THE WILD BUNCH: AN ALBUM IN MONTAGE (1997)
A film review by Steve Rhodes
Copyright 1997 Steve Rhodes
RATING (0 TO ****): ** 1/2
Once upon a time, in Warner Brothers's archives they came across a set of old film canisters labeled "Behind the Scenes at THE WILD BUNCH." From that chance discovery was spawned the short documentary, THE WILD BUNCH: AN ALBUM IN MONTAGE. I saw it at San Jose's Cinequest film festival and got to participate in the question and answer session afterwards with its writer and director Paul Seydor. (Seydor is an easy man to find in a crowd since he has a remarkable resemblance to Richard Dreyfuss.) The film has been submitted for Oscar consideration in the documentary short subject category.
THE WILD BUNCH (1969) was the favorite film of famous and controversial director Sam Peckinpah (1925-1984). Most people remember it as an ultra violent Western. It was that, but it was much more as this film about its director partially demonstrates.
You may think that Seydor's job consisted of splicing together the old film stock and then getting some talking heads to do some voice-overs and interviews. If you did, you would be wrong. The film he got was from just 4 days of the 80 day movie shoot, all done on location in a small Mexican village.
The making of the documentary is as amazing as the documentary itself. He only had about thirty minutes of film to work with. Although THE WILD BUNCH was in vibrant color, the film footage they found was in black and white and without any sound. And to complicate matters even more, whoever originally shot the film used only one minute long film cassettes. This meant that most of the scenes in it only lasted five to six seconds. When it was given to Seydor, it was basically assumed that, as valuable as it was, there was probably nothing he could do with it. As the results prove, this one-time professor and film historian, is an extremely resourceful and creative person.
The documentary tells us about Sam Peckinpah. He was a feared director who was fired on the set by the producer of another film prior to THE WILD BUNCH. It took him three years to get another picture. You may remember him from a wide variety of films including, MAJOR DUNDEE (1965), STRAW DOGS (1971), and THE GETAWAY (1972).
He worked 20 hour days on the set of THE WILD BUNCH and would improvise scenes as they were happening. One of the most famous parts of the movie is known as the long walk. In it William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, and Robert Ryan strolled through town on their way to the big confrontation with the Mexican army. This walk was not in the script, but the documentary shows Peckinpah improvising it on the spur of the moment. They grabbed extras and start setting up little vignettes for the actors to stroll past, and they do this while the cameras were rolling.
Overlaying the recovered black and white background footage, Ed Harris does the voice of Sam Peckinpah and reads some of the things Peckinpah said about the film. Of the many battles in it, Peckinpah said, "Even the battle was a ballet." And his battles were.
The film also includes some interviews as well as parts of the movie. Seydor spent a lot of time making the film long enough to be substantial. He did it all as a labor of love while making a living as the editor of TIN CUP.
The documentary is full of great little tidbits about the movie like the way in which they killed more men and shot up more uniforms than they had. To do this they had to retrieve the supposedly dead extras, wash and dry the uniforms, patch the holes in the uniforms, and then recycle the extras back into the battle.
The movie ends with the famous scene of a blown-up bridge with horses and riders falling into the river below. Without computers to fake it, they really had to do it. Since the river was low, they dammed it up weeks in advance. If it looks dangerous, that is because it was.
Peckinpah and company were on a mission. Nothing would stop them in their quest for perfection. They even paid the town to delay for six months its planned conversion to electricity.
THE WILD BUNCH: AN ALBUM IN MONTAGE runs a delightful 34 minutes. It is not rated, but would be R for some of the violent images. It would be fine for teenagers as the violent parts appear only briefly. I recommend this unusual documentary short to you and give it ** 1/2.
**** = A must see film. *** = Excellent show. Look for it. ** = Average movie. Kind of enjoyable. * = Poor show. Don't waste your money. 0 = Totally and painfully unbearable picture.
REVIEW WRITTEN ON: February 5, 1997
Opinions expressed are mine and not meant to reflect my employer's.
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