The Grey Fox

 (Canada)

By VARIETY STAFF

Mercury. Director Phillip Borsos; Producer Peter O'Brian; Screenplay John Hunter; Camera Frank Tidy; Editor Ray Hall; Music Michael Baker
 
Richard Farnsworth
Jackie Burroughs
Wayne Robson
Ken Pogue
David Petersen
Timothy Webber
 

A graceful, stunningly-photographed bio of Bill Miner, a notorious train robber in Canada and the US at the turn of the century.

Director Phillip Borsos approaches his material - a stagecoach robber goes to jail for 30 years and is released into an unknown world where trains have started carrying the mail - as a kind of neo-western very much in sympathy with the bandit. Veteran Hollywood actor and western stunt man Richard Farnsworth was suggested for the role by Francis Coppola. His performance as the gentleman robber is one of the $3 million pic's strong points.

Until trapped by a Pinkerton detective, Miner lives a quiet life in a frontier town passing himself off as a gold-digger. Between train robberies, there is a delicately-handled love story with a cultured blue-stocking who makes a living as a photographer in the town.

(Color) Available on VHS, DVD. Extract of a review from 1982. Running time: 90 MIN.