The genius of Elliott Gould: A star for an uptight age

As I've said many times before -- the 1970s, by far, is my favorite film decade. The movies were smarter, darker and more adventurous than any time before or since.

One of my favorite stars of that era is Elliott Gould, who really only could have been a star in that unique time. He didn't look or act like what matinee idols were supposed to, but that's precisely what made him so cool.

In M*A*S*H, The Long Goodbye (his greatest role) and The Silent Partner (which I revisited today) he has a marvelous, off-kilter presence. Leading men were allowed to be neurotic and smart back then and that wit was rightly perceived as sexy.

Sadly, a series of flops and changing tastes sidelined Gould for years. He became a successful character actor but more often than not he was viewed as a relic.

Elliott Gould

Still, he's hung around. He was one of the best hosts of the first five years of Saturday Night Live, he was an amusing addition to the Ocean's Eleven films and pretty much whenever he pops up in something now it's a pleasant surprise.

In The Silent Partner, Gould plays a very unconventional hero. He's a lonely bank teller who collects fish (and not-so-secretly lusts after his gorgeous British co-worker). He deduces that a Salvation Army Santa is actually a thief casing the branch where he works, so he steals money for himself seconds before the thief (played by a terrifying Christopher Plummer) robs him.

It's an ingenious plot, one that makes you wonder why no one has thought to make it before. Yet it's all handled with such realism and subtlety that the thrills come very organically.

Everything seems to go smoothly for Gould's character. The girl from work (Susannah York) and the local press start to take a fancy to him because he 'stood up' to the crook. Gould gets to bask in his newfound celebrity but little does he know that the would-be thief is onto him. That is just the beginning of a very twisty, always inventive film.

Gould plays the type of man that people "usually underestimate" in this movie -- which was sort of his stock in trade back then. He was deadpan and a little dorky, aggressively 'ethnic' at a time when that was a statement instead of an afterthought.

Come to think of it we wouldn't have stars like Jonah Hill or Jason Segal if it wasn't for someone like Gould. He provided the blueprint for this kind of leading man.

Do yourself a favor and check out The Silent Partner, one of the great overlooked thrillers from my favorite decade of films -- featuring vintage Gould at his best.