Sam Peckinpah's Legendary Westerns Collection (The Wild Bunch / Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid / Ride the High Country / The Ballad of Cable Hogue)

If you view the four movies comprising the Sam Peckinpah's Legendary Westerns Collection and don't agree it is the single best collection of western varieties ever . . . well, just as Angel said to the Bunch--as some didn't share his vision that Mexico was more beautiful than Texas crossing the swollen river into his homeland--"You have no eyes." The Wild Bunch is simply the best real Western ever. Men learn how to be men; how to handle failure with its recognition then laughing the pain away so one can go forward. The idea of loyalty, so missing in modern day bunches, is emphasized here like Pike preaching, "Once you side with a man, you stay with him; otherwise you're just like some animal." And so your modern personal business model has changed . . . Medicare doesn't reimburse enough, commissions are squeezed, selling a book doesn't earn what it used to . . . all of those things are not new. A startling hero of the movie, Edwin O'Brien as Freddie Sykes, remembers at the end whatever you like and want and need to do, "It ain't like it used to be, but it'll do," electrically making it okay to go on and enjoy, the heck with everything else. After this movie, worth every penny of the collection, the rest cost nothing but are perfect attendees to the king of westerns, The Wild Bunch. Billy Bob Thornton comments in the special features of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, this is his favorite of Peckinpah's Westerns because it is so far out there--way out. The story between the two "friends," James Coburn and Kris Kristofferson, is cut in the Peckinpah way of surprises, twists, and then touching moments interspersed with the harsh realities of the untamed West. You'll never again see anything like this. Leaving the lead character's performances for the moment--Coburn is as menacing a psychopath as Kristofferson's Billy--Richard Jaeckel as Sheriff Kip McKinney "goes loco" with his fundamentalist beliefs trying to redeem Billy's soul before the hanging. Peckinpah's slight of hand in his direction allows the viewer to inhabit the moment as a shotgun loaded with 16 dimes does far more than $1.60 worth of killing. The minor character Donnie Fritts brings to life Beaver who is so unintentionally funny as his lines are repeating what was just said, causing even Garrett so laugh behind clinched teeth over a cigar while he contemplates "tickling (Fritts') private parts" with a bullet. The entrepreneurial Cable Hogue, the best blue-collar frontiersman hero yet, winning the pretty girl, Stella Stevens' Hildy, with his deep pioneering spirit and fumbling ways, tells a life one comes to see as the way Peckinpah may have viewed his own, even down to the funeral. His conversations with the Lord are a reflection of a religion where Holy Ones are friends, and when you need water, and on about the third day going without, you're going to talk to that friend in a pretty harsh, direct way. ". . . Now about sinnin', you just send me a drop or two (of rain), and I won't do it no more... whatever in hell it was that I did." L Q Jones calls Ride the High Country the best Saturday matinee, take your girl friend and eat popcorn Western movie ever. There's a love story here and with feeling the viewer sees it develop in a wonderful way even at a dinner she cooks "a fine ham hock; eating Chapter one," in a reference to the strict Biblical father's quoting scripture to squeeze every drop out of happiness. But the powerful story here is of two men, now out-of-date cowboys, aging, and in doing so, refinding their moral compass and friendship of one another. This yields one of the all-time best lines in any movie, a thought that can guide one's life as a goal, an aspiration higher than any other: "All I want is to enter my house justified." View the movie and the special featurette where this notion is discussed . . . you won't be able to forget it. The box-set cover reflecting a scene from each of the four films also has a side portrait of Peckinpah himself, looking into a camera as his mind saw and interpreted a unique vision of changes in life and how one is left behind in a different era. It is in many respects like any modern times, yet the parable is set in these frontier times, and harsh times lead to some very difficult outcomes. But along the way, all of these characters lived, really lived, a lesson all of us need to remember as we find ourselves becoming politically-correct stiffs. Watching this collection will enhance your life, broaden your horizons, and deepen appreciation of the twisted but brillant creator, Sam Peckinpah.

This DVD is default programmed with subtitles. It was difficult to find the shutoff command. Otherwise good movie.

When I was younger, Sam Peckinpah's more violent films were my favorites, now, as I approach the age of the title character, this film is far and away my favorite. Peckinpah came up with a philosophical, almost biblically themed picture here- yet it is also filled with the most laugh-out-loud humor of any of his films. It had to be an accident, it just works too perfectly to have been done on purpose....This is the story of Cable Hogue, a prospector in the Arizona territory of 1908. He is left to die without water by his two partners. Not only is he left to die- he is laughed at because of his "yellowness" at not doing the same to them when given a chance. So Cable tries to walk out of the desert knowing that he has no chance. He talks (he never prays) to the God that he has never had much use for. As a result, he finds water; water where it never was and could never possibly be.This is the start of Cable's desert kingdom. He builds it out of nothing and out of bluff. He builds it with his own hands, out of what the desert provides. When necessary, he defends it with deadly force. Yet Cable gains respect and friends along the way. Sure, he can be mean and ruthless when he has to be, but to those who prove worthy, he can be a generous and loyal friend. He even wins the love of the most beautiful woman in a land where women are scarce (Stella Stevens- she never looked better than she did in this film.)Then, at the height of his success, the two former partners that left him to die are delivered into his hands....I used to wonder at the name "Cable", since I had never heard it before. Then I got it, Cable is a combination of Cain and Abel. This is because Cable is a combination of good and bad. On the one hand he is capable of hardness, even to the point of taking a life, but on the other hand he can show justice and mercy in sparing a life. To paraphrase the phoney preacher at the end of the film, Cable wasn't strictly a good man, and he wasn't strictly a bad man, but Lord- he was a MAN!

Back in 2006, Warner Bros. released a Sam Peckinpah 4-DVD Westerns box set, featuring acclaimed classics "The Wild Bunch", "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid", "Ride the High Country", and "The Ballad of Cable Hogue". Of these films, "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" is less known, having been placed on the backburner by the studio and released with relatively no publicity following the release of "The Wild Bunch", despite Cable Hogue being filmed before it. "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" begins much like other Peckinpah films: an older man of the Western frontier, wronged and tossed around by younger gunslingers, only to be left alone and left to die while vowing revenge if he lives. Seemingly, Hogue will veer down the road familiar to Peckinpah, a revenge fantasy in a changing Western frontier, where the old ways are being pushed aside in favor of modernity. Then the film does a 180, turning into a farcical sex romp comedy (brought about by a priest!). A welcome change of pace given Peckinpah's oeuvre. Which isn't to say his other films are devoid of humor; he often injects it among his most violent fare as a mean of lightening the dark mood. But to structure a whole film as a comedy would appear to be beyond Peckinpah's grasp yet it feels remarkably like a Peckinpah film.The final act sees his favorite themes reemerge: revenge and modernity. Where in his other films the main character would get his revenge culminating in a bloody shootout, here Peckinpah turns this expectation on its head, forgiving a man that wronged him and in fact rewarding him after feeling sorry for him. The theme of modernity is also addressed by Peckinpah. Represented by a car, Peckinpah has Hogue face the changing landscape of the West with comical results. "The Ballad of Cable Hogue" is a welcome departure from Peckinpah's moody and sometimes overused violence, a Western comedy that refuses to take itself seriously. Highly recommended

Coming just after "The Wild Bunch" and before "Straw Dogs" this film shows Peckinpah can do gentler, more character driven tales. Like the "Bunch" this mourns the passing of the west and is almost allegorical. Jason Robards (wonderful) is Cable who discovers water halfway between 2 towns 40 miles apart and as he now has the only water around he determines to make some money and win the love of Stella Stevens, giving a lovely, warm performence, proving she can act, be sexy and vulnerable - one of, in my opinion, her best performences. Coming in at nearly 2 hours I was never bored, as Peckinpah fills the screen with vast desert images, great character actors, most from his "stock" company - the unique Strother Martin and L Q jones as the only bad guys in the story, R G Armstrong, Slim Pickens (wasted as the friendly Stage Coach driver), Peter Whitney and of course David Warner for that extra touch of sex mad craziness. I much prefer this "Sam" even tho I think "Wild Bunch" and "Major Dundee" are two of the finest westerns around. The DVD of the Panavision film is excellent quality, good picture, sound and optional English Subs. Extras include a must see interview with Stella Stevens. Not for everyone perhaps, but a must for western, and just good film, lovers. Recomended

This isn't a bad movie, but, it is not as good as hisfilm before, and that was The Wild Bunch.After making The Wild Bunch, much was expectedfrom Sam Peckinpah. He had re-invented actioncinema, and much of today's action films, like TheTransformers movies, owe a debt to Peckinpah.So this film is a little surprising, compared to thetype of movies he made thereafter.OK, the cast is great, and full of Peckinpah stockactors. There is a good story of the end of theold west, but that is a trope he used in other filmstoo. This is a light comedy Western, which is all welland good, but this is no blood and guts festival, forwhich Peckinpah was best known for.This movie is OK... But not great. His next movie wasa violent Western, set in the West of England, calledStraw Dogs, which I will watch and review later, butI have to say, I find Straw Dogs a troublesome film towatch, and I feel it hasn't aged well, but thereafter itset the Peckinpah style.I am trying to watch all Sam Peckinpah films andreview them too, but I can't say too much aboutthis one. It's Ok, but...

Good film, bought the Dvd to replace my video of it. Always liked this western and there is a great performance from one of my favourite western character actors, Strother Martin. Love the scene where they are in a hole and Jason Robards throws Rattlers into it! Very funny, but scary too.

I was pleased when The Ballad of Cable Hogue was reissued, having only read about in it in If They Move Kill 'Em & John Cale's song Cable Hogue. As with some Peckinpah films (most notably Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia) it has been rarely shown on TV and had been impossible to locate on VHS.It is quite odd and comic compared to Pecknipah's more famous The Wild Bunch and certainly has an oddball, abusurd element that featured to a lesser degree in Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid. Jason Robards is excellent in the lead role, his grizzled Cable Hogue not unrelated to the character he portrayed in Sergio Leone's Once Upon a Time in the West (something to do with death?). It is quite odd and almost Beckettian in parts, while there are homoerotic elements unusual to the Western genre. It does feel of it's time, largely to the split-screen shots- which are very of its time and place it next to films like The Thomas Crown Affair, Head, Valley of the Dolls & The Boston Strangler.Great that this is available again, and at budget price- this film is well placed in Peckinpah's genre and has a lot more emotional feeling than later films (such as the over-rated Straw Dogs or the messy Osterman Weekend). A curio maybe, but a film that aids the critical reassessment of Peckinpah's oeuvre.

Turn of the (20th) century. Water shortages , stagecoaches, and gunslinger ways are dying out slowly, as artifacts from pre war time.Good 70's film worth 1-time watch.