Richard Brooks "Bite the Bullet" (1975) was Brooks' return to the western. He based his original screenplay on the endurance horse races popular at the turn of the century. In 1977, he released another controversial film, an adaptation of Judith Rossner's 1975 novel "Looking for Mr. Goodbar." It starred Diane Keaton as a Catholic school teacher who searches for sexual satisfaction in singles bars. Brooks made the film on a tight budget, and its frank treatment of sex and its horrific storyline brought praise and condemnation and sold tickets. He ended his career with "Wrong Is Right" (1982), a satire about the
The Big Bounce (novel) "The Captives." Jack Ryan returned in the novel "Unknown Man No. 89". The novel, set in the Thumb area of Michigan, tells the story of a young thief named Jack Ryan who gets a new shot at life with the help of a justice of the peace named Mr. Majestyk (Leonard later wrote a novel called "Mr. Majestyk," with a title character that is completely unrelated to the character of the same name in "The Big Bounce"), who hires Jack to work at his beach resort. During this time, Jack gets involved with a psychotic woman named Nancy, a young