A nuclear holocaust has caused a new ice age and all but wiped out humanity... and the survivors kill time with pointless murder games. Robert Altman's Quintet has two of the greatest movie concepts in history jammed together, in a quintessentially 1970s blend of apocalypse and wacky death game. No wonder Paul Newman is excited! It's like stumbling into Rollerball, Death Race 2000, Jericho and the Sci Fi Channel's Ice all rolled into one. (And check out the proto-Bartertown sets, complete with weird slogans.) Sadly, the seemingly innocent game of Quintet hides a dark secret, as you'll see after the jump.
The dark secret of Quintet is that it's sort of a crappy game. Here Newman is, having lost his entire family to the postapocalyptic Rottweilers and stab-happy Quintet players, and he's finally killed his last opponent in the game. And it only now occurs to him to find out what the prize is. Which is, basically, bragging rights. You get to hang around the crappy parlor with the guy in the zany felt hat and talk about all the people you scragged. I would at least want a sticker, or maybe a slice of blueberry pie. With whipped cream.









A nuclear holocaust has caused a new ice age and all but wiped out humanity... and the survivors kill time with pointless murder games. Robert Altman's Quintet has two of the greatest movie concepts in history jammed together, in a quintessentially 1970s blend of apocalypse and wacky death game. No wonder Paul Newman is excited! It's like stumbling into
The dark secret of Quintet is that it's sort of a crappy game. Here Newman is, having 



Comments
That's Butch, not Sundance.
That's Paul bloody Newman, not Robert effing Redford.
Sheesh.
Not a bad movie, all in all. Great set design, mysterious story, well acted, just depressing as all get-out.
Newman, not Redford. Just to be clear.
Umm...wow, I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around this one, never heard of it. Was Redford desperate for money or just wanted to show that he could be in postapocalyptic movies like Heston and Caan?
err...haha..just read the first comment, you're right, I was wondering why that didn't look like Redford. Needed more sleep.
I've seen "Quntet" with Paul Newman...I've never heard of a version of "Quintet", directed by Robert Altman, starring...Robert Redford!
Maybe the question might be ... is there really any significant difference between Robert Redford and Paul Newman?
OMG you're right... I always get those two mixed up, because they're so interchangeable. I'll fix it.
Beats playing lame-o full-court Death Basketball for Cuervo Jones.
What is "an infinite combination of sexies"?
I really need to know.
I thought Quintet was an OK Altman film.
OC and Stiggs on the other hand....
@SavannahJack:
Agreed. Not bad, but deeeeeeeeeepressing.
A modicum of fact checking and research. Newman, not Redford.
I like your site a lot, but in your rush to post there are a LOT of simple errors like this.
@victheremin: Can you prove that Robert Redford and Paul Newman are two different people? I think you cannot.
Anyway, this isn't a fact-checking issue. I watched this entire movie, *and* read up on it on IMDB and several other sites. And still went around for days telling people it stars Robert Redford. Luckily, we have diligent commenters like you, who are convinced these two actors actually are separate people. I know one of them is the peanut butter guy, at least.
I remember seeing a movie some sat afternoon on the local UHF station a long time ago with people gun fighting in a snowy apocolyptic ruins... I wonder if this is that. I do remembering why a movie that looked so good was not so good.
I watched about an hour of that movie and had to change the channel. It is quite possibly one of the most boring movies I have ever attempted to see.
@Garrison Dean: Yeah, it's gorgeous, but there are long stretches of blah.
Interchangeable?? No way. Redford could never have played Cool Hand Luke or Fast Eddie Felson -- because he could never allow a character of his to be that vulnerable -- and Newman could never have played the lead in The Candidate or the skeevy millionaire in Indecent Proposal. Two very different actors. In fact, Redford would have never have taken a risk like playing in an experimental Altman film in the first place.
@Charlie Jane Anders: gah I'm torn. I love the apocolypse, but I hate boredom!!! What should I do?! tell me io9?
Hrmmm if only someone would remake it.
Paul Newman played Sundance in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. WAY WAY cooler than Redford
And one of them has been nominated for an Academy Award nine times and won once, while the other has been nominated for best actor three times and actually won for Best Director. I really like this site but if you've ever seen The Sting or Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (let alone Hud, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof or Cool Hand Luke)...I just think you'd be able to tell them apart-it's not really that hard.
And two of those movies do prove that Redford and Newman are two separate people.
@spacedcowboy: Umm, I'm pretty sure he played Butch Cassidy. He is way cooler than Redford, though.
@Charlie Jane Anders: Sounds like an Altman movie to me. Beautifully shot, but long stretches of boredom.
@IHateWhatYouHaveOn: And yet they're still totally interchangeable to me.
They've been in a total of 2 movies together.
They are a decade apart in age.
They have had very different careers, on and off screen.
There is very "interchangeable" about them, save that they appeared in 2 movies together over 30 years ago.
And it IS a fact check issue. "Checking" and getting it wrong really isn't an excuse, is it?
Seriously, falling back on "whatev, nerds" probably isn't the best defense on a nerdcore site, is it?
And since this is io9, here's a big fact that separates them - Redford was on Twilight Zone, Newman wasn't.
@dwiff: They're not the same age? Which one is older?
@zeppelined:
I think it's what you get when you pay a hooker $4300, plus expenses.
At least, I hope it is.
-Kle.
Did anyone else consciously superimpose the MST3k gang on top of that clip? This would have been perfect fodder.
@Charlie Jane Anders: Don't you know? Isn't that something covered by your "fact check"?
@dwiff: Look, I'm sorry I mixed them up. It was an honest mistake. But yeah, I checked, and it's still a fact that I think those actors are kind of interchangeable.
@dwiff: P.S.: I genuinely am sorry here. It was a brain fart, not a fact-checking error per se. With a blog, sometimes things go up that would have been caught at a print publication. We'll definitely try to be more careful in future.
@Charlie Jane Anders: We try to gently take the shovel away, and yet there you go, still digging.
Not interchangeable.
And, actually a text book fact check error, "per se" even. It's not a typo. It's an error.
@Klebert: Ah. The Spitzer Special.
ZING!
Don't yield to 'em, Charlie. Some actors just are interchangable, however much they shouldn't be. It's a fact of the world.
This movie (Quintet, remember? It was mentioned up there above the millions of Newman/Redford corrections) is the only Robert Altman movie I hate. In fact, it's also my least favorite postapocalyptic game of death. It's no Blood of Heroes. It's not even Deathsport (terrible almost-sequel to Death Race 2000)!
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