Wild Bunch with William Holden: DVD Cover

    Wild Bunch Director: Sam Peckinpah, Paul Seydor Cast: William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien

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    • DVD Release Date: 01/10/2006
    • Original Release: 1969
    • Rating: Rated R

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    DVD - Letterbox$19.99
    DVD - Wide Screen$14.99
    Blu-ray - Director's Cut / Wide Screen$11.99

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    Editorial Reviews

    Sam Peckinpah's elegiac, wildly revisionist western kicked up plenty of dust with its release in 1969, turning the cowboy flick into a kinetic, blood-splattered ballet. Sporting glorious performances by Ernest Borgnine and a remarkably vulnerable William Holden, The Wild Bunch follows a group of aging outlaws as they try to outride a posse led by a former member of the gang (Robert Ryan). As the film details the final days of men who have outlived their world -- it's 1913 and Model Ts are replacing horses -- it rushes forward by using the then-experimental technique of rapidly editing together slow-motion images. Blood flies visibly on each bullet impact, forcing audiences to consider the moral impact of violence by making them feel it on a visceral level; it was the antithesis of the safe movie violence of the Saturday matinees. Arguably Peckinpah's greatest film, The Wild Bunch changed the way in which action sequences are shot, and its influence can still be seen today in the work of such directors as John Woo, Walter Hill, and James Cameron. Ben Wolf, Barnes & Noble

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    Customer Reviews

    "Let's Go"by Anonymous

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    December 31, 2005: Certainly one of the most brilliant Westerns (if not movies in general), the Wild Bunch carries the full weight of a time changing from the old Western days to civilization and its discontents. This is probably by far the most well known of Peckinpah's cinematic efforts and the most ifluential film of the 60's, especially in its portrayal of violence. The True Western at its best

    This review was written about the DVD Letterbox edition.

    One Of The Greatest Westernsby Anonymous

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    May 13, 2004: In 1969, Sam Peckinpah took Sergio Leone's reinvention of the western genre in the mid-60s portraying ambivalent drifters as protagonists in films such as 'The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly' to a next level with 'The Wild Bunch'. With even more audacity than Leone, Peckinpah presents a western where there are really no true heroes or good archetypes. All of the characters, even those seemingly respectable, are beasts seeking to save their own skin at any cost. Whereas Leone gives his Blondie character a consistent moral code to some degree throughout the film, Peckinpah's characters are constantly immoral opportunists almost until the end. When the characters finally seek to present some semblance of morals or good deeds, they die. This theme recurs through scenery and script. For example, the opening scene shows the bunch entering town for a heist while they pass children putting scorpions against ants and then setting them on fire for thrills. The audience is thus fixed in the idea that one's pain and suffering is meaningless amusement to others. The characters' indifference to life is made clear with lines such as 'If they move, kill them!' Altogether one of the best westerns ever made.

    This review was written about the DVD Wide Screen edition.


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