The Wild Bunch (1969) 8.0
An aging group of outlaws look for one last big score as the "traditional" American West is disappearing around them. Director:Sam Peckinpah |
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The Wild Bunch (1969) 8.0
An aging group of outlaws look for one last big score as the "traditional" American West is disappearing around them. Director:Sam Peckinpah |
|
Watch Trailer 0Share... |
Cast overview, first billed only: | |||
William Holden | ... | ||
Ernest Borgnine | ... | ||
Robert Ryan | ... | ||
Edmond O'Brien | ... | ||
Warren Oates | ... | ||
Jaime Sánchez | ... |
Angel
(as Jaime Sanchez)
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Ben Johnson | ... | ||
Emilio Fernández | ... |
Mapache
(as Emilio Fernandez)
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Strother Martin | ... | ||
L.Q. Jones | ... | ||
Albert Dekker | ... | ||
Bo Hopkins | ... | ||
Dub Taylor | ... | ||
Paul Harper | ... |
Ross
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Jorge Russek | ... |
Zamorra
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In the Wild Bunch the movie opens with a group of aging outlaw's final score, a bank robbery. The event concludes with a violent and overtly bloody shootout that would generally mark the finale of a movie. This is correct in that it marks the finale of an era, for the characters and the world they live in. They simply can no longer keep up, the times are changing, technology advancing, and they're style of life is getting left behind in the dust that they spent so long galloping through. They abandon their careers for the simpler life of retirement. They enjoy this time, they live their fantasies. During this time the law is always on their tracks, bounty hunters. The further into their fantasy they get, the closer their demise seems to get. When one of their own is captured they are faced with the choice of escape or what is certainly a suicide mission to attempt and free their fallen behind comrade. For them it is not a choice. They all die in what can only be described as a ... Written by VilanTrub@gmail.com
An incredible performance by Bill Holden is the high point of this sensational, landmark film. Holden made a whole career out of laid-back, easy-going, what-the-hell sort of characters but here, at his zenith, he departs from type and plays a character so mean and so embittered that in some ways he even out-Bronsons Bronson himself.
The Wild Bunch is a group of disillusioned outlaws who are out of time and they know it. When Sykes says that they've got one of those things (a car) up north that can fly, they gloomily accept that this new-fangled 20th Century is not for them.
It is a movie all about values and about a man's loyalty to his companions. Holden brilliantly declares that if you cannot stand by a man who rides with you, you are like some kind of animal. In the end, that is all these hunted men have: their loyalty to each other.
And so they band together for one last walk to try and rescue their doomed Mexican comrade. The bloodbath that follows is an eloquent summary of their lives. They who live by the gun.....
Superb performances by Holden in particular and also by O'Brien, Ryan, Borgnine, Oates and Johnson. Peckinpah's finest hour. Definitely ten out of ten.