Two English guys, one young, one older, on the run in a dusky landscape, pursued and intermittently taunted by a VERY low-flying helicopter. (Good stunt pilots!) We don't know where they've escaped from but it must've been recently for their hands are still bound behind their backs and they don't seem to know each other very well.
The older man is at first more forceful, giving the impression that it is he who has been the prime mover of their getaway, but we soon see that he is not all that smart and in an early scene he (off-screen) kills an old goatherd, hoping to get a knife, but the body yields nothing. This gives an immediate bad feeling about the fate of these two guys.
It is in fact quite annoying to watch how long they stumble through the landscape without seriously trying to sever the cords. After all, they are bound with rope and there are plenty of sharp rocks around.
Later, in a village, they manage to enter a house and find a razor. After finally cutting their bonds they steal a rifle and supplies and stuff, all in the presence of a silent, staring woman who seems to be mourning a dead man. But Mac can't resist swiping a loaf of bread from in front of the corpse which sets the woman off screaming and they have to run, as the village comes to noisy life about their ears.
Time after time they manage to elude capture, even when surrounded and hunted by hundreds of soldiers! Trying to pick up the men's history from their talk is impossible and we are never told what - if anything - they have done to have caused their captivity.
Robert Shaw is fairly convincing as the slightly unhinged Mac. We believe that he could be a criminal of some kind.
But Malcolm McDowell, as Ansell, though physically convincing, says his lines as if he's acting in his school play. A scene toward the end where he is supposed to be a bit delirious is particularly cringe-inducing.
Now, I know many consider McDowell to be a talented actor who made wrong choices and ended up in dodgy roles, but the fact is that (like Keanu Reeves) he is one of those actors who speak as if they're saying lines that they've memorised (which of course, they have!) Sure, this can work in the right part. Nobody could have played Alex in 'A Clockwork Orange' better than McDowell, but Alex is basically a comic book character, so his rendition fitted perfectly.
As others have pointed out, the film doesn't make you feel all that much sympathy for the fugitives, although a bit more for the younger one because, in contrast to the older one, he doesn't seem to want to kill and only does it when forced to.
Striving for freedom, the men head for the mountains and here (still pursued by soldiers and helicopter) they reach what we presume to be a border for there is a group of soldiers waiting who do not fire on them as they approach. Ansell is the first to reach them. On their guard, they visibly relax when he throws down his gun. He urges Mac to join him but Mac is curiously reluctant, and hearing the approach of the helicopter goes back down the slope to confront it and make a pointless sort of 'last stand' with his machine gun. Failing to shoot down the chopper, he is himself killed but we don't feel any pity for him.
A high camera shot at the very end shows Ansell turning and walking up the hill towards an outpost, shepherded by the soldiers, but we have no idea what fate awaits him. Will he be freed or imprisoned or will he be surrendered to the country from which he has escaped? We don't know. The camera pulls away from the figures and the last view is only landscape.
'Figures in a Landscape' is an action film that puts its main characters through a gruelling succession of hardships but breaks the cardinal law of action by failing to make us identify with them and root for them.
This is something that was fully understood by Hitchcock, who knew how to get the viewer to root for the main characters. Think of 'The 39 Steps' in which the hero is also on the run through the landscape. You thrill with Hannay in every episode and WANT him to escape and succeed. And then compare with 'Kill Bill' where, for me, it was impossible to identify and sympathise with the main girl because she was herself a cold-blooded killer.
If the film is supposed to be 'existentialist' then it fails there too because the characterisation and dialogue is too poor.
All in all, worth watching once at least for the great landscape photography and the helicopter stunts.
The older man is at first more forceful, giving the impression that it is he who has been the prime mover of their getaway, but we soon see that he is not all that smart and in an early scene he (off-screen) kills an old goatherd, hoping to get a knife, but the body yields nothing. This gives an immediate bad feeling about the fate of these two guys.
It is in fact quite annoying to watch how long they stumble through the landscape without seriously trying to sever the cords. After all, they are bound with rope and there are plenty of sharp rocks around.
Later, in a village, they manage to enter a house and find a razor. After finally cutting their bonds they steal a rifle and supplies and stuff, all in the presence of a silent, staring woman who seems to be mourning a dead man. But Mac can't resist swiping a loaf of bread from in front of the corpse which sets the woman off screaming and they have to run, as the village comes to noisy life about their ears.
Time after time they manage to elude capture, even when surrounded and hunted by hundreds of soldiers! Trying to pick up the men's history from their talk is impossible and we are never told what - if anything - they have done to have caused their captivity.
Robert Shaw is fairly convincing as the slightly unhinged Mac. We believe that he could be a criminal of some kind.
But Malcolm McDowell, as Ansell, though physically convincing, says his lines as if he's acting in his school play. A scene toward the end where he is supposed to be a bit delirious is particularly cringe-inducing.
Now, I know many consider McDowell to be a talented actor who made wrong choices and ended up in dodgy roles, but the fact is that (like Keanu Reeves) he is one of those actors who speak as if they're saying lines that they've memorised (which of course, they have!) Sure, this can work in the right part. Nobody could have played Alex in 'A Clockwork Orange' better than McDowell, but Alex is basically a comic book character, so his rendition fitted perfectly.
As others have pointed out, the film doesn't make you feel all that much sympathy for the fugitives, although a bit more for the younger one because, in contrast to the older one, he doesn't seem to want to kill and only does it when forced to.
Striving for freedom, the men head for the mountains and here (still pursued by soldiers and helicopter) they reach what we presume to be a border for there is a group of soldiers waiting who do not fire on them as they approach. Ansell is the first to reach them. On their guard, they visibly relax when he throws down his gun. He urges Mac to join him but Mac is curiously reluctant, and hearing the approach of the helicopter goes back down the slope to confront it and make a pointless sort of 'last stand' with his machine gun. Failing to shoot down the chopper, he is himself killed but we don't feel any pity for him.
A high camera shot at the very end shows Ansell turning and walking up the hill towards an outpost, shepherded by the soldiers, but we have no idea what fate awaits him. Will he be freed or imprisoned or will he be surrendered to the country from which he has escaped? We don't know. The camera pulls away from the figures and the last view is only landscape.
'Figures in a Landscape' is an action film that puts its main characters through a gruelling succession of hardships but breaks the cardinal law of action by failing to make us identify with them and root for them.
This is something that was fully understood by Hitchcock, who knew how to get the viewer to root for the main characters. Think of 'The 39 Steps' in which the hero is also on the run through the landscape. You thrill with Hannay in every episode and WANT him to escape and succeed. And then compare with 'Kill Bill' where, for me, it was impossible to identify and sympathise with the main girl because she was herself a cold-blooded killer.
If the film is supposed to be 'existentialist' then it fails there too because the characterisation and dialogue is too poor.
All in all, worth watching once at least for the great landscape photography and the helicopter stunts.