Boxcar Bertha (1972)

Now that Martin Scorsese has finally gotten his Oscar, it’s time to set the way-back machine and revisit one of his early directing efforts, Boxcar Bertha.

This low-budget gem is a fascinating window into the mind of the fledgling genius behind the lens. It’s full of the kind of gritty action that Scorsese later raised to the level of art in Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, filmed in a fresh visual style that’s almost as exciting as the car chases, shoot-outs and fistfights he packs into the film’s 90 minutes.

Boxcar Bertha is the story of Bertha Thompson (Barbara Hershey), a young woman trying to make ends meet during the Great Depression. After seeing her father die in a crop dusting accident, she drifts from town to town, and from man to man, looking for a way out of the poverty that rules her life.

The cast of the film is made up of familiar faces that, like the director, all went on to better things. Hershey is good in the lead, despite the fact that she’s not given much more to do than look pretty and practice her southern drawl. David Carradine has a much juicer role playing Big Bill Shelly, the union organizer who dies in a very unique way at the end of the film.

The real reason to watch Boxcar Bertha, of course, is to see what Scorsese was capable of 35 years ago working under the gun, so to speak, with legendary low-budget producer Roger Corman. The answer, it turns out, is quite a lot.

IMDB Site.