Way before he played a recurring role as Lorraine Bracco’s psychiatrist in The Sopranos, Peter Bogdanovich was one of Hollywood’s brightest up and coming star directors. Bursting onto the cinema scene with The Last Picture Show, which had a slew of Oscar nominations and wins for best supporting actor and actress, Bogdanovich was a protégé of Orson Welles and was often nominated but never won the major awards. Cannes, Oscars, even Golden Globes eluded the writer/director, but one constant was Ryan O’Neal and his daughter, Tatum.

Together, the trio turned a simple book into a period masterpiece called Paper Moon that chronicles middle America in the early part of the twentieth century like few films have done before or since.

And Moses Shall Lead Them

Religious symbolism surrounds the viewer throughout Paper Moon. Addie Pray’s father is Moses, and it is he who leads her to her promised land despite a series of hardships in the desolate areas of Missouri and Kansas. The stark black and white picture adds a level of realism and grittiness that is matched only by young Tatum O’Neal’s determination, grit and star presence at the age of ten.

Her performance as the Child of America lost in the wilderness without a mother to care for her is simply marvelous. Acting is a hard job. Acting as a child must be even more difficult, and one can only imagine how difficult a child acting with one of their parents in a movie about the relationships between a child and parent must be.

Tatum took home the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her work in Paper Moon, beating out co-star Madeline Kahn, who is a hoot as Ms. Trixie Delight and Linda Blair’s haunting role in The Exorcist.

Tatum’s daddy was shut out of the awards circuit in an especially tough year for male leads and compounded his life by divorcing his second wife, Tatum’s stepmother, the year Paper Moon was filming. Audiences at the time best knew O’Neal for his role as Oliver in 1970’s Love Story, but he is at the height of his acting career during Paper Moon. Bogdanovich would later direct both O’Neals in 1975’s Nickelodeon, and star director Stanley Kubrick would do the same in Barry Lyndon, but O’Neal pere let his career lapse into a series of questionable choices.

Even Ryan O’Neal at his peak doesn’t match his daughter’s intensity. When they are on-screen together (and Tatum is on screen almost all the time), the daughter constantly outshines her father. His role as Moses Pray (and how’s that for a symbolic name) is a little too slick and smooth, even for the hustler role he was playing. I have no doubt he nailed his marks, but his performance seems perfunctory at times when Tatum is lighting up the screen.

While you’re watching the Kahn and the two O’Neals romp through the wonderful script, keep a close eye peeled for John Hillerman in a role nothing like his Higgins character in TV’s Magnum, P.I. You will also spot one of Bogdanovich’s favored actors -- a young Randy Quaid playing a farmboy, but already giving audiences a taste of his goofy over-the-top, scene-stealing delivery. Yes, Virginia, there was a time when Randy Quaid was in his early twenties. Paper Moon was his third major motion picture role, and not by coincidence, the third time he had appeared in a Bogdanovich film.

Having brilliant writer Alvin Sargent translate the original book to the screenplay certainly helped the entire cast. Since then Sargent has worked on blockbusters like A Star Is Born, Ordinary People, and even Spider-Man. One of cinema’s most respected screenwriters, he and Bogdanovich pace Paper Moon well. Meanwhile, Tatum and Ryan O’Neal both get some wonderful lines from Sargent’s gifted pen, even if Quaid’s “hootin’ and hollerin’” is the scene that leaves you laughing the most. At times Sargent writes simultaneously touching and funny, a unique opportunity that the cast puts to excellent use.

The Bottom Line, Popcorn Kernels and All

This is a film for an older crowd. Children will quickly get bored with the plot that takes just a little too long to unfold. Older teens who enjoy character sketches and who won’t mind the black and white may be interested, but it will mostly be adults who enjoy this film. Yes, there is a sort of a car chase and some action, but this is a story about a little girl and her search for the promised land that only her father can deliver – if he ever admits to being her father.

Five Things To Remember From This Review

1. One of Peter Bogdanovich’s early 1970s movies, this followup to The Last Picture Show lets him stretch his wings in a setting a generation earlier than that film.
2. Tatum O’Neal picked up an Oscar at the tender age of ten for her role as Addie Pray.
3. Look for a sparkling character-driven script from super-writer Alvin Sargent
4. The film is heavy on the religious symbolism, but if you view it from a shallow perspective, it is still an enjoyable comedy.
5. Paper Moon spawned a television show that gave a major outlet to another young actress who became pretty well known in her own right: Jodie Foster.

Joubert’s FunLink

Can’t get enough of Tatum as Addie Pray? A smart company is selling plain and custom prints of Rolling Stone magazine covers and offers the July 19, 1973 cover shot of Tatum in costume at this URL:

http://coverstories.barewalls.com/product/framer.exe?ARTWORKID=174289&ITEMID=174289

(Special bonus on the cover: G. Gordon Liddy circa Watergate and Norman Mailer)

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Good for a Rainy Day
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older