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I had never heard of this movie until the Internet era; it was one of my first purchases from iTunes. I liked it well enough at the time, but this post makes me want to go back and rewatch

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It's absolutely a grower. But do bear in mind I have a soft spot for a lot of people involved (Culp, Hill, even Hickman), and I'm an absolute sucker for "loser movies" that never found their audience. It's a shame Culp never got the chance to direct again.

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I have a similar soft spot -- as you might know, I actually wrote a piece called "Bill Hickman at Home"

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Know it? I'd never heard anything like it (in a good way)!

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God I loved them in this movie. I think Duane Swiercyznski talked about on a blog or newsletter years ago and I bought it that day. An excellent flick.

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Same (ish - it was a tough one to buy over here, so it took me longer). Never underestimate The Swierczynski Effect. That man has buckets of taste.

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Thank you for this article. A friend and I watched Hickey & Boggs and thought we were the only people who'd seen and liked it. We felt the same way about the

excellent (to us) The Counselor.

Can you give an example of a neo neo-noir film. I don't know what that is.

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Neo neo-noir is just an arbitrary thing so I can keep track, because neo-noir is usually used as a catch-all term for the revisionist neo-noirs of the '70s AND the neo-noirs of the '90s like The Last Seduction. That said - and having thought about it a bit - neo-noir would probably cover it all, given that it never really stopped in the '80s (Blood Simple, anyone?).

And you're not the only one who likes The Counselor, one of those weird movies where I agree with all the negative criticism and STILL love the socks off it. "Oh, it's a Cormac McCarthy audiobook with Ridley Scott visuals ..." Yes, and that is not necessarily a bad thing.

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Your description of The Counselor makes me like it even more. In the neo neo realm I have a soft spot for Romeo is Bleeding.

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Haven't seen that one in ages, but I remember it fondly. May have to revisit.

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