MovieChat Forums > Major Dundee (1965) Discussion > The real problem with this film

The real problem with this film

posted 15 years ago by antimatter33
8 replies | jump to latest

I've seen all the arguments about the arguments, but it seems to me the basic problem with this film is directorial indecision - it can't figure out what it is - it can't fill up the big screen. Although there are some amazing deep shots of the surrounding territory that are worthy of Ford, most of the time this film seems like a clunky over-large TV show - claustrophobic, dark, artificial, poorly staged. Peckinpah had come from the world of 50s and 60s television, which as we know was shot through with action-filled, vapid oaters, and Peckinpah had done his share of those. True, he had "Ride the High Country" under his belt, but that was three years and many other belts - the kind that come from a bottle - in the past. It is known that Peckinpah was extremely surly to cast and crew and irritated Heston to the point of being threatened by a saber! - almost certainly the sign of a having a bad drunk on. If Peckinpah could have cleared his mind and found his vision, this could have been a great film - as it is, it just seems a strange mess, somewhere between an epic and a boob-tube potboiler.

-drl

[–] madbandit20002000 14 years ago

You have no proof he was drunk or not. The only people that have been noted for the film's early premise were producer Jerry Bressler and then-executives at Columbia Pictures.

[–] Hancock_the_Superb 14 years ago

I do think Peckinpah was too inexperienced to handle this big of a production. He'd done television and two fairly small films, and making a big-budget epic with a huge cast was probably beyond his talents at the time. The studio and Jerry Bresler, rightly, get a lot of flack for what went on, but Peckinpah isn't blameless either.

"Paper can be ripped - like your HEAD!"

[–] bstephens21 14 years ago

I kind of agree. There's a lot of directions the films could have gone, and which it tiptoes towards, but never settles on. Heston as a Captain Ahab type on an obsessive quest. Heston as a fascist Kurtz-like leader, lording over his private army. A Beckettian western, Searching for Chariba, if you will. But the movie simply falls apart after Hadley's execution.

With that said, I think it was a film that needed to be made. It's hard to imagine The Wild Bunch without it, and all you have to do is take one look at the finale with the French troops to see Peckinpah straining towards the innovations of that film, but unable to find the means of expression for it.

[–] MsELLERYqueen2 13 years ago

I really wanted to like this movie, but I couldn't watch more than half an hour of it. What a waste of great talent!

~~
JIM HUTTON: talented gorgeous HOT; adorable as ElleryQueen; SEXIEST ACTOR EVER

[–] Blueghost 12 years ago

Well, the shots are pretty basic. Beyond that I don't see much to criticize. The age of radical cinematography would come after he passed on.

[–] FANatic-10 11 years ago

For me, the film really falls apart when Heston is in Durango. Its not clear how long this sequence is supposed to last, which confuses the main storyline, and Heston going out of his head, despite what Peckinpah may have been aiming for, just doesn't really ring true with his character throughout the film previously. I thought the scenes which showed evidence of the film being hacked up the most were in the beginning when the Confederate soldiers are caught after breaking out of prison (a bit of voice-over explains what has happened, while a dark nighttime scene is shown - surely there was more to this sequence?) and the way the movie just ends after the final battle. As long as the movie is, and I saw the extended version, it feels very abrupt and we are left to wonder what happens after to Dundee.

[–] Eric-62-2 10 years ago

As long as the movie is, and I saw the extended version, it feels very abrupt and we are left to wonder what happens after to Dundee.

BINGO! This to me is the worst thing about the film and how Peckinpah is the one who deserves the blame for not giving us a true ending. A scene back at the fort was called for because we need to know if Dundee is going to be hailed as a hero for "Mission accomplished" or is he going to get disciplined? (I would suspect the former and you could have Dundee taking the promotion and glory but also knowing inside that perhaps its undeserved). Also, the chronology of the return would come after Lee's surrender to Grant and the end of the War. This meant we *should* have had a scene of the Union and Confederate soldiers now realizing they have nothing left to fight each other about and how their whole "until the Apache are taken or destroyed" mantra that has supposed to have been their code for when they'll start fighting each other again is now irrelevant.

Even before the Durango scene we were getting too much "down" time in the village and Senta Berger's character added nothing to it. Harry Julian Fink may not have left Peckinpah with a great first draft but Peckinpah deserves the blame for why the script and story ended up being so weak.

[–] PeterBlues 8 years ago

i had never heard of this before, anyway the funniest part was the "i'm not your uncle, you redneck" bit, and apparently the actor from blazing saddles didn't put on that part for that western spoof cause he seems to be the same way in every movie i see him in.. the dvd i got of this had different sounds available and loads of extra material like deleted scenes, i thought too much of this was shot in the dark, ran for well over two hours, kind of like a story telling without using the motion picture impact.

in the dancing ballroom you were centre of the floor,
heavenly times ive had here at your blessed forms,
you danced most everyday,
but something happened to this ballroom stage,
as the times passed on,
one after another marched on in and crowded the floor,
until anywhere you could hardly be seen at all,
look at those 10 hands to carry the punch bowl,
as you cant be found in the crowd,
no one can move like you at all while in this mess im getting trampled down,
and from being centre of the floor youre slipping out.