The Grey Fox is still slick
Viewers can still get lost in B.C. scenery in Borsos’s excellent Canadian movie
Like a sweet mix of Butch Cassidy and Goin’ Down the Road, the 1982 film The Grey Fox tells a distinctly Canadian tale about a turn-of-the-(last)-century criminal by the name of Bill Miner.
History (OK, Wikipedia) tells us Miner was a U.s.-born robber whose good manners when holding up stagecoaches earned him the nickname The Gentleman Bandit. He is also credited with inventing the phrase “Hands up!” which is an amazing thing for which to be known. It’s as if someone told you, “You know how people say ‘Hello’ when they pick up the phone? Yeah, my great-grandfather came up with that.”
Anyway, Miner started his stagecoach-thieving ways in the 1860s and spent several stints in prison, including a 20-year stretch in San Quentin that ended in 1901 when he was, as the film poetically puts it, “released into the 20th century.”
There is where we find Bill at the start of The Grey Fox, the debut feature of B.C. filmmaker Phillip Borsos. Played by stuntman-turned-actor Richard Farnsworth with a handlebar moustache and a twinkle in his eye (today it would be Sam Elliott), Bill clearly feels out of place in the new century, with nary a stagecoach to be seen.
But a chance viewing of The
Great Train Robbery convinces him his skills might still have some tangential use. And as he says mildly: “I’ve got ambitions in me that just won’t quit.” With one successful railroad raid behind him, Bill heads north to Kamloops to lie low for a while.
Turns out small-town western-canadian life suits him. Bill becomes friendly with the local lawman, Sergeant Fernie of the British Columbia Provincial Police, played by Timothy Webber. And he falls hard for Katherine Flynn (Jackie Burroughs), a trade unionist he first notices giving the local newspaper editor what-for over his publication’s stance on equal pay for women.
When they next meet she’s out in the hills golfing and listening to opera on the phonograph. “Isn’t that an aria from Martha?” he hazards. The rest is romantic history.
Borsos was just 27 when he shot this film in B.C., using the heritage town of Fort Steele as early Kamloops, and filming in some locations close to where Miner had actually lived and, um, plied his trade. The film shows him unable to resist a bit of horse-rustling and train robbery, even as he tries to settle down with Kate.
The Grey Fox isn’t a precise record of history — for one thing, Miner’s story in the film ends on a different note than it did in real life. But it’s a beautiful piece of Canadiana, winning six Genies in the year it was made, including best motion picture and the amusingly named “best performance by a foreign actor,” for the Los Angeles-born Farnsworth. It placed fifth in a 1984 Toronto Film Festival poll of best Canadian
films, and was still in the top 10 a decade later when the festival updated the list.
The newly restored print is also just the latest example of a movie being released online as a way to raise money for independent cinemas that have been shut down during the pandemic. Viewers wanting to watch this time capsule — honestly, you could get lost in the gorgeous B.C. scenery — can buy a virtual ticket, essentially an online rental, with the proceeds going to participating cinemas. It’s a steal. And a couple of train robberies.
The Grey Fox is available to stream through filmswelike.com.