Cocaine Cowboys

1979's COCAINE COWBOYS, not to be confused with the much later Netflix documentary of the same name, is another case of Andy Warhol wanting to play "movie".  Some of the films he's associated with are OK, and some are dreck.  Like this one.  Something that feels like the famous artist/man about town got bored and figured that he had a cool summer home in Montauk and hey, wouldn't it be fun to shoot a movie there?  Maybe like something to do with rock 'n' roll and drugs? A crime tale and all? Despite the presence of four screenwriters, one of whom is director Ulli Lommel, this so-called narrative is an amateurish fiasco.  A "hang out movie" with nothing to say and does it with the barest of interest. 

A rock band, led by "actor" Tom Sullivan (who also co-wrote), has been successfully dealing cocaine in between concert bookings.  It's probably safe to say they've made more bread doing that than playing their mediocre songs, which we get more than enough of throughout the picture.  One day two of them are flying back to Long Island with twenty kilos and panic when they see some police cars on the runway.  Despite being low on fuel, they fly back over the ocean as they ponder their next step.  It is decided to unload the two big bags into the water and retrieve them later.  The search will be unsuccessful. 

Bad news as their buyer has mafia connections.  The band's manager, Raphael (Jack Palance) stalls his contact (who insists on being called "Baby") for awhile, but soon he and the band (who ride horses on the beach, like real cowboys) just don't seem too concerned that they lost two million in dope.  Even the Mafia seem awfully patient, if not forever.  But what's going on with that geeky guy - some sort of secretary for the band, and the house maid (played by Mrs. Lommel, Suzanna Love)? Why is Andy Warhol, playing himself, hanging around taking Polaroid shots? Will they prove to be incriminating?

COCAINE COWBOYS is told in flashback.  Dustin (Sullivan) relays the story later to Warhol and others at the artist's pad in Manhattan.  No one has anything interesting to say, about anything.  Music, drugs, life.  While Lommel is a competent director, much of this feels like the home movie that it literally is.   There is also zero suspense, but the movie doesn't really care about the plot anyway.  There is one mildly kinky scene involving baby powder that is just another tedious tease.  The acting is as poor as you would expect, except from Palance, whose effortless charisma is always entertaining.  Were it not for him I would rate the film even lower.

Many folks have learned about this obscurity from Quentin Tarantino and Roger Avary's enjoyable new podcast, "The Video Archives Podcast".  And many probably wondered what they saw in this trash.  Their apologias are entertaining if baffling.  Though undeniably educational.  Sullivan apparently really was a drug smuggler and was more or less playing himself.  And that it was his brainchild to make this movie, eventually convincing Lommel, a previous collaborator of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, to direct.  That knowledge ahead of time may make COCAINE COWBOYS more palatable, but I'm skeptical.