police Woman.-Early life:Dickinson, the second of...
, Keanu Reeves
Keanu Reeves
Keanu Charles Reeves is a Canadian actor. Reeves is perhaps best known for his roles in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Speed, Point Break and the science fiction-action trilogy The Matrix...
, John Hurt
John Hurt
John Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor, known for his leading roles as John Merrick in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York...
, Rain Phoenix
Rain Phoenix
Rain Phoenix is an American actress, musician, and singer. Phoenix has four siblings: two brothers, actors Joaquin and the late River Phoenix, and two sisters, Summer and Liberty.-Early life:...
, and Grace Zabriskie
Grace Zabriskie
Grace Zabriskie is an American actress. She has appeared in many popular American films but, she is best known for her work in television. She is perhaps best known for her roles in the television series Twin Peaks, Seinfeld, and Big Love.-Early life:Zabriskie was born in New Orleans, Louisiana...
. Tom Robbins himself was the narrator. The soundtrack was sung entirely by k.d. lang
K.D. Lang
Kathryn Dawn Lang, OC , known by her stage name k.d. lang, is a Canadian pop and country singer-songwriter and occasional actress...
. The film was dedicated to the late River Phoenix
River Phoenix
River Jude Phoenix was an American film actor, musician, and teen icon. He was the oldest brother of fellow actors Rain, Joaquin, Liberty, and Summer Phoenix.Phoenix began acting at age 10 in television commercials...
.
The film was a critical and commercial failure. After its world premiere in September 1993 at the Toronto Film Festival, the film was set to open, but due to the incredibly negative response, the film was delayed for more editing. The United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
wide release
Wide release
Wide release is a term in the American motion picture industry for a motion picture that is playing nationally . Specifically, a movie is considered to be in wide release when it is on 600 screens or more in the United States and Canada.In the US, films holding an NC-17 rating almost never have a...
was May 20, 1994. It was given two Razzie Award nominations: Worst Actress (Uma Thurman) and Worst Supporting Actress (Sean Young
Sean Young
Sean Young is an American actress, best known for her performance in films from the 1980s such as Blade Runner, Dune, and No Way Out.-Early life:...
). This movie holds a 24% rating on Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes
Rotten Tomatoes is a website devoted to reviews, information, and news of films—widely known as a film review aggregator. Its name derives from the cliché of audiences throwing tomatoes and other vegetables at a poor stage performance...
.
The film's credits refer to Gus Van Sant as Gus Van Sant, Jr.
Plot
The story of Sissy Hankshaw (Uma ThurmanUma Thurman
Uma Karuna Thurman is an American actress and model. She has performed in leading roles in a variety of films, ranging from romantic comedies and dramas to science fiction and action movies. Among her best-known roles are those in the Quentin Tarantino films Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill...
), a woman born with a mutation
Mutation
In molecular biology and genetics, mutations are changes in a genomic sequence: the DNA sequence of a cell's genome or the DNA or RNA sequence of a virus. They can be defined as sudden and spontaneous changes in the cell. Mutations are caused by radiation, viruses, transposons and mutagenic...
(she would not call it a defect
Congenital disorder
A congenital disorder, or congenital disease, is a condition existing at birth and often before birth, or that develops during the first month of life , regardless of causation...
) giving her enormously large thumb
Thumb
The thumb is the first digit of the hand. When a person is standing in the medical anatomical position , the thumb is the lateral-most digit...
s. The film is a transgressive romp, covering topics from homosexuality
Homosexuality
Homosexuality is romantic or sexual attraction or behavior between members of the same sex or gender. As a sexual orientation, homosexuality refers to "an enduring pattern of or disposition to experience sexual, affectional, or romantic attractions" primarily or exclusively to people of the same...
and free love
Free love
The term free love has been used to describe a social movement that rejects marriage, which is seen as a form of social bondage. The Free Love movement’s initial goal was to separate the state from sexual matters such as marriage, birth control, and adultery...
to drug use
Recreational drug use
Recreational drug use is the use of a drug, usually psychoactive, with the intention of creating or enhancing recreational experience. Such use is controversial, however, often being considered to be also drug abuse, and it is often illegal...
and political rebellion
Rebellion
Rebellion, uprising or insurrection, is a refusal of obedience or order. It may, therefore, be seen as encompassing a range of behaviors aimed at destroying or replacing an established authority such as a government or a head of state...
to animal rights
Animal rights
Animal rights, also known as animal liberation, is the idea that the most basic interests of non-human animals should be afforded the same consideration as the similar interests of human beings...
and body odor
Body odor
Body odor or body odour, sometimes colloquially abbreviated as B.O., is the smell of bacteria growing on the body. The bacteria multiply rapidly in the presence of sweat, but sweat itself is almost completely odorless to humans....
and religions. Sissy makes the most of her thumbs by becoming a hitchhiker. Her travels take her to New York, where she becomes a model for a transvestite
Transvestism
Transvestism is the practice of cross-dressing, which is wearing clothing traditionally associated with the opposite sex. Transvestite refers to a person who cross-dresses; however, the word often has additional connotations. -History:Although the word transvestism was coined as late as the 1910s,...
feminine hygiene products mogul who introduces her to the man whom she will marry, a staid Mohawk
Mohawk nation
Mohawk are the most easterly tribe of the Iroquois confederation. They call themselves Kanien'gehaga, people of the place of the flint...
named Julian Gitche (Keanu Reeves
Keanu Reeves
Keanu Charles Reeves is a Canadian actor. Reeves is perhaps best known for his roles in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Speed, Point Break and the science fiction-action trilogy The Matrix...
). In her later travels, she encounters, among many others, a sexually open cowgirl named Bonanza Jellybean (Rain Phoenix
Rain Phoenix
Rain Phoenix is an American actress, musician, and singer. Phoenix has four siblings: two brothers, actors Joaquin and the late River Phoenix, and two sisters, Summer and Liberty.-Early life:...
) and an itinerant escapee from the Japanese internment camp
Japanese internment camp
Japanese internment camp is a term generally used to refer to one or both of the following:*Japanese American internment, the internment of Japanese Americans in the United States during World War II...
s happily mislabeled "The Chink" (Pat Morita
Pat Morita
Noriyuki "Pat" Morita was an American actor of Japanese descent who was well-known for playing the roles of Matsuo "Arnold" Takahashi on Happy Days and Mr. Miyagi in the The Karate Kid movie series, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1984.-Early life:Pat...
).
Cast
- Tom RobbinsTom RobbinsThomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins Thomas Eugene "Tom" Robbins (born July 22, 1936 is an American author. His best-selling novels are serio-comic, often wildly poetic stories with a strong social and philosophical undercurrent, an irreverent bent, and scenes extrapolated from...
(voice) as Narrator - Uma ThurmanUma ThurmanUma Karuna Thurman is an American actress and model. She has performed in leading roles in a variety of films, ranging from romantic comedies and dramas to science fiction and action movies. Among her best-known roles are those in the Quentin Tarantino films Pulp Fiction and Kill Bill...
as Sissy Hankshaw - Lorraine BraccoLorraine BraccoLorraine Bracco is an American actress. She is best known for her TV roles as Dr. Jennifer Melfi on HBO series, The Sopranos, and Angela Rizzoli on the TNT series, Rizzoli & Isles...
as Delores Del Ruby - Pat MoritaPat MoritaNoriyuki "Pat" Morita was an American actor of Japanese descent who was well-known for playing the roles of Matsuo "Arnold" Takahashi on Happy Days and Mr. Miyagi in the The Karate Kid movie series, for which he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1984.-Early life:Pat...
as The Chink - Angie DickinsonAngie DickinsonAngie Dickinson is an American actress. She has appeared in more than fifty films, including Rio Bravo, Ocean's Eleven, Dressed to Kill and Pay It Forward, and starred on television as Sergeant Suzanne "Pepper" Anderson on the 1970s crime series Police Woman.-Early life:Dickinson, the second of...
as Miss Adrian - Keanu ReevesKeanu ReevesKeanu Charles Reeves is a Canadian actor. Reeves is perhaps best known for his roles in Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure, Speed, Point Break and the science fiction-action trilogy The Matrix...
as Julian Gitche - John HurtJohn HurtJohn Vincent Hurt, CBE is an English actor, known for his leading roles as John Merrick in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York...
as The Countess - Rain PhoenixRain PhoenixRain Phoenix is an American actress, musician, and singer. Phoenix has four siblings: two brothers, actors Joaquin and the late River Phoenix, and two sisters, Summer and Liberty.-Early life:...
as Bonanza Jellybean - Ed Begley, Jr.Ed Begley, Jr.Edward James "Ed" Begley, Jr. is an American actor and environmentalist. Begley has appeared in hundreds of films, television shows, and stage performances. He is best known for his role as Dr. Victor Ehrlich, on the television series St...
as Rupert - Carol KaneCarol KaneCarolyn Laurie "Carol" Kane is an American actress. Kane has worked on the stage, on the screen and in television. She appeared on the television series Taxi in the early 1980s, as the wife of the character played by Andy Kaufman. She received two Emmy Awards for her work...
as Carla - Sean YoungSean YoungSean Young is an American actress, best known for her performance in films from the 1980s such as Blade Runner, Dune, and No Way Out.-Early life:...
as Marie Barth - Crispin GloverCrispin GloverCrispin Hellion Glover is an American film actor, director and screenwriter, recording artist, publisher, and author. Glover is known for portraying eccentric people on screen such as George McFly in Back to the Future, Layne in River's Edge, unfriendly recluse Rubin Farr in Rubin and Ed, the...
as Howard Barth - Roseanne Arnold as Madame Zoe
- Buck HenryBuck HenryHenry Zuckerman, better known as Buck Henry , is an American actor, writer, film director, and television director.-Early life:...
as Dr. Dreyfus - Grace ZabriskieGrace ZabriskieGrace Zabriskie is an American actress. She has appeared in many popular American films but, she is best known for her work in television. She is perhaps best known for her roles in the television series Twin Peaks, Seinfeld, and Big Love.-Early life:Zabriskie was born in New Orleans, Louisiana...
as Mrs. Hankshaw - Ken KeseyKen KeseyKenneth Elton "Ken" Kesey was an American author, best known for his novel One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , and as a counter-cultural figure who considered himself a link between the Beat Generation of the 1950s and the hippies of the 1960s. "I was too young to be a beatnik, and too old to be a...
as Mr. Hankshaw - Heather Graham as Cowgirl Heather
- Udo KierUdo KierUdo Kier is a German actor, known primarily for his work in horror and exploitation movies.-Early life:...
as Commercial Director - Lin ShayeLin ShayeLinda "Lin" Shaye is an American film, theatre and television actress.-Early life:Born in Detroit, Michigan, Shaye is the daughter of Dorothy , a homemaker, and Max Mendle Shaye, a painter and supermarket owner. Her brother is film executive Robert Shaye...
as Rubber Rose Maid - William BurroughsWilliam S. BurroughsWilliam Seward Burroughs II was an American novelist, poet, essayist and spoken word performer. A primary figure of the Beat Generation and a major postmodernist author, he is considered to be "one of the most politically trenchant, culturally influential, and innovative artists of the 20th...
as Himself - Edward James OlmosEdward James OlmosEdward James Olmos is an American actor and director. Among his most memorable roles are William Adama in the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica, Lt...
(uncredited) as Musician at Barbecue - River PhoenixRiver PhoenixRiver Jude Phoenix was an American film actor, musician, and teen icon. He was the oldest brother of fellow actors Rain, Joaquin, Liberty, and Summer Phoenix.Phoenix began acting at age 10 in television commercials...
(uncredited) as Pilgrim
Soundtrack
The soundtrack was released on November 2, 1993 by Rhino Records. k.d. langK.D. Lang
Kathryn Dawn Lang, OC , known by her stage name k.d. lang, is a Canadian pop and country singer-songwriter and occasional actress...
performed the music. The album was composed by k.d. lang and Ben Mink
Ben Mink
Ben Mink is a Canadian songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, and producer.Born of Polish parents, Mink was raised in Toronto Ontario. He got his start performing with the rock/country group Mary-Lou Horner, which became the house band at bar and nightclub....
.
Track listing
- Just Keep Me Moving
- Much Finer Place
- Or Was I
- Hush Sweet Lover
- Myth
- Apogee
- Virtual Vortex
- Lifted by Love
- OvertureOvertureOverture in music is the term originally applied to the instrumental introduction to an opera...
- Kundalini Yoga Waltz
- In Perfect Dreams
- Curious Soul Astray
- Ride of Bonanza Jellybean
- Don't Be a Lemming Polka
- Sweet Little Cherokee
- Cowgirl Pride
Chart performance
| Chart (1993) | Peak position |
|---|---|
| Canadian RPM Country Albums | 6 |
| Canadian RPM Top Albums | 47 |
| U.S. Billboard 200 | 82 |
Filming locations
- PortlandPortland, OregonPortland is a city located in the Pacific Northwest, near the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers in the U.S. state of Oregon. As of the 2010 Census, it had a population of 583,776, making it the 29th most populous city in the United States...
, OregonOregonOregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern... - TerrebonneTerrebonne, OregonTerrebonne is a census-designated place in Deschutes County, Oregon, United States. It is part of the Bend, Oregon Metropolitan Statistical Area...
, Oregon - SistersSisters, OregonSisters is a city in Deschutes County, Oregon, United States. It is part of the Bend, Oregon Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 959 at the 2000 census, but more than doubled to 2038 as of the 2010 census.- History :...
, Oregon - BendBend, OregonBend is a city in and the county seat of Deschutes County, Oregon, United States, and the principal city of the Bend, Oregon Metropolitan Statistical Area. Bend is Central Oregon's largest city, and, despite its modest size, is the de facto metropolis of the region, owing to the low population...
, Oregon