One day, he decided to go into town and check out a movie. He eventually decided on Brewster McCloud, a bizarre comedy about a Houston kid (played by Bud Cort) who wants to fly. The movie was a commercial and critical flop; Cohen saw it twice that day. \u201cIt\u2019s a very, very beautiful and I would say brilliant film,\u201d he told Crawdaddy! in 1975. \u201cMaybe I just hadn\u2019t seen a movie in a long time, but it was really fine.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n HYPERLINK BELOW<\/p>\n That night, the singer-songwriter traveled to Nashville to do some studio work. While there, he got a phone call: \u201cThis is Bob Altman,\u201d the voice on the other line said. \u201cI\u2019d like to use your songs in a movie I\u2019m making.\u201d Cohen was flattered but had no idea who this guy was: \u201cIs there any movie you\u2019ve done I might have seen?\u201d<\/p>\n Altman mentioned his smash success M*A*S*H, which Cohen had missed. The filmmaker then said, \u201cI also did a small movie that nobody saw \u2014 Brewster McCloud.\u201d As Cohen later recalled to Altman biographer Mitchell Zuckoff, \u201cI told him, \u2018I just saw it this afternoon \u2014 I loved it. You can have anything you want.’\u201d<\/p>\n Thus began one of the great pairings of film and soundtrack of the modern era. The movie Altman was making was McCabe & Mrs. Miller, which legendary director John Huston would later reportedly proclaim the greatest Western ever made. It\u2019s certainly one of the most visionary, with Altman transforming Edmund Naughton\u2019s novel into a sad, beautiful tale of the American dream playing out in Washington State at the turn of the century. A luckless schemer named John McCabe (Warren Beatty) encounters the enigmatic madam Constance Miller (Julie Christie) in burgeoning, rustic Presbyterian Church, and these two entrepreneurs\u2019 destinies are soon to be intertwined.<\/p>\n In much the same way, Altman\u2019s and Cohen\u2019s legacies would forever be linked by McCabe. The movie is inextricably connected to Cohen\u2019s songs. It\u2019s impossible to imagine Altman\u2019s masterpiece without them.<\/p>\n The poet-musician may not have been familiar with Altman, who died in 2006, but the director certainly knew the songwriter \u2013 the iconoclastic auteur loved Songs of Leonard Cohen when it came out. \u201c[W]e\u2019d put that record on so often we wore out two copies!\u201d he once professed to film scholar David Thompson. \u201cWe\u2019d just get stoned and play that stuff. Then I forgot all about it.\u201d When Altman started dreaming up McCabe, he drew inspiration from Cohen\u2019s music \u2014 without realizing he had. After shooting the film and moving to the editing stage, he happened to hear some Cohen for the first time in a while and had a revelation: \u201c\u2018Shit, that\u2019s my movie!\u2019 \u2026 [B]ack in the cutting room we put those songs on the picture and they fitted like a glove. I think the reason they worked was because those lyrics were etched in my subconscious, so when I shot the scenes I fitted them to the songs, as if they were written for them.\u201d<\/p>\n Altman initially inserted about 10 Cohen tracks into the film, eventually settling on three tunes: \u201cThe Stranger Song,\u201d Sisters of Mercy\u201d and \u2018Winter Lady.\u201d But as musicology professor Gayle Sherwood Magee suggests in her book Robert Altman\u2019s Soundtracks, the lyrics to other Cohen songs certainly seem to presage McCabe plot points \u2014 specifically, \u201cSuzanne\u201d (which describes a woman with details that are emulated in Mrs. Miller) and \u201cOne of Us Cannot Be Wrong\u201d (which references a \u201cblizzard of ice\u201d reminiscent of McCabe\u2019s snowy death after he runs afoul of a mining company). Even when you don\u2019t hear Cohen\u2019s music gracing scenes, the songwriter\u2019s spirit pervades the film.<\/p>\n This indelible trio of tracks, all of which appear on the first side of Songs of Leonard Cohen, served as McCabe\u2019s musical themes. \u201cThe Stranger Song\u201d drifts over the film\u2019s opening credits as McCabe comes to Presbyterian Church on horseback. Before we\u2019ve even been formally introduced to our antihero, Cohen paints a picture of this mournful man as a cardsharp (\u201cIt\u2019s true that all the men you knew were dealers\u201d) who has a mysterious past (\u201cI told you when I came I was a stranger\u201d) and is seeking sanctuary (\u201cHe was just some Joseph looking for a manger\u201d).<\/p>\n The second, \u201cSisters of Mercy,\u201d enters the picture when we meet Mrs. Miller\u2019s prostitutes, Cohen\u2019s gentle song echoing the characters\u2019 warmth and generosity: \u201cThey were waiting for me when I thought that I just can\u2019t go on \u2026 you won\u2019t make me jealous if I hear that they sweetened your night.\u201d![\"\"](\"https:\/\/travelingboy.com\/travel\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/09\/McCabeOffset.jpg\")
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