Buck and the Preacher
Encyclopedia
Buck and the Preacher is a 1972 American Western film starring Sidney Poitier
as Buck and Harry Belafonte
as the Preacher. Buck is a trail guide leading groups of former slaves trying to homestead
in the West
, immediately after the American Civil War
. The Preacher is a swindling
minister of the "High and Low Order of the Holiness Persuasion Church". Together, they protect a wagon train
from bounty hunters.
This is the first film Sidney Poitier directed. Vincent Canby
of The New York Times
said Poitier "showed a talent for easy, unguarded, rambunctious humor missing from his more stately movies".
The notable blues
musicians Sonny Terry
and Brownie McGhee
performed in the film's soundtrack, composed by jazz great Benny Carter
.
Buck (Sydney Poitier) enter the scene and dismounts his horse about to walk up to his home. DeShay makes Buck’s wife, Ruth (Ruby Dee), wave to him as if everything is all right. Buck begins to approach the house and is then engulfed in a firefight between DeShay’s posse. He gets on his horse and flees the seen after being chased by the posse and stops at an apparently empty campsite that has a campfire, food and a horse. A naked man, the Preacher (Harry Belafonte), is washing at the stream below and approaches the campsite to dress, but Buck stops him and steals his horse and breakfast at gunpoint. The Preacher dresses and takes Buck’s horse to the nearest town where he grabs a drink and finds out the location of the nearby camp from an African American boy working at the general store.
The Preacher is approached by DeShay and is told that any information leading to finding Buck or bringing Buck in dead or alive will be a five hundred dollar reward. The Preacher is excited about this because he has a good feeling Buck is out by the African American wagon camp the little boy spoke of earlier.
Buck returns to the camp to be told by the men that the elder wise man thinks they should continue West and not turn back. The elder is shown using animal teeth and throwing them on a towel, which the audience assumes to be a prediction of the future. Buck agrees to further helping the group when the Preacher appears and punches Buck in the face. Buck agrees to feeding the Preacher and giving his horse back, after which the Preacher must depart and leave their camp. Buck does this because he is fearful of the Preacher’s motives for wanting to stay after he is caught looking at the women folk and wondering where the money was kept.
The Preacher leaves the group and stalks Buck when he leaves to make a deal with the Native Americans. The Native Americans pursue the Preacher and Buck bargains with them for protection of the wagon group. The Native Americans are portrayed as shrewd bargainers who constantly haggle for a better deal with Buck. After reaching an agreement, the Preacher has a newfound respect for Buck because of his hard work effort and desire to help the traveling freed slaves. While the two protagonists were negotiating, DeShay and his men strike the camp again and do similar damage. The Preacher turns cheek at this point in the film and stops attempting to corner and kill Buck for the reward because of Buck’s compassion towards the wagon camp. The Preacher tells Buck where DeShay and his men are quartered at and suggests an ambush.
Buck agrees to the Preacher’s plan and they ambush DeShay and kill him and most of his men. The sheriff in the town pursues the two, but they make a dramatic escape on horseback. The two then decide with Buck’s wife to rob the bank at the town where they murdered DeShay’s men with hopes of gaining more money for the African Americans in the camp so they have a better chance of surviving the winter West. The three rob the mail office first unsuccessfully and then cross the street and rob the actual bank. The entire scene is a comedy because of the daunting risks being taken while still doing so in a relaxed manner. The sheriff returns during the robbery and chases the three money filled robbers out of town.
Buck, the Preacher and Ruth ride hard for the Indian Territory and reach it just in time. The Native Americans are formed in columns on horseback defending their boundary and do not permit entry to the sheriff and the posse. The sheriff continues the search and finds the wagon camp and decides not to attack it. One of the men in the posse suggests they attack the camp to bring out Buck, but the sheriff disagrees arguing that the African Americans did no harm. The man kills the sheriff and orders the posse to attack. Buck approaches the wagon camp and lures the posse away to the mountains. A gunfight ensues and the Preacher is wounded, but the posse is defeated. The Native Americans who said they would not help fight Buck’s battle did send several men to help and ended up being the force that turned the tide of the shootout in Buck’s favor.
The movie ends with Buck, the Preacher and his wife riding happily into the prairie.
Sidney Poitier
Sir Sidney Poitier, KBE is a Bahamian American actor, film director, author, and diplomat.In 1963, Poitier became the first black person to win an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field...
as Buck and Harry Belafonte
Harry Belafonte
Harold George "Harry" Belafonte, Jr. is an American singer, songwriter, actor and social activist. He was dubbed the "King of Calypso" for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with an international audience in the 1950s...
as the Preacher. Buck is a trail guide leading groups of former slaves trying to homestead
Homestead Act
A homestead act is one of three United States federal laws that gave an applicant freehold title to an area called a "homestead" – typically 160 acres of undeveloped federal land west of the Mississippi River....
in the West
Western United States
.The Western United States, commonly referred to as the American West or simply "the West," traditionally refers to the region comprising the westernmost states of the United States. Because the U.S. expanded westward after its founding, the meaning of the West has evolved over time...
, immediately after the American Civil War
American Civil War
The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...
. The Preacher is a swindling
Confidence trick
A confidence trick is an attempt to defraud a person or group by gaining their confidence. A confidence artist is an individual working alone or in concert with others who exploits characteristics of the human psyche such as dishonesty and honesty, vanity, compassion, credulity, irresponsibility,...
minister of the "High and Low Order of the Holiness Persuasion Church". Together, they protect a wagon train
Wagon train
A wagon train is a group of wagons traveling together. In the American West, individuals traveling across the plains in covered wagons banded together for mutual assistance, as is reflected in numerous films and television programs about the region, such as Audie Murphy's Tumbleweed and Ward Bond...
from bounty hunters.
This is the first film Sidney Poitier directed. Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby
Vincent Canby was an American film critic who became the chief film critic for The New York Times in 1969 and reviewed more than 1000 films during his tenure there.-Life and career:...
of The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
said Poitier "showed a talent for easy, unguarded, rambunctious humor missing from his more stately movies".
The notable blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
musicians Sonny Terry
Sonny Terry
Saunders Terrell, better known as Sonny Terry was a blind American Piedmont blues musician. He was widely known for his energetic blues harmonica style, which frequently included vocal whoops and hollers, and imitations of trains and fox hunts.-Career:Terry was born in Greensboro, Georgia...
and Brownie McGhee
Brownie McGhee
Walter Brown McGhee was a Piedmont blues singer and guitarist, best known for his collaborations with the harmonica player Sonny Terry.-Life and career:...
performed in the film's soundtrack, composed by jazz great Benny Carter
Benny Carter
Bennett Lester Carter was an American jazz alto saxophonist, clarinetist, trumpeter, composer, arranger, and bandleader. He was a major figure in jazz from the 1930s to the 1990s, and was recognized as such by other jazz musicians who called him King...
.
Plot
Buck and the Preacher opens with deep rhythm and blues soundtrack reminiscent of a modern John Wayne Western that was given deep soul and harmony from the 1970’s. The camera then switches scenes into a camp of African Americans who were just freed from slavery and are traveling West for a better life. Suddenly, a band of men on horseback terrorize the camp by burning wagons and tents and killing men, women and children. The leader of these white bandits, DeShay (Cameron Miller), is wearing an old cavalry jacket hinting at his military past.Buck (Sydney Poitier) enter the scene and dismounts his horse about to walk up to his home. DeShay makes Buck’s wife, Ruth (Ruby Dee), wave to him as if everything is all right. Buck begins to approach the house and is then engulfed in a firefight between DeShay’s posse. He gets on his horse and flees the seen after being chased by the posse and stops at an apparently empty campsite that has a campfire, food and a horse. A naked man, the Preacher (Harry Belafonte), is washing at the stream below and approaches the campsite to dress, but Buck stops him and steals his horse and breakfast at gunpoint. The Preacher dresses and takes Buck’s horse to the nearest town where he grabs a drink and finds out the location of the nearby camp from an African American boy working at the general store.
The Preacher is approached by DeShay and is told that any information leading to finding Buck or bringing Buck in dead or alive will be a five hundred dollar reward. The Preacher is excited about this because he has a good feeling Buck is out by the African American wagon camp the little boy spoke of earlier.
Buck returns to the camp to be told by the men that the elder wise man thinks they should continue West and not turn back. The elder is shown using animal teeth and throwing them on a towel, which the audience assumes to be a prediction of the future. Buck agrees to further helping the group when the Preacher appears and punches Buck in the face. Buck agrees to feeding the Preacher and giving his horse back, after which the Preacher must depart and leave their camp. Buck does this because he is fearful of the Preacher’s motives for wanting to stay after he is caught looking at the women folk and wondering where the money was kept.
The Preacher leaves the group and stalks Buck when he leaves to make a deal with the Native Americans. The Native Americans pursue the Preacher and Buck bargains with them for protection of the wagon group. The Native Americans are portrayed as shrewd bargainers who constantly haggle for a better deal with Buck. After reaching an agreement, the Preacher has a newfound respect for Buck because of his hard work effort and desire to help the traveling freed slaves. While the two protagonists were negotiating, DeShay and his men strike the camp again and do similar damage. The Preacher turns cheek at this point in the film and stops attempting to corner and kill Buck for the reward because of Buck’s compassion towards the wagon camp. The Preacher tells Buck where DeShay and his men are quartered at and suggests an ambush.
Buck agrees to the Preacher’s plan and they ambush DeShay and kill him and most of his men. The sheriff in the town pursues the two, but they make a dramatic escape on horseback. The two then decide with Buck’s wife to rob the bank at the town where they murdered DeShay’s men with hopes of gaining more money for the African Americans in the camp so they have a better chance of surviving the winter West. The three rob the mail office first unsuccessfully and then cross the street and rob the actual bank. The entire scene is a comedy because of the daunting risks being taken while still doing so in a relaxed manner. The sheriff returns during the robbery and chases the three money filled robbers out of town.
Buck, the Preacher and Ruth ride hard for the Indian Territory and reach it just in time. The Native Americans are formed in columns on horseback defending their boundary and do not permit entry to the sheriff and the posse. The sheriff continues the search and finds the wagon camp and decides not to attack it. One of the men in the posse suggests they attack the camp to bring out Buck, but the sheriff disagrees arguing that the African Americans did no harm. The man kills the sheriff and orders the posse to attack. Buck approaches the wagon camp and lures the posse away to the mountains. A gunfight ensues and the Preacher is wounded, but the posse is defeated. The Native Americans who said they would not help fight Buck’s battle did send several men to help and ended up being the force that turned the tide of the shootout in Buck’s favor.
The movie ends with Buck, the Preacher and his wife riding happily into the prairie.
Production
Buck and the Preacher was one the first films directed by an African American and to be based on a band of African Americans fighting against the White Majority. Sydney Poitier directed the film and it was produced by Belafonte Enterprises, Columbia Pictures Corporation and E & R Productions Corp. The film was recorded in Durango, Mexico as well as in Kenya. It was released in the United States in 1972.Reception
Buck and the Preacher was received warmly at first because of the first time a leading black character was able to receive violent revenge on a white hegemony. Black Westerns and Westerns in general strong declined after that 1970’s because audiences became indifferent to the excitement of the Wild West.Cast
- Sidney PoitierSidney PoitierSir Sidney Poitier, KBE is a Bahamian American actor, film director, author, and diplomat.In 1963, Poitier became the first black person to win an Academy Award for Best Actor for his role in Lilies of the Field...
as Buck - Harry BelafonteHarry BelafonteHarold George "Harry" Belafonte, Jr. is an American singer, songwriter, actor and social activist. He was dubbed the "King of Calypso" for popularizing the Caribbean musical style with an international audience in the 1950s...
as The Preacher - Ruby DeeRuby DeeRuby Dee is an American actress, poet, playwright, screenwriter, journalist, and activist, perhaps best known for co-starring in the film A Raisin in the Sun and the film American Gangster for which she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.-Early years:Dee was born Ruby...
as Ruth - Cameron MitchellCameron Mitchell (actor)Cameron Mitchell was an American film, television and Broadway actor with close ties to one of Canada's most successful families, and considered, by Lee Strasberg, to be one of the founding members of The Actor's Studio in New York City.-Early life and career:Born Cameron MacDowell Mitzel in...
as Deshay - Denny MillerDenny MillerDenny Scott Miller is an American actor, perhaps best known for his guest-starring roles on Gilligan's Island and as Tarzan in the late 1950s....
as Floyd - Nita TalbotNita TalbotNita Talbot is an American actress. Talbot was a leading lady who spent the first decade or so of her career playing "slick chicks" and sharp-witted career girls, but is perhaps best known for her role as Marya, the White Russian spy in the 1960s sitcom, Hogan's Heroes, as well as Sheila Fine in...
as Madame Esther - John Kelly as Sheriff
- Tony Brubaker as Headman
- Bobby Johnson as Man Who Is Shot
- James McEachinJames McEachinJames McEachin is an American actor, award-winning author, and known for his many character roles such as portraying police Lieutenant Brock in several Perry Mason television movies.-Military career:...
as Kingston - Clarence MuseClarence MuseClarence Muse was an actor, screenwriter, director, composer, and lawyer. He was inducted in the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame in 1973. Muse was the first African American to "star" in a film. He acted for more than sixty years, and appeared in more than 150 movies.-Life and career:Born in...
as Cudjo - Lynn Hamilton as Sarah
- Doug Johnson as Sam
- Errol JohnErrol JohnErrol John was a Trinidadian actor and playwright.Born in Trinidad, he was home schooled then began his career as an artist and journalist. Deciding to pursue a career in acting, he joined the Whitehall Theatre Group...
as Joshua