I missed the opportunity to watch this film once, so I rented it on DVD, I recognised it by the image of the leading actor, also directing, with a beard posing behind a hangman's noose, I hoped the film itself would be worthwhile. Basically set in the late 1860s, shortly after the Civil War, in Longhorn, Texas, third-rate outlaw Henry Lloyd Moon (Jack Nicholson) is a convicted bank robber, horse thief and cattle thief. Moon is sentenced to be hanged, to the glee of the locals who gather to watch his execution, a local ordinance dictates that as he has not committed murder, he may be freed if a lady will marry him and take responsibility for his good behaviour. An elderly woman offers to marry him, but dies on the spot immediately, as Moon is dragged back to the gallows, headstrong, genteel Southern virgin Julia Tate (introducing Golden Globe nominated Mary Steenburgen) agrees to marry and take charge of him. Julia weds Moon, intending only to use him as labour in a secret gold mine under her property, they strike up a shaky partnership and he gains her trust, it slowly develops into something more. The local sheriff's Deputy Towfield (Christopher Lloyd) constantly accuses Moon of stealing "his" girl, but there is no evidence Julia has any interest in him, and she offered marriage to Moon herself. It gets complicated when Moon's old gang arrive at Julia's house, she is abstinent, but they introduce her to intoxicating beverages. Julia and Moon are overjoyed when they successfully strike gold, but soon enough the outlaws discover this, Moon schemes to betray Julia and steal the gold., but following a collapse in the mine, he has a change of heart. There is a gun fight between the many men for the gold rush, and in the end, Julia and Moon walk away to make way with their fortune, with the nature of their relationship changed for the better. Also starring John Belushi as Deputy Hector, Danny DeVito as Hog, Veronica Cartwright as Hermine, Richard Bradford as Sheriff Andrew Kyle, Batman's Tracey Walter as Coogan, Ed Begley Jr. as Whitey Haber, Barbara Ann Grimes as Spinster #1, Anne Ramsey as Spinster #2, Marsha Ferri as Spinster #3 and Lin Shaye as Parasol Lady. Nicholson is good as the antihero, this is a good first movie for Steenburgen, and there is fair support from the other recognisable actors, the story is fairly simplistic, a relationship that turns from sour to smooth, a search for gold, and some bandits trying to get their hands on it, the movie may have been a flop at the cinemas, but it is a reasonable and fun comedy western. Worth watching!

This movie has a great cast, many of whom are inter-related in various ways. First, there is Jack Nicholson, Danny DeVito and Christopher Lloyd, all of whom were in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest together three years earlier in 1975. Needless to say, Nicholson must have had some influence in casting DeVito and Lloyd, as he directed this picture. DeVito and Lloyd were still relatively unknown until they were cast the following year in TAXI. Next, we have Veronica Cartwright, who would be cast in ALIEN the very next year in 1979. Then we have the lovely Luana Anders, who looked just as fabulous as she did 17 years earlier in her signature role as Don'a Medina in The Pit and the Pendulum, in 1961. There is John Belushi in his first film role, which ironically was in the same year that he would appear in Animal House. Finally, Mary Steenburgen appears here in her first film, as well. She would later go on to make some fabulously successful appearances in films like Parenthood and Back to the Future Part 3. As for the movie, it was an under-rated and relatively unknown independent film made by Nicholson on a lark. It remains one of those magnificent sleepers that was just great fun to watch. It's a happy movie with lots of laughs and lessons in loyalty and kindness. It remains one of my favorite comedies, westerns, and casts nearly 40 years later.

First of all, Going South is funny. And it is entertaining. So just enjoy the movie and stop analyzing it.This is a bit surprising, given Jack Nicholson's corpus. Look at the list of movies he made, and you will see this is his first comedy; not until Witches of Eastwich, 9 years later, do we see him starring in another comedy. There are comic elements in other movies of his, of course, such as the earlier One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, and the bizarre Mars Attacks! But in no other movie does Nicholson play such a purely comedic role, where the movie is dependent on his comedic acting. If you look at his first 10 years of starring roles, from 1969 to 1978, you see an actor demonstrating the ability to handle a wide range of serious roles, who wants to avoid being typecast. Yet he is in some slight danger of typecasting, of playing post-60s hipsters and rather serious characters. Going South broadened his acting palette, and while he did not do much more straight comedy, he employed comic twists to lighten many of his roles, especially in "As Good As It Gets."One of the keys to good comedy that stands the test of time is not going overboard. Nicholson pushes his character to extremes, but avoids crossing the line into shallowness, in part because he gives his character such depth through his fine acting. There is a lot of shallow contemporary comedy out there now, and current actors and directors could learn a lot from watching this movie. Nicholson immersed himself so fully in this role that some viewers seem to assume naively that Nicholson was really like Henry Lloyd Moon, at least at the time. He's an actor! (See The Passenger - 1975.)I'm a bit puzzled by some of the off the mark reviews, which seem to be due in part to judging the 1978 Nicholson by 2008 Nicholson. One "Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine," quite bizarrely complained that in Going South, Nicholson was reusing "faces and attitudes and gestures that we have already seen" ... in later films!Speaking of time travel, Going South is almost a prequel to Back to the Future, Part III, which starred the loony Christopher Lloyd and the lovely Mary Steenburgen in the wild West. Yet Going South was Steenburgen's first movie! Steenburgen delivered her role to perfection. This is interesting given her serious expression opposite Nicholson's antics. I wonder if she had a hard time keeping a straight face? But one of the things that makes this movie work is seeing Nicholson draw Steenburgen in his direction, including sexually and even to taking a drink, and Steenburgen drawing Nicholson toward taking life more seriously. You know this is coming, and in the beginning of the movie you are skeptical, and yet it is done credibly, and with a romantic touch.The scene with the brass bed is one of the most memorable of the movie. Sorry if it offended some women, but there's a lot of truth to that scene, and humor. There's no indication it was done with in a mean spirit or cruelty, which is never appropriate in romance, in or out of marriage. Thankfully, the rest of the scene is all left to the imagination, unlike some of the gratuitous, garbage sex scenes in more recent movies, like Titanic and Cold Mountain. When I watched Rooster Cogburn, I wished John Wayne had tied the eternally chattering Katherine Hepburn to a brass bed, or at least gagged her! Nicholson did a fantastic job of selecting his cast. There are several actors who are still early in their careers, including John Belushi, Danny DeVito, Veronica Cartwright (not so early, given her experience as a child actress) and Ed Begley Jr. The weakness of Going South is that it did not given more of an opportunity for Belushi and DeVito to show their stuff, but this is easily said in hindsight. Lloyd's is the only other major comic role as Nicholson's nemesis. Some rare comedies work every time you see them, and some only work once. Going South is somewhere in between; it works if you watch it every few years, but it is best the first time. It works because of the comedic tension between the key characters, because it doesn't push the comedy too far, and because there is enough serious dramatic acting underlying the performances by Nicholson and Steenburgen. Another reason it works is that not everyone in the movie is a Lloyd or Belushi; there are some normal people, like the sheriff. When everyone in a comedy is a goofball, you've got a problem. I think you need some normal people as a reference point, even in screwball comedies.Going South might have been a little better had there been more amusing lines for some of the secondary characters like DeVito and Belushi. But it is a fun movie to watch, and you get the feeling that Nicholson, Steenburgen and cast had a lot of fun making it. You might want to watch some of the other movies Nicholson made in this 10 year period before seeing Going South to get a perspective on his early work. What you will see is a great actor who has demonstrated versatility throughout his career. Perhaps the one element these performances have in common is the ability of Nicholson to project intense personal energy through the character onto the screen. We see this certainly in later films, but there are few roles where Nicholson invests more energy into his character than in Going South.

"Goin' South" is a watchable comedy directed by and starring Jack Nicholson. Filmed cheaply with a local crew down in Mexico, the film wasn't received well upon release. "Star Wars" had rendered westerns obsolete and screwball comedies were long out of date.Still, "Goin' South" holds up pretty well. Nichsolson's performance is amazing and cinematographer Néstor Almendros equals his work on Terrence Malick's "Days of Heaven".The film works more as a bizarre insight into Jack Nicholson, than a comedy. He turns what should be light slapstick, into a pretty nasty and mean spirited R rated comedy-drama. Watching his filmography from end to end, I'm surprised how consistently wicked and misogynistic his characters are. Here he players an outlaw who's hired by a sexually repressed woman to work in her gold mines. After tying her to a bed and giving her the hump of her life, she renounces her repressed ways and gradually begins to appreciate his animalistic masculinity.The Jack Nicholson persona seems to constantly be seeking to dominate women. If he can't have his way, he breaks down. "Goin South" is like a happy version of his "Carnal Knowledge", only here he finally gets a girl who submits to his primal charm.In terms of comedy, the film is similar in tone to the Coen Brothers' "O Brother Where Art Thou?" It's not as visually stylish, but the emphasis on wacky accents is the same. The cast includes Danny Devito, John Belushi and Christopher Lloyd, and many other comic faces pop up.But it's Jack Nicholson's face that keeps us watching. He's manic, cartoonish, sadistic and riveting. Take a look at the IMDb photo of this film (the DVD cover). The guy looks like a bearded Saddam Hussein, laughing at his hang man's noose like a psychopath. Nicholson's face is a work of art. His eyebrows are constantly twitching, his eyes constantly mischievous, his teeth lighting up his face. Whether you enjoy the film will depend on whether you love his scenery chewing. He puts so much energy and skill into his performance here that he transcends everything else about this film.6/10- Worth one viewing. I recommend fast forwarding all the exposition and simply watching Jack act. The guy's a pleasure to watch.