The Wild Bunch
-
Wed 21 December 2005 // 20:00
Sam Peckinpah / USA / 1969 / 145 mins / 35mm / Cert 18
(Wed 21st / 8pm / £2)
Sam Peckinpah's elegiac western, charting the shift in attitudes at the turn of the twentieth century marked both a radical departure in the look and tone of action films. Back when slow-motion was a radical aesthetic choice and not an action scene obligation, and brutal violence was largely the staple of Vietnam news bulletins and not big budget movies, Peckinpah's viscerally ultra-violent poetics were perhaps a little too resonant with contemporary audiences. Now hailed as a classic of the genre, and a watershed of modern film, this fully restored version reveals not only a distinct portrait of the era from which the film hails, but also the genesis of a new way of experiencing action that was to shape a generation of filmmakers and film fans alike. Essential.
(Wed 21st / 8pm / £2)
Sam Peckinpah's elegiac western, charting the shift in attitudes at the turn of the twentieth century marked both a radical departure in the look and tone of action films. Back when slow-motion was a radical aesthetic choice and not an action scene obligation, and brutal violence was largely the staple of Vietnam news bulletins and not big budget movies, Peckinpah's viscerally ultra-violent poetics were perhaps a little too resonant with contemporary audiences. Now hailed as a classic of the genre, and a watershed of modern film, this fully restored version reveals not only a distinct portrait of the era from which the film hails, but also the genesis of a new way of experiencing action that was to shape a generation of filmmakers and film fans alike. Essential.