Joe Buck (Voight) is tall, brawny and handsome, but not very smart. As the movie opens, he quits his job as a restaurant dishwasher in Texas and heads to New York to become a male prostitute. He seems to think this means getting paid to have sex with rich city women. It doesn't go well. In fact, the first "rich city woman" he beds is actually a prostitute herself and wants him to pay her instead of the other way around.
Before long, Joe Buck is out of money, disillusioned and desperate. Then he meets "Ratso" Rizzo (Dustin Hoffman) a similarly down on his luck hustler. Things get off to a bad start as Ratso cons Joe Buck out of his remaining money, but eventually they become friends. For a while, they manage to scrape by committing petty street crimes. However, every effort to turn a profit on Joe Buck's good looks goes wrong. And, as winter comes, Ratso's hacking cough starts getting worse.
Eventually, the two friends hit rock bottom. Ratso is clearly very sick. They decide to give up on New York and fulfill Ratso's longstanding dream of going to Miami. There, everything will be different. They manage to scrape up bus tickets, but it's too late for Ratso, who dies on the bus just outside Miami.
"Midnight Cowboy" is an edgy drama that deals frankly with subjects such as poverty, prostitution and drug use. Although it finds thin strands of hope in the lessons Joe Buck learns from Ratso, and in the way their friendship helps them cope with their troubles, it also paints a very dark picture of life on the underside of the American dream. Both Joe Buck and Ratso are hopeless characters, dragged on into desperation and misery by completely unrealistic dreams of finding a better life. Joe Buck imagines himself awash in money and women in the big city. Ratso is convinced that he'd somehow become a big, important operator if he just went to Miami. Both men see these dreams shattered by the cruel realities of their world.
In many ways, "Midnight Cowboy" is a modern take on a long tradition of stories about people who go to the city seeking escape from their problems, only to find that things are worse there. These include early twentieth century masterpieces such as Theodore Dreiser's "Sister Carrie," and John Steinbeck's "Of Mice and Men."
"Midnight Cowboy" was directed by English director John Schlesinger (who would also directed Hoffman in "Marathon Man.") The screenplay was written by Waldo Salt, based on a 1965 novel by James Leo Herlihy.
Jon Voight had mostly done small guest roles on TV before getting the part of Joe Buck. He was not the filmmakers' first choice. Lee Majors was originally going to play Joe Buck, but his TV show, The Big Valley, was renewed and he had to drop out. Then Michael Sarrazin was attached, leaving just before production began.
Ratso Rizzo was only Dustin Hoffman's second role, after playing the clean cut all-American boy in "The Graduate."
"Midnight Cowboy" was rated X on its initial release. This was in the very early days of the new rating system and the X rating was intended for legitimate films that dealt with adult subjects and weren't suitable for children. "Midnight Cowboy" was a perfect example. The film was a box office hit, making more than $44 million, a huge take for the time. The budget was only three and a half million. The film's nudity and frank approach to sexuality shocked audiences, some of whom seem to have been expecting a western based on the title.
Both Hoffman and Voight sprang off "Midnight Cowboy" into major careers. Hoffman avoided typecasting from his huge initial success in "The Graduate," while Voight left TV guest parts behind and became a serious movie star in his own right.
"Midnight Cowboy" won the Best Picture Oscar in 1970, the only X rated film ever to do so. John Schlesinger also won Best Director and Waldo Salt won for Best Screenplay. Both Voight and Hoffman were nominated for Best Actor, but lost to John Wayne in "True Grit." The film got seven Oscar nominations all together, as well as a raft of other awards.
Almost immediately after "Midnight Cowboy's" success, the X rating became associated mainly with the pornography industry. "Midnight Cowboy" was quietly given an R rating in 1970 without any actual changes being made to the film at all.
"Midnight Cowboy" remains one of the most respected films ever made. The American Film Institute put it at number 36 on its list of the 100 greatest films of all time.