Heehaw

By J.C.

THE DUCHESS AND THE DIRTWATER FOX

Directed by MELVIN FRANK Screenplay by MELVIN FRANK, BARRY SANDLER and JACK ROSE

This winded frontier comedy concerns one of those fun couples who, sadly, amuse only each other. The Duchess (Goldie Hawn) is a Barbary Coast hooker trying to get off her back and onto her feet by turning a dishonest dollar. The Dirtwater Fox (George Segal) is a sharpie whose smart schemes always collapse in chaos. These two hook up to defraud a lubricious Mormon--a bit of bunko that helps keep the Dirtwater Fox a few steps ahead of some bad guys who are giving him heated chase. It seems that he made off with their loot from a bank job, only the Duchess swiped it from him, mixing it in by mistake with the baggage of her Mormon mark, who ... oh, well. Let it go at that.

If the plot is enervating to recount, it is excruciating to sit through. The script is replete with rough-and-tumble frontier humor, Hollywood style, which means that the characters talk like unemployed gag writers trying to top each other over a delicatessen breakfast. Segal and Hawn, who are usually actors of charm and humor, here look as if they would like to be on the first stage out of town--or maybe even under it.

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