Karlovy Vary International Film Festival

July 2 - 10, 2010

Fat City
( Fat City )

Colour, 35 mm
USA, 1972, 100 min
Section: Tribute to John Huston (1906-1987)

Director: John Huston
Screenplay: Leonard Gardner podle vlastního románu / from his novel
Dir. of Photography: Conrad L. Hall
Music: Marvin Hamlisch, Kris Kristofferson
Editor: Walter Thompson
Producer: Raymond Stark, John Huston
Production: Columbia Pictures
Sales: Hollywood Classics (rights)
Contact: Cooper Films

Cast

Stacy Keach, Jeff Bridges, Susan Tyrrell, Candy Clark, Nicholas Colasanto

Synopsis

John Huston returns to the talented young boxer he was some fifty years before, bringing the camera into the ring to tell the story of two boxers standing at opposite ends of their careers and to pay a nostalgic but unpretentious film tribute to ordinary, everyday heroes. Stacy Keach, one of the greatest talents of American cinema in the second half of the 20th century, plays thirty-year-old Bill Tully whose best years of boxing are behind him. One day he meets a youngster named Ernie (Jeff Bridges) whose talent wakes up the desire in him to make up for the time lost with a bottle of whisky in his hand. This humanistic character study of individuals in a Californian suburb, struggling to rise up from an existence at rock bottom through their dreams of success in the ring, is one of several unfairly overlooked works in Huston’s filmography. Even after 35 years since its creation, Fat City is one of the most interesting motion pictures ever filmed in the sports world.