Junior Bonner is a great film. 9/10
You think they’re all great, don’t you?
It’s a good film IMO, but, like ENNIOO, I do not find its concept intriguing enough.
You bet 
It is very close to what Sam was really aiming for regarding filmmaking.
He was a big fan of Tennesse Williams (he even made his thesis
on one of his plays). Bonner shows that he would have been a perfect director
for films like Cat on a hot tin roof, Long hot summer (Faulkner, but similar) etc.
The ‘concept’ was as brillant as Wild Bunch. A theme in a setting, not a story
that developes because of the surroundings. Bunch is about a man’s guilt
and how he dealt with it, Bonner is about a family drifting apart. Both could
take place in different settings and still work. Flawless films.
Robert Preston should at least have been nominated.
Junior Bonner, or: The Boring Adventures of Some Rode Dude
5/10
[quote=“Bad Lieutenant, post:65, topic:356”]Junior Bonner, or: The Boring Adventures of Some Rode Dude
5/10[/quote]
Quite right. Reading Mike’s post you get an idea of what Peckinpah was trying to do in this movie. Tennesee Williams, William Faulkner, families drifting apart. He was good at what he had been doing most of the time (making movies like Ride the High Country or The Wild Bunch), but was dreaming of something else, something more ‘important’ (most critics rate drama higher than action, rate Tennesee Williams higher than, let’s say, Mickey Spillane). I always wonder why artists so desperately want to do things they’re not very good at. If they’re good at comedy, they want to do drama. If they’re good at mainstream, they want to do avant garde. Charles Dickens was one of the greatest writers in history, but he was not very good at creating adorable female characters (he was very good at creating bitches), and novel after novel he was trying to create at least one ‘darling’. It just didn’t work. In Junior Bonner Peckinpah is doing something he’s not very good at. The result is not bad per se, it’s just not very interesting.
No, Bonner is not more or less ambitious as The Wild Bunch or his other films up to that point.
It is one of Peckinpah’s most personal films, and obviously another variation of his twilight western themes. Belongs in one row with Ride the High Country, Wild Bunch, Cable Hogue, Pat Garrett. Commenting them, complementing them.
Often brilliantly filmed. Very deep, very moving. Not completely flawless, but none of Peckinpah’s film is.
[quote=“Bad Lieutenant, post:65, topic:356”]Junior Bonner, or: The Boring Adventures of Some Rode Dude
5/10[/quote]
He he, well, yes, that’s of course one way to see it.
But for me it is a highly entertaining film.
You have asked this before.
The answer is still no, they are not all great, but none of them is weak. He was a very gifted director, and even inwardly burnt out and completly drunk he was able to create great scenes, which are more fascinating (the scenes not the films) than anything other good directors did in their best films.
His weakest films are Killer Elite and Osterman Weekend, but both have some very good stuff in it, but only some. Both are 6/10
Osterman Weekend was the stuff for an excellent film, but none of the people involved was interested to make anything special out of it.
His best films (Wild Bunch, Pat Garrett) are of course 10/10
Interesting opinions here, I guess one can’t explain great films to people
who don’t get it in the first anyway. Not only a question of taste, but a certain
interest and understanding in themes is necessary I guess.
Explaining doesn’t help, I myself tried hard to like KEOMA (as so many do),
I still find all of Castellari’s films B-movies (seen before in other films, and
better done too). Too bad I’ll never get it 
Peckinpah had studied drama, he came from the theater. And it shows of course.
All his films are build on a strong structure of characters and relationships.
In the first hour of STRAW DOGS he lets us take a look at a marriage falling apart,
and there’s not a dull moment in it. Many people forget that WILD BUNCH
works the same way. Although it starts with a massacre, for the next hour or
so there’s no action at all. It’s just the building of the story through character.
He was one of the best actor’s director’s of his time. Although he used unconventional
methods (just like Ford). Susan George was never better, same with McCrea, Coburn, Holden or Strother.
BONNER was among McQueen’s two favorite films, Ali said so as well. For a reason of course.
It’s a jewel for those who get it and for those who care to look beyond the power of his more
famous films.
I rest my case,
'back to the Steve McQueen book (for a possible release date this winter)
Btw both versions of the UK DVDs are cut by 14 sec. Again some horse falls and cockfighting stuff was edited out.
Short deleted scene from this masterpiece:
It was only part of early TV versions, which otherwise were heavily cut.
You may think you know the story of how Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid was made from reading other books about Sam Peckinpah, but believe me, you don’t.
In The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife Of Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid: The Untold Story of Peckinpah’s Last Western, film editor and Peckinpah scholar Paul Seydor establishes a clear line from the publication of Sheriff Garrett’s book about the Kid, published in March 1882, up through Peckinpah’s rejected screenplay for One-Eyed Jacks in 1958 to his next association with script writer Rudolph Wurlitzer in developing Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid in 1973. Garrett’s book about the Kid was not their only source of inofrmation, and Seydor probes them all. Seydor, a working film editor with an Academy Award nomination to his credit, documents the development, prep, principle photography and post-production of the film in infinite detail. He provides a scene-by-scene analysis, showing how the story changed and improved under Peckinpah’s guiding hand, giving careful attention to outtakes and alternate scenes. He describes the on-set production problems that caused Peckinpah to rethink the film on his feet and how to complete it as they shot it. Seydor probes deep into the conflicts with James Aubrey, the notorious head of MGM who tried to sabotage the film during principle photography and later during post-production. He goes further to examine the previews held two weeks before the theatrical release, explores the film’s critical reception, and then gives a full accounting of the troubled restoration and compromised DVD release. But Seydor doesn’t stop there. He goes even further to respond to print reviewers and internet critics, some of whom will be recognizable to members of this forum. In the end, Paul Seydor’s positions are hard to argue with because he knows more about this film and Sam Peckinpah than anyone else alive. He has written the most authoritative study ever devoted to a single film. 95% of the information in the book has never been printed anywhere else. His positions are documented by reproductions of inter-office memos, edit lists, script pages and interviews with the crew and cast, most of whom are his friends and colleagues. This is a thoroughly researched and comprehensive history of the film. The writing is lucid, graceful, easy to read and highly confrontational. Everybody who loves westerns, Sam Peckinpah’s work, and Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid needs to own this book. It is essential.
Don’t hesitate. Buy It Now:
[quote=“Stanton, post:67, topic:356”]No, Bonner is not more or less ambitious as The Wild Bunch or his other films up to that point.
It is one of Peckinpah’s most personal films, and obviously another variation of his twilight western themes. Belongs in one row with Ride the High Country, Wild Bunch, Cable Hogue, Pat Garrett. Commenting them, complementing them.
Often brilliantly filmed. Very deep, very moving. Not completely flawless, but none of Peckinpah’s film is.[/quote]
A study in Taoism. One of the few Peckinpah films where the protagonist is a good guy with a strong moral code. One of my favorite films, along with Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.
Btw, that book about Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid is of course recommended. Especially as it favours my view that the 2005 version is the best so far.
Wasn’t Seydor responsible for that 2005 version? In that case it seems logical that he favors the view that it’s the best version so far.
I don’t agree, but I’m not a real fan of the movie, so my opinion isn’t too important
In many aspects the 2005 version represents Seydor’s ideas, but actually the 2005 version was done by using the theatrical version and adding most but not all of the scenes only featured in the preview version.
And responsible for that was Warner Bros, who were according to Seydor not interested to put too much money in this version. But at least they spent some money …
I highly recommend The Collected Works of Billy the Kid by Michael Ondaatje.
Beautiful book.
Has the Theatrical Cut from 1973 ever been released on DVD?
No, never.
Criterion should release all 3 versions in a box set. Or maybe add a 4th version which puts in some more (but not all) stuff from the preview version. There are a few short pieces I would not mind to be in the film.