Rent Mad Dog Morgan (1976)

Two Stars just for completing a film that starred Dennis Hopper in mid 1970s - Mad Dog Morgan review by Strovey

Mad Dog Morgan is a 1976 Australian film made on a limited budget featuring Dennis Hopper in his most hedonistic and wild phase about a real Australian criminal from the 1850s in which the filmmakers were trying to emulate to the best of their abilities Sam Peckinpah.

That sentence needs to be made so that any viewer watching Mad Dog Morgan can see the whole film can be given some context. Within that context Mora and writer Margaret Carnegie made a particularly good film.

Right from the get-go it has a 1970s feel about it. Hard to explain but perhaps the foleyed-to-death punch in the mouth earlier on and the wiggy-glued-on-beards made me feel this way. It was not particularly detrimental though.

What was fascinating was to see a Western, which is essentially what it is, but set in Australia. The first thing that has to be said is we get a veritable who’s-who of Australian thespians, all of them as dependable as you expect, good solid actors. Frank Thring, Bill Hunter and John Hargreaves, as good as you expect them, the budget, style of film and undoubtedly difficulty of filming clearly not phasing them. We also get the legendary Aboriginal actor David Gulpilil as charismatic and cheerful as he appeared in most films. Unfortunately, from his own recollections, you can also watch the film where he was led down some very bad paths.

This brings us to the ‘star’ Dennis Hopper. Drunk, drugged up and all the other Dennis-Hoppery-things we know and have read about his demeanour and behaviour off-set somehow added to the performance of Mad Dog Morgan for me – made it seem more authentic. The actual Morgan was apparently a difficult-to-understand conundrum. At times vicious and cruel and others, generous and ebullient depending on your luck. Sounds like the part was made for Hopper and adding in that he got deported from Australia at the end of the film adds another chapter to the legend that has built up around Morgan and not diminished from it.

Taking the film as a film the story meanders along and shows Morgan as a difficult-to-understand anti-hero although it is fairly clear which side the makers were on – especially if you read the real events in Morgan’s life and how they are depicted – or missed out.

The acting is strong throughout with Thring perhaps being a bit ‘evil supervillain’ in his role, although this is necessary to show the callousness of the colonial rule. A joy was the variety of accents on display with Welsh, Irish, Scottish and what sounds similar to me, west-country popping up from various characters.

The scenery and vast vistas will always win in an Australian film featuring the Outback and plonk rough and ready characters in there and you have an enjoyable tale.

The story itself zips along fairly competently, possibly a quarter of an hour too long, but nothing that detracts and although it really does not reveal too much about Morgan, other than his feeling of righteousness and odd behaviour, which might just be down to Hopper’s real personality at the time, it has an overall demeanour of authenticity and gives the colonials a good kick in the delicates until as usual they win.

Bear in mind you are watching a low-budget, difficult-to-make, Australian film nearly 50-years-old and you should enjoy yourself. Even Hopper’s Irish accent holds up although I am not sure where he was supposed to be from. Mad Dog Morgan is an overlooked western about violence, revenge and corrupt authority made in the 1970s and as such should be given a viewing but at no time does that viewing become a task.

Flawed Australian Western - Mad Dog Morgan review by GI

Based on a real 'Bush Ranger' or Australian outlaw and filmed in the typical revisionist style that Hollywood had applied to the western in the 1970s, and I suspect influenced by Sam Peckinpah and even Clint Eastwood's westerns of the time. It's a rather disjointed film with some narrative aspects not properly followed through and in the end it's structure is of the outlaw riding around robbing or befriending folks chased by the police until they inevitably confront one another. Indeed the final climax, long in coming, is disappointing to say the least. There's some pointless and gratuitous violence often amateurishly portrayed in an attempt to emulate Peckinpah but the film lacks any sense of his poetry or keen eye. Dennis Hopper, never a strong leading actor, is fairly uninspiring here and rumour has it he was mostly drunk during filming thinking he was getting closer to his character! In the end it shows as he's not nearly enough interesting to make the central character anything but a shoddy thief. Australian cinema can be extraordinary and in the right hands makes that great link between the land and the characters, that is attempted here and there are some great scenic visuals especially with David Gulpilil, the ubiquitous native Australian actor who adds a sense of realism to this and all his films. This film has its fans but ultimately it's of its time and cannot compete with similar genre pieces from then.