The Great Scout & Cathouse Thursday

Lee Marvin dusted off the rapscallion character he played in both Cat Ballou and Paint Your Wagon to star in The Great Scout&Cathouse Thursday. Marvin is the great scout at least by his lights and Cathouse Thursday is Kay Lenz.

It's 1908 and the scout's seen his best days gone by. But the sight of his old prospecting partner Robert Culp who is now running for governor of the state on a fortune that was started with the money that they prospected and Culp stole sends Marvin into action. Marvin contacts Oliver Reed and Strother Martin the other two partners and they formulate several plans for revenge.

The plan they eventually settle on is to kidnap Culp's wife Elizabeth Ashley who used to be with Marvin and hold her for ransom. Along in all of this is Lenz who is left over from a raid on a bordello she works at when Oliver Reed decides to keep her after he rescues the others. Lenz isn't crazy to go back there and be the special favorite of lesbian madam Sylvia Miles. In fact she comes in quite handy in dealing with Culp.

The Great Scout&Cathouse Thursday is a rollicking western with Marvin, Reed, and Martin all competing to see who can ham it up the most. I think Reed's scene in which he gets cured of the clap after being led down a garden path by Marvin is the best. Let's just say that Marvin was years ahead of his time in predicting the treatment.

The final fight scene between Marvin and Culp was borrowed from the John Wayne classic, McLintock. It still works in this film and provides a fitting climax.