The Wild Bunch

Appropriately enough, the first film in my Peckinpah retrospective was The Wild Bunch, courtesy of the spectacular Warner Brothers Blu-ray. It's one of only three Peckinpah films to have received a Blu-ray release in the United States to date (a Blu-ray of Straw Dogs was just released, presumably to coincide with the theatrical release of Rod Lurie's ill-advised remake). I was a late adopter of HDTV and Blu-ray thanks to an initial skepticism about the format's alleged superiority coupled with a resentment of being asked to upgrade to something better yet again. I finally gave in earlier this year, and I'm glad I did, as Blu-ray discs do indeed have the potential to look absolutely stunning when they're done right. Of course, upgrading to Blu-ray meant that I had to repurchase some films I already owned on DVD (and had previously owned on VHS and LaserDisc, for that matter), and it's a no-brainer that The Wild Bunch was among the first Blu-rays I bought. The screenshots accompanying this article, however, are most definitely not from the Blu-ray, as I don't yet have a Blu-ray drive on my computer (and it's unlikely that I will for some time).

The Wild Bunch tells the story of a gang of outlaws unsuccessfully struggling to remain relevant in the quickly fading American West circa 1913. The Bunch, the core of which is Pike Bishop (William Holden), Dutch Engstrom (Ernest Borgnine), brothers Lyle and Tector Gorch (Warren Oates and Ben Johnson) and Angel (Jaime Sánchez), find themselves on the run in Mexico after a botched robbery attempt and subsequent shootout that leaves scores of innocent civilians dead, though the deaths are attributable more to the ruthless bounty hunters pursuing them than to the Bunch themselves. As lawless as they may be, the Bunch maintain a certain code of honor, a fact not lost on Deke Thornton (Robert Ryan). Thornton is an ex-member of the Bunch who was captured and is being compelled to assist in tracking them down in the hope of avoiding a return to the hellish prison he was released from. After arranging to steal a trainload of weapons for a corrupt Mexican general, Mapache (Emilio Fernández), a series of events lead to a confrontation with Mapache and his troops, ultimately ending in a sustained massacre which leaves the majority of the participants on both sides dead.

"When you side with a man, you stick with him!" - Pike Bishop (William Holden)
delivers one of the film's signature lines to Tector Gorch (Ben Johnson)

Like many others, The Wild Bunch served as my introduction to the cinema of Sam Peckinpah, and I'll freely admit that I was first attracted to it due to the notoriety that its graphic violence engendered. When I was fairly young and first starting to read about the cinema, I obtained a copy of John Brosnan's special effects bible Movie Magic. This eye-opening book had a section on violence and gore which discussed The Wild Bunch at length, as it was still considered at that time to be one of the most violent films ever made. Reading about the bloody bullet hits created by attaching condoms filled with stage blood to explosive squibs and the notorious throat-slitting scene, my curiosity was piqued, but my general antipathy toward westerns at the time meant that it would be several more years until I finally saw the film. As a young man who was by then used to horror films that casually spilled buckets of blood without much thought to the meaning of it all, the cataclysmic eruptions of violence that bookend The Wild Bunch were a revelation. Here were characters I actually cared about dying in a horribly vivid manner, their agony plainly visible on their contorted faces. When the mortally wounded Dutch Engstrom cries out, "Pike! Pike!," while witnessing his partner's death, blood gushing from both of their bullet-riddled bodies, it packs a powerful, emotional punch. At the time, it was something I had not yet experienced, and The Wild Bunch was one of the first movies to demonstrate to me that the medium of film could actually say something important while it was entertaining you. As I've grown older, I've found that the themes of alienation, regret and confusion in the face of changing times that infuse the film have only become more poignant.

Lyle Gorch (Warren Oates) heads up the Bunch's robbery of a munitions train

The 2007 Blu-ray release of The Wild Bunch looks absolutely stunning to me. It's hard to believe that the film is over 40 years old. Over time, I've seen it in several different formats, including a theatrical screening that I was lucky enough to catch back in the day, and I can't ever recall being as impressed with the scenery as I was here. I never considered The Wild Bunch to be a particularly lovely-looking film, but the Blu-ray definitely brings that aspect out, with the color looking especially vivid compared to the previous DVD releases. When Angel surveys the panoramic vista of his home country, just across the Rio Grande, and remarks "Mexico lindo," I tend to agree with him, even the Gorch brothers don't. The Blu-ray's 5.1 soundtrack has been taken to task for not being lossless, but it sounded pretty good to me, with clear dialogue and a fairly impressive bottom end, despite the film's age. The disc contains numerous supplements, including a handful of documentaries and a commentary by several of the notable Peckinpah scholars mentioned in my previous post. (I believe all of these materials were present on the previous Special Edition DVD release.) Although I've read several of the books on Peckinpah that these men have written, I haven't yet found the time to listen to one of their commentaries; I hope to remedy that soon. The fact that I picked the disc up for under $10 was icing on the cake. I can only hope that subsequent Blu-ray releases of Peckinpah's films are handled as well as this one.

If you've never seen a Sam Peckinpah film, start here. As well as being his most renowned and arguably his best film, The Wild Bunch functions as a perfect encapsulation of everything he was trying to express through his art. It's a masterpiece made by a world-class filmmaker at the height of his power and creativity, and it's a glorious thing to behold.

Summer of Sam

Having embarked upon a mission to view every one of director Sam Peckinpah's films this summer, including a number of them that I've never seen before, my undertaking seemed a natural subject for my newly-christened blog. The problem is that volumes have been written about Peckinpah's life and films by a small army of respected scholars, including David Weddle, Garner Simmons, Paul Seydor, Stephen Prince and the estimable Neil Fulwood, whose erudite and entertaining blog, The Agitation of the Mind, can be found here. I would not presume to hold myself in the company of these esteemed gentlemen by thinking I could add much of anything to the conversation, but I'm going to give it a go anyway. After all, isn't that why I'm here? I'll talk a little bit about the films themselves and then discuss their digital presentations, some of which I'm finding to be sorely lacking. With that being said, when it comes to DVDs and Blu-rays, I'm far from an expert on the technical side of things, so you won't be hearing me use such menacing phrases as "macroblocking," "edge enhancement" or "DNR" all that much. I'm no video guru; I just know what looks good to me and what looks like crap.

Peckinpah himself as a coffin maker in Pat Garrett And Billy The Kid

Obviously, the summer is almost over, and I've already watched many of these films, so many in fact that my wife pleaded with me the other day to watch something without "dust and guns." At this point, with only a few weeks left, I'm uncertain if my objective will be reached. Nevertheless, I do plan to comment on what I've seen so far. I'll break my observations up into periodic installments to avoid posts that are too lengthy. This first post is mainly concerned with Peckinpah as a director and how I feel about his films in general. To begin, an introduction to the maestro would seem to be in order.

Sam Peckinpah was a legendary figure, infamous not only for his films, some of which pushed the level of screen violence far beyond what had previously been seen, but also for his volatile personal life. He directed a relatively small number of films in his career, which was tragically cut short by heart failure at age 59. Undoubtedly, his near-constant boozing and, later, cocaine use, contributed to his early demise, but it's not hard to imagine that his legendary, volcanic battles with producers and film studios who sought to sanitize his output for public consumption also took their toll on his well-being. Despite this interference, almost all of his films are recognizable as his work in some way, due to their technical and thematic elements. Peckinpah was one of the first American directors to be recognized as an auteur. His involvement in his films, when not sabotaged by clueless higher-ups, usually began with a script rewrite and extended all the way through the final editing process (unless he found himself summarily kicked out of the editing bay by vengeful producers), and because of this total involvement, his filmic signature is distinct and indelible.

William Holden dies an ugly death in The Wild Bunch

More often than not, Peckinpah's name is invoked within the context of a discussion on film violence. A number of his films, beginning with 1969's monumental western, The Wild Bunch, do indeed depict scenes of savage brutality, the likes of which were completely foreign to movie audiences at the time. Viewed out of context now, they would likely elicit a yawn from many younger viewers who've been weaned on graphically violent movies and video games. Indeed, the quantity of blood spilled in most of Peckinpah's violent films is routinely surpassed by today's average "family-friendly" PG-13 action movie. But with Peckinpah, context is everything. The violence in his films still shocks and disturbs because it's not neat and tidy. When the titular members of The Wild Bunch meet their end at the film's climax, we feel it, despite the fact that they're less than savory characters whose self-serving actions ultimately precipitate their collective demise. In stark contrast to the thoughtless exhilaration we're meant to experience when one of today's action heroes empties their automatic weapon into an advancing horde of faceless villains (and please don't think that I'm condemning those types of films out of hand, because I'm not), Peckinpah unflinchingly demonstrates to us the agonizing pain of being ripped apart by a hail of bullets, the despair of watching friends die and above all, the utter senselessness of violence and the resounding void it creates. These upsetting images and themes would recur throughout Peckinpah's oeuvre, though many critics were unable to see past the blood. Small-minded individuals sometimes cling to the warped notion that showing something on screen is tantamount to condoning it; in Peckinpah's case, this could not be further from the truth. He was truly a cinematic maverick, and he remains one of the most revered - or reviled - filmmakers in motion picture history, depending on who you're talking to. As far as I'm concerned, his genius will probably never be surpassed.

Welcome

Welcome to Filmiliarity. The purpose of this oddly-titled blog is to discuss films that interest me, regardless of their genre or, for that matter, their quality. I've been wanting to start this blog for a while; in a way, it's meant to be a rebirth of another, less-focused blog I have over at LiveJournal. I never liked the cumbersome URL of the other blog, and I prefer the layout options over here, so I decided to make a fresh start. One of my major stumbling blocks, however, has been coming up with a suitable title. Practically everything I thought of had already been taken, and I was beginning to think I'd never be able to create something both unique and clever. My epiphany came today, and here I am.

As you can see from the blog description, the title is a mash-up of the words film and familiarity. It doesn't exactly roll off the tongue, I know (say it with me - "film-ill-ee-air-it-ee"), but the more I think about it, the more I like it. The film part, well, that's obvious. The word familiarity, though, has multiple definitions, and most of them seem to coincide with my general feelings about movies. Let's take a look at how Dictionary.com defines familiarity:

1. thorough knowledge or mastery of a thing, subject, etc.
2. the state of being familiar; friendly relationship; close acquaintance; intimacy.
3. an absence of ceremony and formality; informality.
4. freedom of behavior justified only by the closest relationship; undue intimacy.

While I would never in a million years claim to have mastery of the subject, I do possess a relatively thorough knowledge of film, although said knowledge is abnormally slanted toward horror films. I'd like to think I have a friendly relationship with the cinema, but like all relationships, it can become strained at times. I do tend to prefer a certain informality to the movies I watch; if a film lapses into pretentiousness, it usually gets shut off. (Notice I didn't say "walked out on" - despite my avowed love of the cinema as an art form, my love of the cinema as a building has waned as of late, and my excursions to an actual movie theater have subsequently dwindled to a few per year at best.) And the part about undue intimacy, well, let's just say that many of the films I watch tend to take certain liberties with one's sensibilities that the average viewer might not appreciate. But I'm not the average viewer, as you will discover if you stick around.