Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid
Encyclopedia
Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid is a 1973
Western
film directed by Sam Peckinpah
and starring James Coburn
and Kris Kristofferson
. Co-star Bob Dylan
composed multiple songs for the movie's score and the album Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
was released the same year.
The film was noted for behind-the-scenes battles between Peckinpah and production company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
. Soon after completion, the film was taken away from the director and substantially re-edited, resulting in a truncated version released to the theaters and largely disowned by cast and crew members. Peckinpah's director's cut was released on video in 1988, leading to a reevaluation, with many critics hailing it as a mistreated classic and one of the era's best films.
becomes sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico
, where Governor Lew Wallace expects him to go after an old friend, the wanted-dead-or-alive outlaw William Bonney, a.k.a. Billy the Kid
.
Garrett and a pack of deputies trap Billy in a hideout, killing young Charlie Bowdre and forcing Billy to surrender. A brutal and self-righteous deputy, Bob Ollinger, taunts and beats Billy as the hangman's gallows are built in town, but a second deputy standing guard, J.W. Bell considers himself to be, like Garrett, one of Billy's friends. With a gun hidden for him in an outhouse, Billy gets the drop on Bell and shoots him in the back. He uses Ollinger's shotgun, loaded with dimes, to dispose of him, saying: "Keep the change, Bob."
A distressed Garrett begins appointing other men to help him hunt for Billy. It leads to the death of Sheriff Baker in a gunfight with men from Billy's gang and a similar fate for Alamosa Bill, who is killed by Billy in a duel.
On the run, Billy is aided by Alias, a soft-spoken young man who is deadly with a knife. It seems nobody is going to be able to find and kill Billy, but one quiet night near Fort Sumner
, the relentless Garrett is able to do both.
and was originally intended to be directed by Monte Hellman
. The two had previously worked together on the acclaimed film Two-Lane Blacktop
(1971). Sam Peckinpah became involved through the actor James Coburn, who wanted to play the legendary sheriff Pat Garrett
.
Peckinpah believed this was his chance to make a definitive statement on the Western genre, and complete the revision he had begun with Ride the High Country
(1962) and The Wild Bunch
(1969). Working with Wurlitzer, he rewrote the script in order to create a more cyclical narrative, and added a prologue and epilogue depicting Garrett's own assassination at the hands of the men who hired him to kill Billy the Kid
. In the original script, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid never met onscreen until the film's conclusion, and Wurlitzer reportedly resented Peckinpah's reworking of the narrative. Wurlitzer and Peckinpah had a strained relationship, and Wurlitzer would later write a book highly unfavorable to Peckinpah.
After having initially considered Bo Hopkins
for the part of Billy, Peckinpah eventually cast country music
star Kris Kristofferson as the outlaw. Kristofferson was 36 when the film was made, playing 21-year-old Billy. Kristofferson's band would play small roles along with his then-wife Rita Coolidge
. Kristofferson also brought Bob Dylan into the film. Initially hired to write the title song, Dylan eventually wrote the score and played the small role of "Alias". Peckinpah had never heard of Dylan before, but was reportedly moved by hearing Dylan play the proposed title song and hired him immediately. Among the songs written by Dylan for the film was "Knockin' on Heaven's Door
," still regarded as one of rock music's
most enduring anthems.
Peckinpah deliberately cast his film's supporting roles with legendary Western character actors such as Chill Wills
, Katy Jurado
, Jack Elam
, Slim Pickens
, Barry Sullivan
, Dub Taylor
, R.G. Armstrong, Elisha Cook, Jr. and Paul Fix
. Jason Robards
, who had starred in Peckinpah's earlier films, the television production Noon Wine
(1966) andThe Ballad of Cable Hogue
(1970), had a cameo appearance as the governor. The large supporting cast also included Richard Jaeckel
, Charles Martin Smith
, Harry Dean Stanton
, Matt Clark
, L.Q. Jones, Emilio Fernández
, Aurora Clavel
, Luke Askew
, Jack Dodson
, Richard Bright
and John Beck
.
From the beginning, the film was plagued with production difficulties. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's
President James Aubrey, for economic reasons, refused to give Peckinpah the time or budget required, forcing the director to rely on local crew members in the Mexican state of Durango
. Multiple technical problems, including malfunctioning cameras, led to costly reshoots. Cast and crew members also came down with influenza
. Aubrey objected to several scenes he considered superfluous to the film's plot, and Peckinpah and his crew reportedly worked weekends and lunch hours in order to secretly complete the sequences. Aubrey began to send telegrams to the set complaining about the number of camera setups Peckinpah used and the time spent to shoot specific scenes. According to the producer Gordon Carroll, the movie's set was "a battleground."
Peckinpah was plagued by alcoholism
, which he would struggle with for the remainder of his life. This, combined with his clashes with Aubrey and the studio led to Peckinpah's growing reputation as a difficult, unreliable filmmaker. Reportedly, when Dylan first arrived on the set, he and Kristofferson sat to watch dailies
with Peckinpah. The director was so unhappy with the footage, he angrily stood on a folding chair and urinated on the screen. Similar stories began to reach Hollywood, prompting Peckinpah to purchase a full-page ad in the Hollywood Reporter mocking the rumors and the brass at MGM. Hollywood producers were not amused. The film finished 21 days behind schedule and $1.6 million over budget.
before and Peckinpah's usual composer, Jerry Fielding
, was unhappy with being relegated to a minor role in the scoring process.
Peckinpah did complete a director's cut
of the film, which was shown to critics on at least one occasion. Martin Scorsese
, who had just made Mean Streets
(1973), was at the screening, and praised the film as Peckinpah's greatest since The Wild Bunch.
This version, however, would not see the light of day for over ten years. Peckinpah was eventually forced out of the production and Aubrey had the film severely cut from 124 to 106 minutes, resulting in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid being released in a truncated version largely disowned by cast and crew members. This version was a box-office failure and was panned by most major critics, who had harbored high expectations for the director's first Western since The Wild Bunch. Roger Ebert
rated the film two stars out of four, beginning his review with "Sam Peckinpah attempted to have his name removed from Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. I sympathized with him. If this wasn't entirely his work, he shouldn't have had to take the blame." Ebert went on to note, "Another alarming factor is that no less than six editors are credited. Not assistant editors, but editors; this sets a modern-day record, I think. My guess is that there was an argument over the movie's final form, and that Peckinpah and MGM platooned editors at each other during the battle. You'd think the executives would have figured out that their only chance was to release the movie as Peckinpah made it; audiences were more interested in the new Peckinpah film than in still another rehash of Billy the Kid."
The film remained something of an enigma for the next decade, with rumors flying about other versions and the nature of what had been left out of the release version. Peckinpah himself was in possession of his own director's cut, which he often showed to friends as his own definitive vision of the film.
. This version led to a rediscovery and reevaluation of the film, with many critics praising it as a lost masterpiece and proof of Peckinpah's vision as a filmmaker at this time. The film's reputation has grown substantially since this version was released, and the film has come to be regarded as something of a modern classic, equal in many ways to Peckinpah's earlier films. Kristofferson noted in an interview, though, that Peckinpah had felt Dylan had been pushed on him by the studio and thus left "Knocking on Heaven's Door" out of the director's cut. In Kristofferson's opinion, "Heaven's Door" "was the strongest use of music that I had ever seen in a film. Unfortunately Sam ... had a blind spot there."
In 2005, a DVD of the film distributed by Warner Brothers was released containing the director's cut as well as a new special edition which combined elements of the theatrical version, the director's cut and several new scenes left out of both versions. This third version of the film runs slightly shorter than the director's cut.
1973 in film
The year 1973 in film involved some significant events.-Events:*The Marx Brothers' Zeppo Marx divorces his second wife, Barbara Blakely. Blakely would later marry actor/singer Frank Sinatra....
Western
Western (genre)
The Western is a genre of various visual arts, such as film, television, radio, literature, painting and others. Westerns are devoted to telling stories set primarily in the latter half of the 19th century in the American Old West, hence the name. Some Westerns are set as early as the Battle of...
film directed by Sam Peckinpah
Sam Peckinpah
David Samuel "Sam" Peckinpah was an American filmmaker and screenwriter who achieved prominence following the release of the Western epic The Wild Bunch...
and starring James Coburn
James Coburn
James Harrison Coburn III was an American film and television actor. Coburn appeared in nearly 70 films and made over 100 television appearances during his 45-year career, and played a wide range of roles and won an Academy Award for his supporting role as Glen Whitehouse in Affliction.A capable,...
and Kris Kristofferson
Kris Kristofferson
Kristoffer "Kris" Kristofferson is an American musician, actor, and writer. He is known for hits such as "Me and Bobby McGee", "For the Good Times", "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", and "Help Me Make It Through the Night"...
. Co-star Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan
Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
composed multiple songs for the movie's score and the album Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid
Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (album)
Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid is a soundtrack album released by Bob Dylan in 1973 for the Sam Peckinpah film of the same name. Dylan himself appeared in the film as the character "Alias"...
was released the same year.
The film was noted for behind-the-scenes battles between Peckinpah and production company Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
. Soon after completion, the film was taken away from the director and substantially re-edited, resulting in a truncated version released to the theaters and largely disowned by cast and crew members. Peckinpah's director's cut was released on video in 1988, leading to a reevaluation, with many critics hailing it as a mistreated classic and one of the era's best films.
Plot
In late 1880, Pat GarrettPat Garrett
Patrick Floyd "Pat" Garrett was an American Old West lawman, bartender, and customs agent who was best known for killing Billy the Kid...
becomes sheriff of Lincoln County, New Mexico
New Mexico
New Mexico is a state located in the southwest and western regions of the United States. New Mexico is also usually considered one of the Mountain States. With a population density of 16 per square mile, New Mexico is the sixth-most sparsely inhabited U.S...
, where Governor Lew Wallace expects him to go after an old friend, the wanted-dead-or-alive outlaw William Bonney, a.k.a. Billy the Kid
Billy the Kid
William H. Bonney William H. Bonney William H. Bonney (born William Henry McCarty, Jr. est. November 23, 1859 – c. July 14, 1881, better known as Billy the Kid but also known as Henry Antrim, was a 19th-century American gunman who participated in the Lincoln County War and became a frontier...
.
Garrett and a pack of deputies trap Billy in a hideout, killing young Charlie Bowdre and forcing Billy to surrender. A brutal and self-righteous deputy, Bob Ollinger, taunts and beats Billy as the hangman's gallows are built in town, but a second deputy standing guard, J.W. Bell considers himself to be, like Garrett, one of Billy's friends. With a gun hidden for him in an outhouse, Billy gets the drop on Bell and shoots him in the back. He uses Ollinger's shotgun, loaded with dimes, to dispose of him, saying: "Keep the change, Bob."
A distressed Garrett begins appointing other men to help him hunt for Billy. It leads to the death of Sheriff Baker in a gunfight with men from Billy's gang and a similar fate for Alamosa Bill, who is killed by Billy in a duel.
On the run, Billy is aided by Alias, a soft-spoken young man who is deadly with a knife. It seems nobody is going to be able to find and kill Billy, but one quiet night near Fort Sumner
Fort Sumner
Fort Sumner was a military fort in De Baca County in southeastern New Mexico charged with the internment of Navajo and Mescalero Apache populations from 1863-1868 at nearby Bosque Redondo.-History:...
, the relentless Garrett is able to do both.
Production
The screenplay of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid was written by Rudy WurlitzerRudy Wurlitzer
Rudolph "Rudy" Wurlitzer is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is known for his experimental style and has a large cult following for both his novels and screenplays. His fiction includes Nog, Flats, Quake, Slow Fade, and Drop Edge of Yonder...
and was originally intended to be directed by Monte Hellman
Monte Hellman
Monte Hellman is an American film director, producer, and film editor.Hellman is among a group of directing talent mentored by Roger Corman, who produced several of the director's early films...
. The two had previously worked together on the acclaimed film Two-Lane Blacktop
Two-Lane Blacktop
Two-Lane Blacktop is a 1971 road movie directed by Monte Hellman, starring singer-songwriter James Taylor, Beach Boys drummer Dennis Wilson, Warren Oates, and Laurie Bird. Esquire magazine declared the film its movie of the year for 1971, and even published the entire screenplay in its April, 1971...
(1971). Sam Peckinpah became involved through the actor James Coburn, who wanted to play the legendary sheriff Pat Garrett
Pat Garrett
Patrick Floyd "Pat" Garrett was an American Old West lawman, bartender, and customs agent who was best known for killing Billy the Kid...
.
Peckinpah believed this was his chance to make a definitive statement on the Western genre, and complete the revision he had begun with Ride the High Country
Ride the High Country
Ride the High Country is a noted 1962 American Western film. It stars Joel McCrea, Randolph Scott, Ron Starr, Edgar Buchanan and Mariette Hartley. It was written by N.B...
(1962) and The Wild Bunch
The Wild Bunch
The Wild Bunch is a 1969 American Western film directed by Sam Peckinpah about an aging outlaw gang on the Texas-Mexico border, trying to exist in the changing "modern" world of 1913...
(1969). Working with Wurlitzer, he rewrote the script in order to create a more cyclical narrative, and added a prologue and epilogue depicting Garrett's own assassination at the hands of the men who hired him to kill Billy the Kid
Billy the Kid
William H. Bonney William H. Bonney William H. Bonney (born William Henry McCarty, Jr. est. November 23, 1859 – c. July 14, 1881, better known as Billy the Kid but also known as Henry Antrim, was a 19th-century American gunman who participated in the Lincoln County War and became a frontier...
. In the original script, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid never met onscreen until the film's conclusion, and Wurlitzer reportedly resented Peckinpah's reworking of the narrative. Wurlitzer and Peckinpah had a strained relationship, and Wurlitzer would later write a book highly unfavorable to Peckinpah.
After having initially considered Bo Hopkins
Bo Hopkins
Bo Hopkins is an American actor.-Career:Hopkins has appeared in more than one hundred film and television roles in a career of more than forty years, including The Bridge at Remagen, The Wild Bunch, The Getaway, American Graffiti, White Lightning, Radioland Murders, The Killer Elite, Midnight...
for the part of Billy, Peckinpah eventually cast country music
Country music
Country music is a popular American musical style that began in the rural Southern United States in the 1920s. It takes its roots from Western cowboy and folk music...
star Kris Kristofferson as the outlaw. Kristofferson was 36 when the film was made, playing 21-year-old Billy. Kristofferson's band would play small roles along with his then-wife Rita Coolidge
Rita Coolidge
Rita Coolidge is a multiple Grammy Award-winning American vocalist. During the 1970s and 1980s, she charted hits on Billboard's Pop, Country, Adult Contemporary and Jazz charts.-Career:...
. Kristofferson also brought Bob Dylan into the film. Initially hired to write the title song, Dylan eventually wrote the score and played the small role of "Alias". Peckinpah had never heard of Dylan before, but was reportedly moved by hearing Dylan play the proposed title song and hired him immediately. Among the songs written by Dylan for the film was "Knockin' on Heaven's Door
Knockin' on Heaven's Door
"Knockin' on Heaven's Door" is a song written and performed by Bob Dylan for the soundtrack of the 1973 film Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid. It reached #12 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.-Story line and song structure:...
," still regarded as one of rock music's
Rock music
Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...
most enduring anthems.
Peckinpah deliberately cast his film's supporting roles with legendary Western character actors such as Chill Wills
Chill Wills
Chill Theodore Wills was an American film actor, and a singer in the Avalon Boys Quartet.-Biography:Wills was born in Seagoville, Texas in 1902. He was a performer from early childhood, forming and leading the Avalon Boys singing group in the 1930s...
, Katy Jurado
Katy Jurado
Katy Jurado , born María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García in Mexico, D.F., was a Mexican actress who had a successful film career both in Mexico and in Hollywood....
, Jack Elam
Jack Elam
William Scott "Jack" Elam was an American film actor best known for his numerous roles as villains in Western films and, later in his career, comedies .-Early life:...
, Slim Pickens
Slim Pickens
Louis Burton Lindley, Jr. , better known by the stage name Slim Pickens, was an American rodeo performer and film and television actor who epitomized the profane, tough, sardonic cowboy, but who is best remembered for his comic roles, notably in Dr...
, Barry Sullivan
Barry Sullivan (actor)
Barry Sullivan was an American movie actor who appeared in over 100 movies from the 1930s to the 1980s.Born in New York City, Sullivan fell into acting when in college playing semi-pro football...
, Dub Taylor
Dub Taylor
Walter Clarence Taylor, Jr. , better known as Dub Taylor, was an American actor who worked extensively in Westerns, but also in comedy from the 1940s into the 1990s.-Early life:...
, R.G. Armstrong, Elisha Cook, Jr. and Paul Fix
Paul Fix
Paul Fix was an American film and television character actor, best known for his work in westerns. Fix appeared in more than a hundred movies and dozens of television shows over a 56-year career spanning from 1925 to 1981...
. Jason Robards
Jason Robards
Jason Nelson Robards, Jr. was an American actor on stage, and in film and television, and a winner of the Tony Award , two Academy Awards and the Emmy Award...
, who had starred in Peckinpah's earlier films, the television production Noon Wine
Noon Wine
Noon Wine is a 1937 short novel written by American author Katherine Anne Porter. It was published in 1939 as part of Pale Horse, Pale Rider , a collection of three short novels by the author, including the title story and "Old Mortality." A dark tragedy about a farmer's futile act of homicide that...
(1966) andThe Ballad of Cable Hogue
The Ballad of Cable Hogue
The Ballad of Cable Hogue is a 1970 Western film directed by Sam Peckinpah and starring Jason Robards, Stella Stevens and David Warner.Set in the desert of Arizona during the transitional period when the frontier was closing, the movie follows three years in the life of Cable Hogue, a failed...
(1970), had a cameo appearance as the governor. The large supporting cast also included Richard Jaeckel
Richard Jaeckel
Richard Hanley Jaeckel was an American actor of film and television.-Life and career:Jaeckel was born in Long Beach, New York. A short, but tough guy, he played a variety of characters during his fifty years in movies & television and became one of Hollywood's best known character actors...
, Charles Martin Smith
Charles Martin Smith
Charles Martin Smith is an American film actor, writer, and director.-Early life:Smith was born in Van Nuys, California. His father, Frank Smith, was a film cartoonist and animator, while his uncle Paul J. Smith was an animator as well as a director for the Walter Lantz Studios...
, Harry Dean Stanton
Harry Dean Stanton
Harry Dean Stanton is an American actor, musician, and singer. Stanton's career has spanned over fifty years, which has seen him star in such films as Paris, Texas, Kelly's Heroes, Dillinger, Alien, Repo Man, The Last Temptation of Christ, Wild at Heart, The Green Mile and The Pledge...
, Matt Clark
Matt Clark (actor)
Matt Clark is an American actor and director with credits in both film and television. Clark has played diverse character roles in Westerns, comedies, and dramas....
, L.Q. Jones, Emilio Fernández
Emilio Fernández
Emilio "El Indio" Fernández was an actor, screenwriter and director of the cinema of Mexico. He is best known for his work as director of the film Maria Candelaria which won the Grand Prix at the 1946 Cannes Film Festival.-Early life:Fernández was born in Mineral del Hondo, Coahuila...
, Aurora Clavel
Aurora Clavel
Aurora Clavel is a Mexican film and television actress who is noted for her roles in the movies Tarahumara and Once upon a Scroundel , as well as in numerous telenovelas...
, Luke Askew
Luke Askew
Luke Askew is an American actor best known for his role in the 1969 film Easy Rider.Askew was born in Macon, Georgia. He made his film debut in Otto Preminger's Hurry Sundown , but was first noticed as an actor for his role in the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke...
, Jack Dodson
Jack Dodson
Jack Dodson Born John S. Dodson in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was an American television actor best remembered for the milquetoast character Howard Sprague in The Andy Griffith Show and its spin-off Mayberry R.F.D. From 1959 until his death in 1994, Dodson was married to television art director...
, Richard Bright
Richard Bright (actor)
Richard James Bright was an American actor best known for his role as Al Neri in the The Godfather films.-Early life & work:...
and John Beck
John Beck (actor)
John Beck is an American actor. He grew up in Joliet, Illinois. Renowned as a gritty actor with plenty of presence on set, he is ultimately best-known worldwide for playing the role of Mark Graison in Dallas during the mid-1980s, but is also well-known for several other roles in which he...
.
From the beginning, the film was plagued with production difficulties. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. is an American media company, involved primarily in the production and distribution of films and television programs. MGM was founded in 1924 when the entertainment entrepreneur Marcus Loew gained control of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures Corporation and Louis B. Mayer...
President James Aubrey, for economic reasons, refused to give Peckinpah the time or budget required, forcing the director to rely on local crew members in the Mexican state of Durango
Durango
Durango officially Estado Libre y Soberano de Durango is one of the 31 states which, with the Federal District, comprise the 32 Federal Entities of Mexico. The state is located in Northwest Mexico. With a population of 1,632,934, it has Mexico's second-lowest population density, after Baja...
. Multiple technical problems, including malfunctioning cameras, led to costly reshoots. Cast and crew members also came down with influenza
Influenza
Influenza, commonly referred to as the flu, is an infectious disease caused by RNA viruses of the family Orthomyxoviridae , that affects birds and mammals...
. Aubrey objected to several scenes he considered superfluous to the film's plot, and Peckinpah and his crew reportedly worked weekends and lunch hours in order to secretly complete the sequences. Aubrey began to send telegrams to the set complaining about the number of camera setups Peckinpah used and the time spent to shoot specific scenes. According to the producer Gordon Carroll, the movie's set was "a battleground."
Peckinpah was plagued by alcoholism
Alcoholism
Alcoholism is a broad term for problems with alcohol, and is generally used to mean compulsive and uncontrolled consumption of alcoholic beverages, usually to the detriment of the drinker's health, personal relationships, and social standing...
, which he would struggle with for the remainder of his life. This, combined with his clashes with Aubrey and the studio led to Peckinpah's growing reputation as a difficult, unreliable filmmaker. Reportedly, when Dylan first arrived on the set, he and Kristofferson sat to watch dailies
Dailies
Dailies, in filmmaking, are the raw, unedited footage shot during the making of a motion picture. They are so called because usually at the end of each day, that day's footage is developed, synched to sound, and printed on film in a batch for viewing the next day by the director and some members...
with Peckinpah. The director was so unhappy with the footage, he angrily stood on a folding chair and urinated on the screen. Similar stories began to reach Hollywood, prompting Peckinpah to purchase a full-page ad in the Hollywood Reporter mocking the rumors and the brass at MGM. Hollywood producers were not amused. The film finished 21 days behind schedule and $1.6 million over budget.
Controversy over post-production
By the time Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid was in the editing room, Peckinpah's relationship with the studio and his own producers had reached the breaking point. Aubrey, enraged by the cost and production overruns, demanded the film for an unrealistic release date. Peckinpah and his editors were forced into a desperate situation in order to finish on time. Furthermore, Aubrey still objected to several sequences in the film which he wanted removed, forcing Peckinpah to engage in protracted negotiations over the film's content. Adding to the problems, Bob Dylan had never done a feature film scoreFilm score
A film score is original music written specifically to accompany a film, forming part of the film's soundtrack, which also usually includes dialogue and sound effects...
before and Peckinpah's usual composer, Jerry Fielding
Jerry Fielding
Jerry Fielding was an American radio, record, film and television composer, conductor, and musical director.-Childhood and education:...
, was unhappy with being relegated to a minor role in the scoring process.
Peckinpah did complete a director's cut
Director's cut
A director's cut is a specially edited version of a film, and less often TV series, music video, commercials, comic book or video games, that is supposed to represent the director's own approved edit...
of the film, which was shown to critics on at least one occasion. Martin Scorsese
Martin Scorsese
Martin Charles Scorsese is an American film director, screenwriter, producer, actor, and film historian. In 1990 he founded The Film Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to film preservation, and in 2007 he founded the World Cinema Foundation...
, who had just made Mean Streets
Mean Streets
Mean Streets is a 1973 drama film directed by Martin Scorsese and written by Scorsese and Mardik Martin. The film stars Harvey Keitel and Robert De Niro. It was released by Warner Bros. on October 2, 1973...
(1973), was at the screening, and praised the film as Peckinpah's greatest since The Wild Bunch.
This version, however, would not see the light of day for over ten years. Peckinpah was eventually forced out of the production and Aubrey had the film severely cut from 124 to 106 minutes, resulting in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid being released in a truncated version largely disowned by cast and crew members. This version was a box-office failure and was panned by most major critics, who had harbored high expectations for the director's first Western since The Wild Bunch. Roger Ebert
Roger Ebert
Roger Joseph Ebert is an American film critic and screenwriter. He is the first film critic to win a Pulitzer Prize for Criticism.Ebert is known for his film review column and for the television programs Sneak Previews, At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert, and Siskel and Ebert and The...
rated the film two stars out of four, beginning his review with "Sam Peckinpah attempted to have his name removed from Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid. I sympathized with him. If this wasn't entirely his work, he shouldn't have had to take the blame." Ebert went on to note, "Another alarming factor is that no less than six editors are credited. Not assistant editors, but editors; this sets a modern-day record, I think. My guess is that there was an argument over the movie's final form, and that Peckinpah and MGM platooned editors at each other during the battle. You'd think the executives would have figured out that their only chance was to release the movie as Peckinpah made it; audiences were more interested in the new Peckinpah film than in still another rehash of Billy the Kid."
The film remained something of an enigma for the next decade, with rumors flying about other versions and the nature of what had been left out of the release version. Peckinpah himself was in possession of his own director's cut, which he often showed to friends as his own definitive vision of the film.
Rediscovery
In 1988, Turner Home Entertainment, with distribution by MGM, released Peckinpah's director's cut of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid on video and LaserdiscLaserdisc
LaserDisc was a home video format and the first commercial optical disc storage medium. Initially licensed, sold, and marketed as MCA DiscoVision in North America in 1978, the technology was previously referred to interally as Optical Videodisc System, Reflective Optical Videodisc, Laser Optical...
. This version led to a rediscovery and reevaluation of the film, with many critics praising it as a lost masterpiece and proof of Peckinpah's vision as a filmmaker at this time. The film's reputation has grown substantially since this version was released, and the film has come to be regarded as something of a modern classic, equal in many ways to Peckinpah's earlier films. Kristofferson noted in an interview, though, that Peckinpah had felt Dylan had been pushed on him by the studio and thus left "Knocking on Heaven's Door" out of the director's cut. In Kristofferson's opinion, "Heaven's Door" "was the strongest use of music that I had ever seen in a film. Unfortunately Sam ... had a blind spot there."
In 2005, a DVD of the film distributed by Warner Brothers was released containing the director's cut as well as a new special edition which combined elements of the theatrical version, the director's cut and several new scenes left out of both versions. This third version of the film runs slightly shorter than the director's cut.
Cast
- Kris KristoffersonKris KristoffersonKristoffer "Kris" Kristofferson is an American musician, actor, and writer. He is known for hits such as "Me and Bobby McGee", "For the Good Times", "Sunday Mornin' Comin' Down", and "Help Me Make It Through the Night"...
as William H. Bonney (Billy the KidBilly the KidWilliam H. Bonney William H. Bonney William H. Bonney (born William Henry McCarty, Jr. est. November 23, 1859 – c. July 14, 1881, better known as Billy the Kid but also known as Henry Antrim, was a 19th-century American gunman who participated in the Lincoln County War and became a frontier...
) - James CoburnJames CoburnJames Harrison Coburn III was an American film and television actor. Coburn appeared in nearly 70 films and made over 100 television appearances during his 45-year career, and played a wide range of roles and won an Academy Award for his supporting role as Glen Whitehouse in Affliction.A capable,...
as Sheriff Pat GarrettPat GarrettPatrick Floyd "Pat" Garrett was an American Old West lawman, bartender, and customs agent who was best known for killing Billy the Kid... - Richard JaeckelRichard JaeckelRichard Hanley Jaeckel was an American actor of film and television.-Life and career:Jaeckel was born in Long Beach, New York. A short, but tough guy, he played a variety of characters during his fifty years in movies & television and became one of Hollywood's best known character actors...
as Sheriff Kip McKinney - Katy JuradoKaty JuradoKaty Jurado , born María Cristina Estela Marcela Jurado García in Mexico, D.F., was a Mexican actress who had a successful film career both in Mexico and in Hollywood....
as Mrs. Baker - Chill WillsChill WillsChill Theodore Wills was an American film actor, and a singer in the Avalon Boys Quartet.-Biography:Wills was born in Seagoville, Texas in 1902. He was a performer from early childhood, forming and leading the Avalon Boys singing group in the 1930s...
as Lemuel - Barry SullivanBarry Sullivan (actor)Barry Sullivan was an American movie actor who appeared in over 100 movies from the 1930s to the 1980s.Born in New York City, Sullivan fell into acting when in college playing semi-pro football...
as Chisum - Jason RobardsJason RobardsJason Nelson Robards, Jr. was an American actor on stage, and in film and television, and a winner of the Tony Award , two Academy Awards and the Emmy Award...
as Gov. Lew WallaceLew WallaceLewis "Lew" Wallace was an American lawyer, Union general in the American Civil War, territorial governor and statesman, politician and author... - Bob DylanBob DylanBob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...
as Alias - R.G. Armstrong as Deputy Sheriff Bob Ollinger
- Luke AskewLuke AskewLuke Askew is an American actor best known for his role in the 1969 film Easy Rider.Askew was born in Macon, Georgia. He made his film debut in Otto Preminger's Hurry Sundown , but was first noticed as an actor for his role in the 1967 film Cool Hand Luke...
as Eno - John BeckJohn Beck (actor)John Beck is an American actor. He grew up in Joliet, Illinois. Renowned as a gritty actor with plenty of presence on set, he is ultimately best-known worldwide for playing the role of Mark Graison in Dallas during the mid-1980s, but is also well-known for several other roles in which he...
as John W. Poe - Richard BrightRichard Bright (actor)Richard James Bright was an American actor best known for his role as Al Neri in the The Godfather films.-Early life & work:...
as Holly - Matt ClarkMatt Clark (actor)Matt Clark is an American actor and director with credits in both film and television. Clark has played diverse character roles in Westerns, comedies, and dramas....
as Deputy Sheriff J.W. Bell - Rita CoolidgeRita CoolidgeRita Coolidge is a multiple Grammy Award-winning American vocalist. During the 1970s and 1980s, she charted hits on Billboard's Pop, Country, Adult Contemporary and Jazz charts.-Career:...
as Maria - Jack DodsonJack DodsonJack Dodson Born John S. Dodson in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, was an American television actor best remembered for the milquetoast character Howard Sprague in The Andy Griffith Show and its spin-off Mayberry R.F.D. From 1959 until his death in 1994, Dodson was married to television art director...
as Lewellen Howland - Jack ElamJack ElamWilliam Scott "Jack" Elam was an American film actor best known for his numerous roles as villains in Western films and, later in his career, comedies .-Early life:...
as Alamosa Bill Kermit - Emilio FernándezEmilio FernándezEmilio "El Indio" Fernández was an actor, screenwriter and director of the cinema of Mexico. He is best known for his work as director of the film Maria Candelaria which won the Grand Prix at the 1946 Cannes Film Festival.-Early life:Fernández was born in Mineral del Hondo, Coahuila...
as Paco - Aurora ClavelAurora ClavelAurora Clavel is a Mexican film and television actress who is noted for her roles in the movies Tarahumara and Once upon a Scroundel , as well as in numerous telenovelas...
as Ida Garrett - Paul FixPaul FixPaul Fix was an American film and television character actor, best known for his work in westerns. Fix appeared in more than a hundred movies and dozens of television shows over a 56-year career spanning from 1925 to 1981...
as Pete Maxwell - L.Q. Jones as Black Harris
- Slim PickensSlim PickensLouis Burton Lindley, Jr. , better known by the stage name Slim Pickens, was an American rodeo performer and film and television actor who epitomized the profane, tough, sardonic cowboy, but who is best remembered for his comic roles, notably in Dr...
as Sheriff Colin Baker - Charlie Martin SmithCharles Martin SmithCharles Martin Smith is an American film actor, writer, and director.-Early life:Smith was born in Van Nuys, California. His father, Frank Smith, was a film cartoonist and animator, while his uncle Paul J. Smith was an animator as well as a director for the Walter Lantz Studios...
as Charlie BowdreCharlie BowdreCharles Bowdre was an American cowboy and outlaw. He was an associate and member of Billy the Kid's gang.-Early life:... - Harry Dean StantonHarry Dean StantonHarry Dean Stanton is an American actor, musician, and singer. Stanton's career has spanned over fifty years, which has seen him star in such films as Paris, Texas, Kelly's Heroes, Dillinger, Alien, Repo Man, The Last Temptation of Christ, Wild at Heart, The Green Mile and The Pledge...
as Luke - Rutanya AldaRutanya Alda-Life:Rutanya Alda was born as Rutanya Alda Skrastiņa in Riga, Latvia, the daughter of Vera , a businesswoman, and Jānis Skrastiņš, a poet...
as Ruthie Lee - Rudy WurlitzerRudy WurlitzerRudolph "Rudy" Wurlitzer is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is known for his experimental style and has a large cult following for both his novels and screenplays. His fiction includes Nog, Flats, Quake, Slow Fade, and Drop Edge of Yonder...
as Tom O'FolliardTom O'FolliardTom O'Folliard was the best friend of the famous outlaw William Bonney . Both were members of the Regulators, a gang of cattle rustlers operating in the New Mexico Territory.... - Gene EvansGene EvansGene Evans was an American actor.He was born in Holbrook, Arizona, but reared in Colton, California. His acting career began while he was serving in World War II. He performed with a theatrical troupe of GIs in Europe. Evans made his film debut in 1947 and appeared in dozens of movies and...
as Mr. Horrell