Top 250 Challenge: 224

The Wild Bunch (1969)
Number 188 on IMDb's Top 250

A few months before World War I, an aging band of outlaws led by Pike Bishop rob a Texas bank intent on using the money to retire. When the robbery goes wrong, the gang is forced to flee to Mexico with Bishop's reformed ex-partner, Deke Thornton, in hot pursuit. With nothing to show for the failed robbery, Bishop's gang agrees to steal a shipment of guns for General "Mapache" Juerta, to restore their fortunes. With Thornton closing in, and their association with the evil Juerta trying their conscience, Bishop and co. prepare for their lawless past to catch up with them. Hilarity ensues.

Trivia: Following the film's production, it was severely edited by the studio and producer Phil Feldman (QV) (in Sam Peckinpah's absence), cutting its length by about 20 minutes - remarkably, none of the excised film was violent. Due to its violence, the film was originally threatened with an "X" rating by the newly created MPAA (Motion Picture Association of America), but an "R" rating was its final decision. The film was restored to its original "director's cut" length of 143 minutes and threatened with an NC-17 rating when submitted to the MPAA ratings board in 1993 prior to a re-release in 1994, holding up the film's re-release for many months. The reinstated scenes (including two important flashbacks from Pike's past, and a battle scene between Pancho Villa's rebels and Gen. Mapache at the telegraph station) depicted the underlying character and motivations of the leader of the Bunch. With numerous, elaborate montage sequences with staccato shifts, the film set a record for more edits (3,643 shot-to-shot edits at one count) than any other Technicolor film up to its time.

According to Sam Peckinpah biographer Marshall Fine, there was concern on the set over the bridge explosion. Bud Hulburd, the head of the special-effects crew, was not particularly experienced, having ascended the ranks after Peckinpah fired his predecessors. Stuntman Joe Canutt appealed to both Hulburd and Peckinpah to no avail, so finally, out of concern for the other stuntmen, Canutt enlisted the help of screenwriter Gordon T. Dawson, who was instructed to stand behind Hulburd with a club. If the stuntmen began to fall before the final charge was set off, something that would've resulted in death, Dawson was to club Hulburd unconscious before he detonated the last charge. Luckily, the stunt went off without a hitch.

Supposedly, more blank rounds were discharged during the production than live rounds were fired during the Mexican Revolution of 1914 around which the film is loosely based. In total 90,000 rounds were fired, all blanks. The climatic gun battle sequence took 12 days to film. The crew nicknamed it the "Battle of Bloody Porch." The famous "Last Walk" was improvised by Sam Peckinpah during the shoot. Originally, the scene was to begin with the Bunch leaving the whorehouse and immediately cut to the confrontation with Mapache. Once the decision was made to lengthen the scene, many of the Mexican extras were choreographed by the assistant directors while the scene was filming.

I was a little disappointed in this movie. It is another case of reputation. I have always heard about Sam Peckinpah and directors paying homage to Peckinpah in their movies. Don't get me wrong, this was a good solid western. Maybe the problem is the distance in time. 36 years ago this movie was considered extremely violent, even almost garnering an X rating, but by today's standards it was tame. Even the massive Battle of Bloody Porch scene was just another gun battle to me. Is that saying something about our society today and our desensitization to violence?

Oh Well, Next Up: Manhattan, ugh a Woody Allen film!