Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (Sam Peckinpah, 1973)

What about Laser disc? Or VHS (or dare I hope for a W/S VHS)?

On VHS yes, but most likely only full screen. The laser disc was as far as I know also only the preview version.

Since the preview version appeared the theatrical version was displaced on home video releases. But maybe on TV here and there.

The 2005 Special Edition is Peckinpah’s 1973 theatrical version with the excised footage put back in. Paul Seydor simply put the film back the way Peckinpah had it before the notorious James Aubrey cut it.

I don’t. It’s a terrible book. Perhaps it has some value as poetry or prose but I don’t find anything in it worth remembering. The book has nothing to do with Billy the Kid except to use the name. If you want to learn about the Kid, read Mark Lee Gardner’s To Hell On a Fast Horse and Robert Utley’s Billy the Kid: A Short and Violent Life. Both are excellent biographies that read like action movies.

[quote=“Stanton, post:80, topic:356”]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.[/quote]

Paul Seydor says something like that at the end of his new book. He would like to see five versions of the film on disc. He also says that under the current regime at Warner Home Video, who own and control the film, that it will never happen.

Having just bought this film on DVD (as no BD seems forthcoming), is there a consensus as to which version to watch first? The preview cut or the 2005 version?

I think watch first the 2005 version, and then the longer one, which is some kind of rough cut version.

It is imo better to watch the shorter version first, and then look how the additional material changes the film for you. For better or for worse.

If I had the theatrical cut, I’d start with that and then just work chronologically through the versions, as I did originally with [I]Blade Runner[/I] but, alas, I’m not in that position. If the 2005 version is closer to the theatrical cut then I’m leaning towards that more.

The 2005 version is basically the theatrical cut with the missing scenes (except one) added. But the new scenes are mostly shorter then in the preview version, in the sense of a fine cut.

Do not listen to Stanton!! Sorry Stanton :stuck_out_tongue:

You absolutely have to watch the TCM preview cut first. That was the last time Peckinpah touched it. Anything created after that (the 2005 cut or even the not included theatrical cut) represent carefully considered speculation or outright aberration depending on how you view such things.

That’s true, but not the point. Even if I would not prefer the 2005 cut I would recommend to watch the shorter one first, if one wants to watch both anyway.

I would say watch Peckinpah’s rough cut first to see what Peckinpah wanted to do. Then watch the version that was modified by other people to see what they did to it when Peckinpah was no longer involved. If you’re only going to watch one version, then I say it has to be Peckinpah’s rough cut or else you are watching Peckinpah diluted.

As you say, a rough cut, nothing which would have been released, so also not a definite version by Peckinpah.

And whatever, it still does make more sense to watch first the shorter version. Whatever Peckinpah’s version would have been, could have been, should have been.

But in the end it doesn’t make that great a difference with which version one starts if he watches the other one also.

Another funny idea would be to watch both versions simultaneously scene by scene.

I opted for the Preview Cut which will shortly be followed up by the Seydor version; my initial reaction is that it is very, very good; rambling, episodic (many of the scenes’ order could seemingly be quite easily changed around) and often very lyrical and moving. For once in a Peckinpah film, it’s not the action scenes that you remember but moments like Slim Pickens by the river. Bob Dylan felt rather unnecessary as a character and was a weak link, but not fatally so. I can understand it’s not a fine cut: some of the scenes, such as when Billy is in prison, seem to have rather jagged cutting unusually reliant on master shots. It’s no director’s cut inasmuch Peckinpah would’ve surely altered it further, but [I]‘what you want and what you get are two different things.’[/I]

John, what do you think which scene is the one completely missing from the shorter version?

And which scenes were cut for the theatrical version?

Of course the film is episodic, the major reason while it worked in the 106 min theatrical version already very well. And became quick my favourite Peckinpah together with TWB.

And Dylan has a function, otherwise he wouldn’t be in the film. :wink:
I even have no problems with his amateurish acting, which works very well in the fatalistic context of the film, in which nearly all actors act slightly strange, at least those around Billy.

Like I say, Dylan doesn’t ruin it, but he doesn’t quite work either. Perhaps his face isn’t ‘Western’ enough. His score on the other hand, is excellent.

From what I gather, the only scene entirely cut from the Theatrical version were the bookends, right? In which case, what a terrible decision; still, I’d like to see it one day. The VHS of it costs a fair amount to import from the US, so I’ll have to bide my time.

Bookends means what? The framing scene?

If you order a VHS, make sure that it is really the theatrical version, and not already the preview version. The preview version has replaced the theatrical version more and more since the late 80s.

But of course there was cut a lot more from the theatrical version, which despite running 16 min shorter contains one scene sadly missing in the preview.
I asked for the one scene from the preview which is not in the 2005 version. Thankfully not.

Apart form that scene the 2005 has every other scene from the preview, but runs 7 min shorter than the preview, and contains 2 scenes not included in the preview.

Which scene is missing from the preview and 2005 version but in the theatrical?

Yes, I was referring to Pat being shot in the sepia-tinted framing sequence. I gather you’re referring to the scene between Pat and his wife when you talk about a scene not in the preview but in the 2005 edit.

Watching the Seydor cut at the moment and a few brief thoughts: the use of the theatrical cut credit sequence is an interesting idea, if not as good as the preview. The first scene between Pat and Billy and the later scene in the jail, are better, more finely edited: they flow better. However, Billy’s breakout from the jail isn’t as effective here, it feels hurried.

Yes the wife scene is missing in the preview. A 2nd preview version had it. That’s the one Peckinpah stole, and showed here and there before his death.

The other scene I mentioned is in the 2005 version, it comes later.

But you haven’t tried to guess which scene form the preview was not inserted to the 2005er.
I was just interested if this particular scene is a bit obvious for leaving it out.

I think this could be the theatrical VHS:

http://vhscollector.com/movie/pat-garrett-and-billy-kid