By Erin Free

FilmInk salutes the work of creatives who have never truly received the credit that they deserve. In this installment: the late Robert Towne, who was famed for his screenwriting but far less celebrated for his directing on films like Personal Best and Tequila Sunrise.

Wait a minute! Robert Towne? Unsung Auteur? One of the most high-profile screenwriters in Hollywood history? The man who wrote Chinatown, Shampoo, and The Last Detail? The guy who has more “uncredited” work on bona fide movie classics than just about anyone else? One of the essential 1970s figureheads, and a classic “character” in and of himself? Well, yeah, that guy. But the recent and very sad passing of Robert Towne at the age of 89 instantly made FilmInk think about his work as a director. Though Towne’s behind-the-camera output was only limited, with just four films to his credit, they are all interesting, intriguing works that kind of make you wish Towne had taken a little time off from all that lucrative script doctoring to actually direct a few more films. So, in lieu of all the usual biographical details – which you’ve likely just read in all of the eloquent eulogies published in his honour – we are just going to focus on Robert Towne’s work as a director, for which he has been sorely under-celebrated.

“I didn’t want to paralyze people with authority,” Robert Towne told Rolling Stone in 1982 of his reticence to take his seat in the director’s chair. “Movies require a great deal of skill and coordination; the director usually has to be a quasi-military figure. I was only a writer for a long time, and as a writer, you’re often in the traditional woman’s position – fretting over details at home, being supportive to the men actually making the movie. I was bothered about suddenly having to be this tough guy ordering 200 people around on a set. Then I realized that a director could also be seen as a protector.”

Robert Towne

For a screenwriter so adept at documenting male foibles and anxieties, Robert Towne’s debut as a director came as something of a surprise. 1982’s Personal Best (which Towne also penned) is all about women, and it’s an incredibly insightful piece of work that not only crackles with the director’s trademark punchy dialogue, but which also provides a fascinating look into the world of female athletics. Mariel Hemingway (who would follow Personal Best with 1983’s extraordinary Star 80, a truly great one-two punch) is at her low-key, loose-limbed best as Chris, an athlete who falls into a sexual relationship with her friend Tory (well played by hurdler and first-time actress Patrice Donnelly) while also making time with the duo’s coach (the always excellent Scott Glenn in an essential role). A rare film of its time to treat a lesbian relationship with sensitivity and a lack of sensationalism, Personal Best was born of Towne’s friendships with various female athletes, and the film resounds with authenticity and narrative tenacity. “This movie is about everything I’ve ever loved in women,” Towne told Rolling Stone.

Though sold and remembered somewhat erroneously as a glossy 1980s thriller, 1988’s Tequila Sunrise is much, much more than that. A film all about moral ambiguity and shades of grey, the film copped a little heat on its release for daring to position a drug dealer – albeit one trying to go straight – as its hero. The film turns on the love triangle that develops between two old high school friends – Mel Gibson’s aforementioned drug dealer and Kurt Russell’s cop – and a beautiful woman played by Michelle Pfeiffer. Stylishly made and pithily written, Tequila Sunrise is one of the least black-and-white Hollywood crime dramas of its era, and is also a fascinating treatise on America’s famous war on drugs. “Very often, not just with old buddies, the people that cops are closest to are the criminals,” Towne told Pop Culture Classics of his wonderfully morally murky movie. “They have a great deal in common. Even though the cop hates what the criminal stands for, and thinks he’s dirty, there is a link there. They have shared experiences. They understand each other’s problems. The most manipulative guy in the movie is the cop. He’s fundamentally a decent man, but he has to lie and cheat in order to do the right thing. In his own way, his profession is just as personally corrupting as a hideous job like dealing drugs.”

Robert Towne with Mel Gibson on the set of Tequila Sunrise.

As a man for whom physical fitness proved to be something of a life-changer, Towne had an enduring fascination with athletes, which was once again on show in his criminally overlooked 1998 biopic drama Without Limits. Very, very far from your typical sports movie, this is the tragic story of Steve “Pre” Prefontaine (played brilliantly by Billy Crudup), a feisty, fiery long-distance runner who fought the establishment at every turn and ran on his own terms, much to the frustration of his coach Bill Bowerman (beautifully played by the late, great Donald Sutherland), the man who would eventually co-found Nike. Prefontaine’s life was cut tragically short by a road accident when he was just 24, and Towne’s deeply moving drama chooses to focus on the often-complex relationship between athlete and coach, which the writer/director elucidates superbly. Without Limits was somewhat cancelled out by Stev James’ Pre (with Jared Leto in the title role), which was released the previous year; the gritty, emotionally layered Without Limits is now largely forgotten, which is very, very sad indeed.

Robert Towne’s final film as director was 2008’s Ask The Dust, an adaptation of John Fante’s novel, and another of the writer/director’s meditations on the city of Los Angeles. “I had not ever read anyone who had really captured the Los Angeles that I remembered as a child,” Towne told Filmmaker Magazine of Fante’s book. “He got the look, the ambience of the city, really right down to the dust in the air. There wasn’t a lot of foliage then, and the sun would beat down. LA’s right on the edge of a desert, and its impermanence was much more apparent then. I had forgotten that that Los Angeles really existed until I read Fante. His novel really threw you into the idea that Los Angeles is, basically, a state of mind.”

Robert Towne with Colin Farrell on the set of Ask The Dust.

Like all of Towne’s directorial efforts, Ask The Dust is finely tailored, astutely written, and very well performed, but it also differs from his other films in many ways. It’s a period piece, and it’s also a tale of immigrants in America, which instantly marks it out. Set during The Great Depression, the film tells of the romantic relationship that develops between two LA immigrants – Salma Hayek’s Mexican waitress and Colin Farrell’s Italian wannabe writer – desperate to improve their station in life. The characters are richly realised, and their hardscrabble struggles are the type rarely seen in American cinema; Towne really loves these difficult, desperately ambitious people, and it shows in every frame of his admirably downbeat drama about the city he loves. Barely released, and completely forgotten today, Ask The Dust is another fine example of Robert Towne’s skill behind the camera…a skill for which he was way too rarely celebrated.

If you liked this story, check out our features on other unsung auteurs David Giler, William D. WittliffTom DeSimoneUlu GrosbardDenis SandersDaryl DukeJack McCoyJames William GuercioJames GoldstoneDaniel NettheimGoran StolevskiJared & Jerusha HessWilliam RichertMichael JenkinsRobert M. YoungRobert ThomGraeme CliffordFrank HowsonOliver HermanusJennings LangMatthew SavilleSophie HydeJohn CurranJesse PeretzAnthony HayesStuart BlumbergStewart CopelandHarriet Frank Jr & Irving RavetchAngelo PizzoJohn & Joyce CorringtonRobert DillonIrene KampAlbert MaltzNancy DowdBarry Michael CooperGladys HillWalon GreenEleanor BergsteinWilliam W. NortonHelen ChildressBill LancasterLucinda CoxonErnest TidymanShauna CrossTroy Kennedy MartinKelly MarcelAlan SharpLeslie DixonJeremy PodeswaFerd & Beverly SebastianAnthony PageJulie GavrasTed PostSarah JacobsonAnton Corbijn, Gillian RobespierreBrandon CronenbergLaszlo NemesAyelat MenahemiIvan TorsAmanda King & Fabio CavadiniCathy HenkelColin HigginsPaul McGuiganRose BoschDan GilroyTanya WexlerClio BarnardRobert AldrichMaya ForbesSteven KastrissiosTalya LavieMichael RoweRebecca CremonaStephen HopkinsTony BillSarah GavronMartin DavidsonFran Rubel Kuzui, Elliot SilversteinLiz GarbusVictor FlemingBarbara PeetersRobert BentonLynn SheltonTom GriesRanda HainesLeslie H. MartinsonNancy Kelly, Paul NewmanBrett HaleyLynne Ramsay, Vernon ZimmermanLisa CholodenkoRobert GreenwaldPhyllida LloydMilton KatselasKaryn KusamaSeijun SuzukiAlbert PyunCherie NowlanSteve BinderJack CardiffAnne Fletcher ,Bobcat GoldthwaitDonna DeitchFrank PiersonAnn TurnerJerry SchatzbergAntonia BirdJack SmightMarielle HellerJames GlickenhausEuzhan PalcyBill L. NortonLarysa KondrackiMel StuartNanette BursteinGeorge ArmitageMary LambertJames FoleyLewis John CarlinoDebra GranikTaylor SheridanLaurie CollyerJay RoachBarbara KoppleJohn D. HancockSara ColangeloMichael Lindsay-HoggJoyce ChopraMike NewellGina Prince-BythewoodJohn Lee HancockAllison AndersDaniel Petrie Sr.Katt SheaFrank PerryAmy Holden JonesStuart RosenbergPenelope SpheerisCharles B. PierceTamra DavisNorman TaurogJennifer LeePaul WendkosMarisa SilverJohn MackenzieIda LupinoJohn V. SotoMartha Coolidge, Peter HyamsTim Hunter, Stephanie RothmanBetty ThomasJohn FlynnLizzie BordenLionel JeffriesLexi AlexanderAlkinos TsilimidosStewart RaffillLamont JohnsonMaggie Greenwald and Tamara Jenkins.

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