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Post by petrolino on Aug 3, 2018 22:34:17 GMT
Sam Peckinpah's western 'Pat Garrett And Billy the Kid' observes an aging Pat Garrett (James Coburn) who's been hired as a lawman by cattle barons to take down notorious outlaw Billy The Kid (Kris Kristofferson). It's written by Rudy Wurlitzer who'd recently penned the influential novel 'Nog' (1969); having enjoyed this book, Monte Hellman hired Wurlitzer to rewrite the screenplay for his road movie 'Two-Lane Blacktop' (1971), this being in the same year Wurlitzer co-wrote the script for Jim McBride's counter-culture favourite 'Glen And Randa' (1971). Singer-songwriter Bob Dylan composed music for 'Pat Garrett And Billy the Kid' and he also plays a role in it. The soundtrack includes one of his most popular recordings, 'Knockin' On Heaven's Door' (1973).
There's an interesting story about Peckinpah from when he was enlisted in the army that's briefly touched upon on his Wikipedia page : 'In 1943, he joined the United States Marine Corps. Within two years, his battalion was sent to China with the task of disarming Japanese soldiers and repatriating them following World War II. While his duty did not include combat, he claims to have witnessed acts of war between Chinese and Japanese soldiers. According to friends, these included several acts of torture and the murder of a laborer by sniper fire. The American Marines were not permitted to intervene. Peckinpah also claimed he was shot during an attack by Communist forces. Also during his final weeks as a Marine, he applied for discharge in Peking, so he could marry a local woman, but was refused. His experiences in China reportedly deeply affected Peckinpah, and may have influenced his depictions of violence in his films.'
Kris Kristofferson & James Coburn
Peckinpah is said to have been influenced by marxist texts in the 1970s. He was affected by revolutionary events happening in America and across Europe, some of which erupted into violence. I don't know what his political views were or how he voted.
"The Paris Commune of 1871 was one of the four great traumas that shaped modern France. It stands alongside the 1789 Revolution, the ascent of Vichy, in 1940, and (odd though it seems, given how nonviolent and small-scale they were) the Events of May, 1968. Other, more outward-bending crises—the Napoleonic campaigns, the two World Wars, the battle for Algeria—made as much noise and cost far more lives, but they now belong to the settled, archival past. That Napoleon was a bad man but a big figure, that the Great War was a valiant folly, that the war in Algeria could have ended only with Algerian independence: these are easy to assent to now. The four civic crises belong to the available, still contested past, the one that hangs around and starts living arguments. People ask whether the Revolution, with a little luck and better leadership, could have avoided the Terror and Bonaparte’s subsequent dictatorship, just as they argue over whether May of ’68 was a long-overdue assertion of liberty against hierarchy or the beginning of an infantile appeal to pleasure over value."
- Adam Gopnik, 'The Fires Of Paris'
"As a film maker I must look at both sides of the coin, and do my best as a story-teller. I have no absolutes. I have no value judgments ... Why does violence have such a point of intoxication with people? Why do people structure their day on killing?”
- Sam Peckinpah speaking with Barry Norman in 1976
'Julius & Ethel' - Bob Dylan
'Pat Garrett And Billy The Kid' is sometimes referred to as Sam Peckinpah's "unfinished masterpiece" and you can see this written in print online. It had a troubled production and exists in different cuts. The film deals with compromise and ironically was compromised itself. The cast and crew may have gotten loaded but they did produce an interesting piece of dramatic fiction.
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Post by The Herald Erjen on Aug 3, 2018 22:53:48 GMT
I watched it many years ago but don't remember much about it. Can't remember Dylan's scene in the film at all, but someone told me he played a general store clerk.
Good film from what I remember of it, even if Coburn and Kristofferson were a little older than the real Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid were when those events took place.
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Post by them1ghtyhumph on Aug 3, 2018 23:10:29 GMT
I have managed to avoid it thus far
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Post by politicidal on Aug 4, 2018 0:00:19 GMT
I've seen it once like 6, 7 years ago. It's an odd movie. Sometimes elegiac and melancholy and other times, coarse and vulgar. So typical Peckinpah I guess.
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Post by petrolino on Aug 4, 2018 0:20:32 GMT
I've seen it once like 6, 7 years ago. It's an odd movie. Sometimes elegiac and melancholy and other times, coarse and vulgar. So typical Peckinpah I guess.
I once read a French article on the representation of violence in Sam Peckinpah's films in which the author said he produced lyrical passages of film that were intensely poetic and then poured vinegar on them.
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Post by OldAussie on Aug 4, 2018 0:31:30 GMT
I've seen it 3 times. It gets better with each viewing.
It contains some scenes which are among Peckinpah's best, but the movie as a whole never seems to come together. It's like a patchwork of moments which never gels.
Definitely should be seen at least once by any serious movie lover, but I don't guarantee you'll like it.
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Post by bravomailer on Aug 4, 2018 0:40:56 GMT
6.5/10 –– Nice texture and setting. Great to see all those character actors. Dylan's soundtrack is quite good. But the script is plodding and has a lot of 1970s ideas in it. Billy is a free-spirited longhair being hassled by the law.
Someone on the old board had the signature: "Keep the change, Bob."
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Post by OldAussie on Aug 4, 2018 0:53:45 GMT
6.5/10 –– Nice texture and setting. Great to see all those character actors. Dylan's soundtrack is quite good. But the script is plodding and has a lot of 1970s ideas in it. Billy is a free-spirited longhair being hassled by the law. Someone on the old board had the signature: "Keep the change, Bob." I think that was a guy called Samoan Bob who absolutely loved this movie. He was a regular on the old Western board. |
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Post by petrolino on Aug 4, 2018 1:04:56 GMT
6.5/10 –– Nice texture and setting. Great to see all those character actors. Dylan's soundtrack is quite good. But the script is plodding and has a lot of 1970s ideas in it. Billy is a free-spirited longhair being hassled by the law. Someone on the old board had the signature: "Keep the change, Bob." I think that was a guy called Samoan Bob who absolutely loved this movie. He was a regular on the old Western board. Oh yeh, I remember. Not only a passionate fan and real afficianado, but also a designated historian of the Old West. I sometimes read a Bob on western blogs I'm sure is him. Great mind. |
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Post by bravomailer on Aug 4, 2018 1:08:19 GMT
Some of the character actors in the flick:
Richard Jaeckel as Sheriff Kip McKinney
Katy Jurado as Mrs. Baker
Chill Wills as Lemuel
Barry Sullivan as John Chisum
Jason Robards as Governor Lew Wallace
Bob Dylan as Alias
R.G. Armstrong as Deputy Sheriff Bob Olinger
Luke Askew as Eno
John Beck as John W. Poe
Richard Bright as Holly (Albert Neri in the Godfather films)
Matt Clark as Deputy Sheriff J. W. Bell
Rita Coolidge as Maria
Jack Dodson as Lewellyn Howland (Howard Sprague of Mayberry)
Jack Elam as Alamosa Bill Kermit
Emilio Fernández as Paco
Paul Fix as Pete Maxwell
L.Q. Jones as Black Harris
Slim Pickens as Sheriff Colin Baker
Jorge Russek as Silva
Charles Martin Smith as Charlie Bowdre
Harry Dean Stanton as Luke
Rutanya Alda as Ruthie Lee
Elisha Cook Jr. as Cody
Gene Evans as Mr. Horrell
Dub Taylor as Josh
Bruce Dern as Deputy Sheriff (uncredited)
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Post by Dramatic Look Gopher on Aug 4, 2018 1:18:19 GMT
Not a great film or masterpiece by any means, yet it is still quite good. Took me a few viewings to fully appreciate it. Certainly has the Peckinpah trademark style and feel to it.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 4, 2018 2:12:52 GMT
I saw it just to see Dylan act. Big fan. He is not a great actor but he played an interesting character and the music is very good. The film is not all that memorable, though.
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Post by teleadm on Aug 4, 2018 14:05:15 GMT
I used to have "Knocking on Heavens Door" on a single, maybe still have it somewhere.
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Post by petrolino on Aug 4, 2018 14:26:32 GMT
I used to have "Knocking on Heavens Door" on a single, maybe still have it somewhere. It's been covered many times. Guns N Roses recorded a popular rendition.
'Knockin' On Heaven's Door' - Avril Lavigne
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Post by koskiewicz on Aug 4, 2018 21:09:47 GMT
...so many Billy the Kid fliks. There was the "Left Handed Gun" with Paul Newman and then much later "Young Guns II" with William S Peterson as Pat Garret. And let's not forget "Little Big Man"...
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