“Every town has somebody who thinks he’s tough as a nickel steak.”
They say that Walter Hill only directs Westerns. His debut, Hard Times, is set in New Orleans during the Great Depression, not exactly a setting that lends itself to the genre. But consider how the tale begins: a mysterious drifter (Charles Bronson) rides into town on a freight train, his laconic demeanor concealing the lethal stopping power contained in his fists. Trade in the locomotive for a horse and bare-knuckle brawling for gunfighting and you’ve got yourself a classic oater.
Pairing up with a voluble and opportunistic hustler Speed (James Coburn), Chaney (Bronson) is only looking to “fill a few in-betweens” before wandering off to his next destination. With Speed’s connections, including an eccentric opium-addicted cutman (a scene-stealing Strother Martin), the unlikely team wins one bout after another, making money as quickly Speed can gamble it away. A robust individualist who keeps his cards close to his vest, we expect Chaney to live by a code of honor, but not to show compassion, especially considering the personal deprivation the working man suffered from during the era. And yet, when Speed’s loan shark comes calling, Chaney shows up for the smooth operator by betting all of his earnings on himself in a fight with a professional prize fighter brought in from Chicago.
Taking place in a series of dockside factories, pool halls, and speakeasies that, along with the period costumes, completely define the film’s setting, Hard Times nevertheless achieves a timeless quality by virtue of its Western inflections, shrewd style, austere storytelling, and well-realized characters. Like Hill’s subsequent The Long Riders, it’s less a period drama than a picturesque homage to a mythologized past, capped off with a near-silent climactic showdown that’s punctuated by little more than the fleshy sounds of landed blows. Though much different in scope and structure, it would make for an interesting companion piece to John Huston’s Fat City, a contemporary film about the less glamorous side of organized fighting.