THE PURSUIT OF D. B. COOPER

US, 1981, 96 minutes, Colour.
Treat Williams, Robert Duval, Kathryn Harrold, Ed Flanders, Paul Gleason, R.G.Armstrong.
Directed by Roger Spottiswoode.

The Pursuit of D. B. Cooper is an entertaining, if minor, caper and chase film. Directed by Roger Spottiswoode, who directed the Jamie Lee Curtis thriller Terror Train, it has excellent special effects. The cast is also very good: Treat Williams (Hair, The Ritz, Prince of the City) confronts Robert Duvall. There is an excellent supporting cast led by Kathryn Harrold. The film takes the familiar theme of the outlaw becomes hero and is admired by the public. This is aided by the fact that he is a Vietnam veteran, has warfare skills from the war, has a case for compensation in his exploit. There is a rousing musical score.

1. An entertaining crime caper and chase film? A piece of Americana? Characters, situations, justice? The effectiveness of the stunt work? The quality of the film as entertainment?

2. The importance of the stunts and their contribution to mood and excitement: the technical details of the robbery, the plane trip, the free fall, the boats, the vehicles, horses and planes? The background of the Vietnam war and tactics?

3. The atmosphere of the score - echoes of Deliverance? The song and themes?

4. How entertaining was the caper in itself? The nature of the plan and its motive of revenge? The opening atmosphere, the success of the robbery, the ingenuity of Cooper? Getting the audience onside? Meade as person. hero? The free fall and its effectiveness? His skill in disguises? His capacity for talking, insinuating himself into a group and out of a group? Evading the law? The contact with Hannah? The build-up to the confrontation with Gruen? The encounters with Remsen, Homer, his father?

5. The role of the media - creating a media identity, outlaw? Glamorising the bucking of the system and inviting people to support Cooper?

6. The background of the open countryside - the deer, the police and their ability to chase in the wilderness, the boat and the rapids, the car, the horses. the truck and the repairs, the airfield and the plane? The build-up to the final stunt and the confrontation? Cooper's achievement in this wilderness?

7. Hannah as heroine? tough. in love with Meade, the decision to help, their relationship, her participation in the excitement?

8. Gruen and the Vietnam background and his memories? Building up the identikit of Meade? The discussions with his boss and his being fired? His determination to follow through the case? Insinuating himself into Hannah's home? The sequence in the sawmill? The encounter with Meade's father? The car chases? Remsen? Taking chances? Getting the money? The final confrontation at the airfield?

9. Remsen and Mexico? Seediness, in the boot of the car, the buying of the car, the truck ? a substitute villain?

10. Meade's father and his stance, the military background, giving his son the gun, discussions with Hannah, discussions with Gruen?

11. The range of types that Meade met in his travels: Homer. the garage attendant, the woman and the horses, the hippie and his love of money? The police?

12. The film as a piece of Americana - the ordinary citizen, financial situation, exploited? Taking the law into his own hands for revenge? The importance of the Vietnam background, the effect on Meade's life, his skills and using them against the system? The presupposition that everybody, including the system, is crooked?

13. An exciting and ingenious chase? The comedy touch - serious themes but presented with the light-hearted larrikin manner? The perennial popularity of this kind of film?