Bliss FIL M ST U DIE S W ritten exclusively for this collection by today’s leading Peckinpah critics, the nine essays in Peckinpah Today explore the body of work of one of America’s most important filmmakers, revealing new insights into his artistic process and the development of his lasting themes Edited by Michael Bliss, this book provides groundbreaking criticism of Peckinpah’s work by illuminating new sources, from modified screenplay documents to interviews with screenplay writers and editors Included is a rare interview with A S Fleischman, author of the screenplay for The Deadly Companions, the film that launched Peckinpah’s career in feature films The collection also contains essays by scholar Stephen Prince and Paul Seydor, editor of the controversial special edition of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid In an essay on Straw Dogs, film critic Michael Sragow reveals how Peckinpah and co-scriptwriter David Zelag Goodman transformed a pulp novel into a powerful film The final essay of the collection surveys Peckinpah’s career, showing the dark turn that the filmmaker’s artistic path took between his first and last films This comprehensive approach reinforces the book’s dawn-to-dusk approach, resulting in a fascinating picture of a great filmmaker’s work   A teacher of writing, literature, and cinema at Virginia Tech, Michael Bliss is the author or editor of eight books of film criticism, including Justified Lives: Morality and Narrative in the Films of Sam Peckinpah, Doing It Right: The Best Criticism on Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” and Dreams within a Dream: The Films of Peter Weir Cover illustrations: The ride out from Angel’s village in The Wild Bunch Printed in the United States of America 1915 university press drive mail code 6806 carbondale, il 62901 www.siupress.com Bliss cvr mech.indd $29.95 usd isbn 0-8093-3106-3 isbn 978-0-8093-3106-2 Southern Illinois University Press southern illinois university press Peckinpah Today: New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah “Peckinpah Today is evidence of Bliss’s reputation as an important Peckinpah scholar, bringing together essays of the most significant writers and researchers on this director and his work This collection will immediately generate enthusiastic interest, as it covers substantial new ground Peckinpah specialists, film scholars, fans, and buffs will all welcome this book.” —Gabrielle Murray, senior lecturer in the Media and Cinema Studies program, La Trobe University Peckinpah Today New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah Edited with an Introduction by Michael Bliss 4/2/12 10:55 AM Peckinpah Today Peckinpah Today New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah Edited with an Introduction by Michael Bliss Southern Illinois University Press  /  Carbondale and Edwardsville Copyright © 2012 by the Board of Trustees, Southern Illinois University “The Deadly Companions Revisited” copyright © Garner Simmons, 2011; “The Ballad of Divine Retribution” copyright © Steven Lloyd, 2010; “From The Siege of Trencher’s Farm to Straw Dogs: The Narrative Brilliance of Sam Peckinpah” copyright © Michael Sragow, 2012; “The Recutting of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: Ethical Problems in Film Restoration” copyright © Stephen Prince, 2012; “The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: The Several Versions of Peckinpah’s Last Western” copyright © Paul Seydor, 2012 All rights reserved Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Peckinpah today : new essays on the films of Sam Peckinpah / edited with an introduction by Michael Bliss p cm Includes bibliographical references and index ISBN-13: 978-0-8093-3106-2 (pbk : alk paper) ISBN-10: 0-8093-3106-3 (pbk : alk paper) ISBN-13: 978-0-8093-3107-9 (ebook) ISBN-10: 0-8093-3107-1 (ebook) Peckinpah, Sam, 1925–1984—Criticism and interpretation I. Bliss, Michael, 1947– PN1998.3.P43P46 2012 791.4302'33092—dc23 2011036411 Printed on recycled paper The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1992 For Jeff Slater: Peckinpah archivist, gentleman, friend Art is the habit of the artist; and habits have to be rooted deep in the personality They have to be cultivated like any other habit, over a long period of time, by experience . .  The habit of art  .  is more than just a discipline, although it is that; I think it is a way of looking at the created world and of using the senses so as to make them find as much meaning as possible in things —Flannery O’Connor, “Writing Short Stories,” in Mystery and Manners Contents List of Illustrations xi Introduction: Times Maybe, Not Them— The Enduring Value of Sam Peckinpah’s Films The Deadly Companions Revisited Martyred Slaves of Time: Age, Regret, and Transcendence in The Wild Bunch Michael Bliss  Garner Simmons  Michael Bliss  36 The Ballad of Divine Retribution Steven Lloyd  45 From The Siege of Trencher’s Farm to Straw Dogs: The Narrative Brilliance of Sam Peckinpah  Michael Sragow  69 The Recutting of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: Ethical Problems in Film Restoration   Stephen Prince  82 The Authentic Death and Contentious Afterlife of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid: The Several Versions of Peckinpah’s Last Western Paul Seydor  101 ix Dawn and Dusk The last sparkles of one of the greatest filmmakers of his time, The Osterman Weekend may be regarded as a metaphor of Peckinpah’s film career, especially if we compare Peckinpah to Fassett, who stands as a demiurge and at the same time as a pathetic prisoner of the pictures of his wife’s death that he keeps watching compulsively in a loop To lie, to cheat, to manipulate, to surprise, to frighten, to guide, to lose but also to watch and watch again, never to forget anything, never to turn the page  .  This disillusioned and fascinating swan song, the work of a visionary who didn’t believe in the future of the world anymore, is quite revealing about Sam Peckinpah’s state of mind Notes Belmans, “Image et Son,” 45 Flaubert, Memoirs d’un Fou, 19–20 183 Bibliography Contributors Index Bibliography Baudrillard, Jean “The Ecstasy of Communication.” In Postmodern Culture, edited by Hal Foster, 126–34 London: Pluto Press, 1983 Bellour, Raymond “Hitchcock—The Enunciator.” Camera Obscura (1977): 80–81 ——— “Psychosis, Neurosis, Perversion.” Camera Obscura 3/4 (1979): 121–34 Belmans, Jacques Review, “Image et Son.” La Saison cinématographique 68, no 219 (September–October 1968): 45 Bliss, Michael Doing It Right: The Best Criticism on Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch.” Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1994 ——— Justified Lives: Morality and Narrative in the Films of Sam Peckinpah Carbondale: Southern Illinois University Press, 1993 Brown, Norman O Life against Death: The Psychoanalytic Meaning of History New York: Vintage Books, 1959 Bryson, John “The Wild Bunch in New York.” New York, August 19, 1974, rpt in Sam Peckinpah: Interviews, edited by Kevin J Hayes, 137–44 Jackson: University of Mississippi Press, 2008 Butler, Terence Crucified Heroes London: Gordon Fraser, 1977 Callenbach, Ernest “A Conversation with Sam Peckinpah.” Film Quarterly 17, no (Winter 1963–64), rpt in Sam Peckinpah: Interviews, edited by Kevin J Hayes, 3–15 Jackson: University of Mississippi Press, 2008 Deming, Robert H “The Television Spectator-Subject.” Journal of Film and Video 37, no (1985): 12–25 Droessler, Stefan “Reconstructing the German Version of Lola Montes.” Journal of Film Preservation 65 (2002): 5–17 Evans, Max Sam Peckinpah—Master of Violence Vermillion, S.D.: Dakota Press, 1972 Flaubert, Gustave Memoirs d’un Fou France: Librio Publishers, 2006 Fleischman, A S Yellowleg Greenwich, Conn.: Gold Medal, 1960 Flitterman-Lewis, Sandy “Psychoanalysis, Film and Television.” In Channels of Discourse Reassemble, edited by Robert C Allen, 203–46 London: Methuen, 1992 Foucault, Michel Discipline and Punish: The Birth of the Prison Translated by Alan Sheridan New York: Pantheon Books, 1977 ——— Power/Knowledge: Selected Interviews and Other Writings, 1972–1977 Edited and translated by Colin Gordon London: Harvester Press, 1980 187 Bibliography Freud, Sigmund “Civilization and Its Discontents” (1929) In Civilization, Society and Religion, translated by James Strachey, 243–340 New York: Penguin Books, 1985 ——— “The Economic Problem of Masochism” (1924) In On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis, translated by James Strachey, 409–26 New York: Penguin Books, 1984 ——— “Instincts and Their Vicissitudes” (1915) In On Metapsychology: The Theory of Psychoanalysis, translated by James Strachey, 105–38 New York: Penguin Books, 1984 Harris, Robert Interview with Scott Tobias A.V Club, March 1, 2000, http:// www.avclub.com/content/node/22892 Hayes, Kevin J., ed Sam Peckinpah: Interviews Jackson: University of Mississippi Press, 2008 Hilmes, Michelle “The Television Apparatus: Direct Address.” Journal of Film and Video 37, no (1985): 27–36 James, William Pragmatism In William James Writings 1902–1910, edited by Bruce Kuklick, 479–624 New York: Library of America, 1987 Jenson, Lee “Stella and Sam.” In Sam Peckinpah: Interviews, edited by Kevin J Hayes, 62–81 Jackson: University Press of Mississippi, 2008 Kael Pauline For Keeps New York: Dutton, 1994 Kerstein, Benjamin “The Last Man: An Epitaph for Sam Peckinpah.” Senses of Cinema 40 (2006), http://www/sensesofcinema.com/2006/40/sam-peckinpah/ Kierkegaard, Søren The Sickness unto Death Translated by Walter Lowrie New York: Doubleday Anchor Books, 1954 Kitses, Jim Horizons West Bloomington: University of Indiana Press, 1969 McKinney, Doug Sam Peckinpah Boston: Twayne Publishers, 1979 Meyer, Mark-Paul “Ethics of Archive Film Restoration Using New Technology.” Image Technology 7, no (1995): 8–12 Murch, Walter “Restoring the Touch of Genius to a Classic.” Reel Classics http: //www.reelclassics.com/Articles/Films/touchofevil-article.htm Murray, Gabrielle “Sam Peckinpah.” Senses of Cinema 20 (2002), http: //www.sensesofcinema.com/2002/great-directors/peckinpah/ Murray, William “Playboy Interview: Sam Peckinpah.” Playboy, August 1972, 65+ Nussbaum, Martha The Fragility of Goodness Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986 O’Connor, Flannery Wise Blood New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1952 Patalas, Enno “The Odyssey of the Battleship: On the Reconstruction of Potemkin at the Filmmuseum Berlin.” Journal of Film Preservation 70 (2005): 30–41 ——— “On ‘Wild’ Film Restoration.” Journal of Film Preservation 56 (1998): 28–38 Peckinpah Collection Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, Beverly Hills, California 188 Bibliography Peckinpah, David Samuel “An Analysis of the Method Used in Producing and Directing a One Act Play for the Stage and Closed Circuit Television Broadcast.” Master’s thesis, University of Southern California, 1954 Prince, Stephen Savage Cinema: Sam Peckinpah and the Rise of Ultraviolent Movies Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998 Rayfield, Donald Anton Chekhov: A Life New York: Henry Holt, 1997 Read, Paul, and Mark-Paul Meyer, eds Restoration of Motion Picture Film Boston: Butterworth-Heinemann, 2000 Seydor, Paul Peckinpah: The Western Films Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1980 ——— Peckinpah: The Western Films—A Reconsideration Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1997 Simmons, Garner Peckinpah: A Portrait in Montage Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982 ——— Peckinpah: A Portrait in Montage Rev ed New York: Limelight Editions, 1998 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre The Divine Milieu: An Essay on the Interior Life New York: Harper and Row, 1960 Tully, Tim “The Sounds of Evil.” FilmSound.org, http://filmsound.org/murch/ evil/ Originally published in Videography Magazine, January 1999 Weddle, David If They Move—Kill ’Em! The Life and Times of Sam Peckinpah New York: Grove Press, 1994 Williams, Gordon M The Siege of Trencher’s Farm London: Secker and Warburg, 1969 189 Contributors Michael Bliss teaches film criticism and English at Virginia Tech Bliss’s books include Justified Lives: Morality and Narrative in the Films of Sam Peckinpah, Doing It Right: The Best Criticism on Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” and Dreams within a Dream: The Films of Peter Weir He recently completed writing Martians, Metaphor, and Madness, a book on 1950s American science fiction films Gérard Camy teaches cinema studies as a historian and is a critic (in Telerama magazine and Jeune Cinéma) and writer He is the head of Carnot Film School in Cannes and the president of Cannes Cinéma, an institutional board presiding over the organization of cinema events throughout the city of Cannes Steven Lloyd has made sure that his nieces grew up unafraid of black-and-white movies Despite being a film purist, he has written essays for Video Watchdog and has spent most of his career as a television production technician Since 1969, his favorite director has been Sam Peckinpah Stephen Prince is a professor of film at Virginia Tech and the author of Savage Cinema: Sam Peckinpah and the Rise of Ultraviolent Movies His newest book is Firestorm: American Film in the Age of Terrorism Paul Seydor is a film editor and professor of cinema at Chapman University’s Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, where he teaches advanced editing and other aspects of filmmaking A former professor of literature at the University of Southern California, he is the author of the seminal critical study Peckinpah: The Western Films, which was updated, expanded, and published under the title Peckinpah: The Western Films—A Reconsideration Seydor has edited for several distinguished writers and directors, including Ron Shelton, Roger Spottiswoode, David Ward, Joe Sargent, Steve James, Kevin Sullivan, and Cyrus Nowrasteh on such films as White Men Can’t Jump, Cobb, Tin Cup, Play It to the Bone, Dark Blue, Hollywood Homicide, The Program, Major League II, The Wall, Passing Glory, Guess Who, Barbershop 2: Back in Business, Turner and Hooch, Time Flies When You’re Alive, This Christmas, and Obsessed He has twice been nominated for the American Cinema Editors “Eddie,” winning for The Day Reagan Was Shot He also wrote, directed, and edited the documentary The Wild Bunch: An Album in 191 Contributors Montage, which was nominated for an Academy Award for best achievement in a documentary short subject of 1996 In 2006, Seydor prepared a special edition of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid for the Warner DVD set Sam Peckinpah’s The Legendary Westerns Collection, for which he also provides part of the audio commentary He is presently editing a feature-length documentary for Lehka Singh and Roger Spottiswoode called Beyond Right and Wrong: Stories of Justice, Reconciliation, and Forgiveness Garner Simmons, a graduate of Colgate University and Northwestern University’s Graduate School of Communication for Television and Film, has worked in both television and motion pictures as a writer, producer, and director His biography on the late filmmaker Sam Peckinpah (Peckinpah: A Portrait in Montage) is still in print He has lectured both in the United States and abroad and has contributed commentaries for the DVDs of ten of Peckinpah’s fourteen features He is a member of the Writers Guild of America, the Writers Guild of Canada, the Directors Guild of America, and the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Married, he lives in Southern California Michael Sragow is the author of Victor Fleming: An American Movie Master, cowinner of the National Arts Writing Award for 2008 He has taught criticism at the University of California–Berkeley’s Graduate School of Journalism and was the 2010 Humana Visiting Scholar at Centre College in Danville, Kentucky He is a writer and an editor for the Baltimore Sun and contributes regularly to the New Yorker He has also written for Salon.com, the Atlantic Monthly, the New York Times, and Rolling Stone, among other publications He edited the Library of America’s two volumes of James Agee’s work, as well as Produced and Abandoned: The National Society of Film Critics Write on the Best Films You’ve Never Seen He lives with his wife, Glenda Hobbs, in Baltimore Cordell Strug studied philosophy at Purdue University and, through one twist of life after another, currently serves as a Lutheran pastor He is old enough to have seen the last movies of John Ford and Orson Welles in actual theaters He was once arrested by the FBI for Christian idealism Tony Williams is a professor and the area head of film studies in the Department of English of Southern Illinois University Carbondale He has recently published John Woo’s Bullet in the Head and has authored books on the American horror film, Larry Cohen, George Romero, and Robert Aldrich He is a frequent contributor to Asian Cinema 192 Index American Graffiti (1973), 83 Anderson, James, 61 Armstrong, R G., 19, 48, 53, 160 Aubrey, James, 83, 89, 90, 97, 104, 115, 116, 117, 123, 124 Ballad of Cable Hogue, The (1970), 2, 3, 4, 6, 36, 40, 41, 46, 102, 114, 135n34, 150, 161, 171, 173 Battleship Potemkin (1925), 82, 87, 89, 98, 99 Baudelaire, Charles, 36 Baudrillard, Jean, 153, 158 Baum, Martin, 72, 175, 177 Beck, John, 92 Berger, Senta, 170 Bigelow, Kathryn, 172 Bliss, Michael, 126 Boetticher, Budd, 53, 146n4 Brando, Marlon, 8, Brecht, Bertolt, 161 Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974), 20, 21, 34n1, 46, 52, 54, 56, 136n34, 148, 150, 160, 164, 171, 173, 180 Broken Arrow (TV series), Butler, Terence, 159 Caan, James, 166 Callenbach, Ernest, 28, 32, 166 Carroll, Gordon, 104, 112, 116, 133n8, 15, 20, 134n23, 25 Clavell, Aurora, 110 Clothier, William, 12, 20, 34n4, 167 Coburn, James, 84, 105, 114, 168 Cochran, Steve, 11, 17, 18, 23, 166 Coleman, Herbert, 98 Connors, Chuck, 49 Conversation, The (1974), 83 Convoy, 149, 164, 169, 175 Cook, Elisha, Jr., 108 Coquillon, John, 176, 181 Craven, Garth, 104, 108, 110, 115, 120, 121, 122, 123, 134n28 Crawford, John, 54, 55, 56, 58, 59, 60, 61, 65 Crawford, Johnny, 50 Cross of Iron (1977), 2, 4, 46, 56, 136n1, 135–36n34, 137, 139, 140, 143–46, 164, 168, 169, 170, 172, 181, 182 Davis, Peter, 175, 177 Dawson, Gordon, 54, 58, 61, 62, 64, 66 Deadly Companions, The (1961), 2, 3, 5, 6–35, 46, 164–74, 177, 180, 182 Deming, Robert H., 154 Dickens, Charles, 138, 139 Dukore, Bernard, 29, 35n37 Duvall, Robert, 166 Dylan, Bob, 107, 126 Eisenstein, Sergei, 87 Eliot, T S., 76 Emerson, Ralph, Ethics (Spinoza), 139 Evans, Max, 53 Fernandez, Emilio, 108 Fielding, Jerry, 2, 56, 140 193 Index FitzSimons, Charles, 7, 9, 10, 11, 17, 18, 19, 20, 23, 25, 26, 28, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34n4, 34n6, 34n7, 34n10, 34n13, 34n18, 34n20, 35n33, 35n35, 35n38, 166, 177 Fleischman, A S., 8–25, 16, 17, 19, 21–23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 30, 32, 33, 34n4, 35n30, 35n40, 165 Flim-Flam Man (1967), 53 Flitterman-Lewis, Sandy, 151–52 Flynn, Errol, 10 Fonda, Henry, 115 Ford, John, 168 Foucault, Michael, 160, 162 Fritts, Donnie, 103 Fukasaku, Kinji, 158 George, Susan, 70 Getaway, The (1972), 6, 46, 123, 125, 136n34, 170 Gillis, Richard, 55, 57 Godard, Jean-Luc, 139 Godfather, The (1972), 74 Goldsmith, Jerry, 55, 57, 60 Goodman, David Zelag, 70, 72, 76 Gunsmoke (television series), 46 Haber, Katy 23, 104, 116 Harris, Robert and James Katz, 98 Heinrich, Willi, 145 Hemingway, Ernest, 138, 140 Henney, Del, 72 Herrmann, Bernard, 98 Heston, Charlton, 166 Hilmes, Michelle, 156 Hitchcock, Pat, 98 Hoffman, Dustin, 70, 80 Hollywood Homicide (2003), 91 Holden, William, 166 Homolka, Oscar, 18 Hopkins, Bo, 166 Hurt, John, 148 194 Hutchison, Ken, 76 Hyde, Don, 111 James, William, 145 Jones, Len, 73 Jones, L Q., 52 Junior Bonner (1972), 56, 123, 150 Kael, Pauline, 69, 70, 73 Keith, Brian, 9–12, 14, 16–18, 20, 21 26–28, 165, 166 Kelley, Walter, 126 Kerstein, Benjamin, 159 Kierkegaard, Søren, 38, 39 Killer Elite, The (1975), 4, 46, 56, 137, 139, 140–43, 147, 148, 150, 151, 166, 177, 179, 180, 182 King Lear, 36 Kitses, Jim, 28 Kristofferson, Kris, 91, 103, 107, 133n8, 168 Lancaster, Burt, 151 Last Laugh, The (1924), 82, 98 Left-Handed Gun, The (1958), 109, 167 Levy, Don, 105, 111 Lola Montes (1955), 99 Ludlum, Robert, 147 Lyons, Richard, 50 MacGraw, Ali, 170 Major Dundee (1965), 1, 6, 14, 46, 48, 54, 82, 122, 135n30, 161, 164, 166, 169, 170, 172, 173 Mann, Anthony, 168, 171 Marnie (1964), 151 Martin, Strother, 19, 22, 53 McCrea, Joel, 168 McKenna, T P., 75 McLuhan, Marshall, 155 McPeak, Sandy, 151 Meisel, Edmund, 87 Index Melnick, Dan, 72, 104, 109–13, 115, 116, 118, 121–24, 128, 130, 133n13, 133n15, 134–35n28, 135n31, 135n32 Memoirs of a Madman, 174 Metropolis (1984 Moroder version), 87 Meyer, Mark-Paul, 88, 98, 99 Mulvey, Laura, 150 Murch, Walter, 83, 86, 98 Murray, William, 79 Nelson, Craig T., 153 Night Moves (1975), 147 Nixon, Richard, 154 Norton, Jim, 76 Noon Wine (1966 television film), 122 Nosferatu (1922), 82, 98, 99 Nussbaum, Martha, 137 Oates, Warren, 21, 52, 160 O’Connor, Flannery, 40 O’Hara, Maureen, 8, 10, 16, 17, 23, 26, 34n5, 166, 167, 170 One-Eyed Jacks (1961), 8, 53 Osterman Weekend, The (1983), 46, 56, 140, 147–63, 164, 174–83 Panzer, William, 175, 177 Passion of Anna, The (1969), 70 Passion of Joan of Arc (1928), 82, 99 Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), 1, 3, 4, 5, 6, 12, 48, 82–100, 101–36, 147, 148, 161, 164, 168, 179, 182 Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (2005 Special Edition), 4, 5, 84, 101–3, 119, 122, 123, 126, 129, 130, 135n30, 136n41 Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1988 Turner Preview Version), 82, 84, 85, 94, 95, 96, 102, 103, 104, 105, 120, 122, 123, 128, 134n28, 135n30, 136n38 Patalas, Enno, 87, 88, 97 Peckinpah, David, 50 Peckinpah: A Portrait in Montage, 6, 103 Peckinpah: The Western Films—A Reconsideration, 5n1, 34n14, 44n1, 47, 67n3, 102, 124, 132n34, 133n7, 133n16, 134n25, 136n37, 136n43, 163n9, 163n24 Penney, Edmund, 54–56, 58–61, 65 Pickens, Slim, 19, 53, 95 Powell, Dick, Psycho (1960), 150 Read, Paul, 88 Reagan, Ronald, 154 Redman, Nick, 101–3, 119 Rescued by Rover (1905), 88 Ride the High Country (1962), 2, 6, 12, 18, 22, 33, 39, 41, 47, 48, 50, 60, 61, 69, 72, 102, 135n34, 140, 160–61, 164, 167–69, 171, 172, 174, 176 Rifleman, The (television series), 16, 48, 51, 53, 54, 67n5 Robards, Jason, 52 Roeg, Nicolas, 77 Rowe, Hansford, 154 Ryan, Robert, 166 Scenes from a Marriage (1973), 76 Scott, Randolph, 72 Scott, Ridley, 83 Seydor, Paul, 5, 12, 47, 48, 83, 86, 87, 89, 90–93, 95–97, 153, 161 Shame (1968), 70 Sharp, Alan, 147, 175 Shaver, Helen, 160 Shaw, Bernard, 47 Shelton, Ron, 91 Simmons, Garner, 3, 52, 102, 104, 128 Skiles, Marlin, 166 Spottiswoode, Roger, 103, 105, 110, 111, 113, 115, 120, 123, 124, 128, 129 195 Index Stevens, Stella, 52 Straw Dogs (1971), 2, 4, 46, 54, 56, 69–81, 122, 123, 147, 150, 157, 171, 172 Susskind, David, 72 Swindlehurst, Joe, 177 Taylor, Dub, 96, 111 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 39–40 Tempest, The, 161 Thomsett, Sallie, 73 Touch of Evil (1958), 83–85, 98, 99 Trevor, Claire, 170 Trigger Happy (1965), 167 Ulzana’s Raid (1971), 147, 175 Vaughn, Peter, 74 Vertigo (1958), 98, 99 Warner, David, 52, 80 196 Warren, Charles Marquis, 49 Weddle, David, 21, 70, 89, 90, 97, 104, 147 Welles, Orson, 83, 86 Westerner, The (television series), 8, 9, 12–14, 17, 27, 53, 165 Whitney, Peter, 53 Wild Bunch, The (1969), 1–3, 14, 16, 36–44, 45, 46, 54, 56, 61, 69, 72, 82, 84, 102, 106, 112, 114, 119, 123, 132, 135n34, 136n42, 147–49, 159, 164, 166–69, 172, 182 Williams, Gordon M., 69–72, 80 Wills, Chill, 11, 17, 18, 23, 95, 166 Winner, Michael, 175 Wolfe, Robert, 83, 90, 105, 123, 124 Wurlitzer, Rudy, 105, 107 Yellowleg (novel), 7, Z Channel, 82, 103 Bliss FIL M ST U DIE S W ritten exclusively for this collection by today’s leading Peckinpah critics, the nine essays in Peckinpah Today explore the body of work of one of America’s most important filmmakers, revealing new insights into his artistic process and the development of his lasting themes Edited by Michael Bliss, this book provides groundbreaking criticism of Peckinpah’s work by illuminating new sources, from modified screenplay documents to interviews with screenplay writers and editors Included is a rare interview with A S Fleischman, author of the screenplay for The Deadly Companions, the film that launched Peckinpah’s career in feature films The collection also contains essays by scholar Stephen Prince and Paul Seydor, editor of the controversial special edition of Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid In an essay on Straw Dogs, film critic Michael Sragow reveals how Peckinpah and co-scriptwriter David Zelag Goodman transformed a pulp novel into a powerful film The final essay of the collection surveys Peckinpah’s career, showing the dark turn that the filmmaker’s artistic path took between his first and last films This comprehensive approach reinforces the book’s dawn-to-dusk approach, resulting in a fascinating picture of a great filmmaker’s work   A teacher of writing, literature, and cinema at Virginia Tech, Michael Bliss is the author or editor of eight books of film criticism, including Justified Lives: Morality and Narrative in the Films of Sam Peckinpah, Doing It Right: The Best Criticism on Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch,” and Dreams within a Dream: The Films of Peter Weir Cover illustrations: The ride out from Angel’s village in The Wild Bunch Printed in the United States of America 1915 university press drive mail code 6806 carbondale, il 62901 www.siupress.com Bliss cvr mech.indd $29.95 usd isbn 0-8093-3106-3 isbn 978-0-8093-3106-2 Southern Illinois University Press southern illinois university press Peckinpah Today: New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah “Peckinpah Today is evidence of Bliss’s reputation as an important Peckinpah scholar, bringing together essays of the most significant writers and researchers on this director and his work This collection will immediately generate enthusiastic interest, as it covers substantial new ground Peckinpah specialists, film scholars, fans, and buffs will all welcome this book.” —Gabrielle Murray, senior lecturer in the Media and Cinema Studies program, La Trobe University Peckinpah Today New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah Edited with an Introduction by Michael Bliss 4/2/12 10:55 AM ...Peckinpah Today Peckinpah Today New Essays on the Films of Sam Peckinpah Edited with an Introduction by Michael Bliss... Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Peckinpah today : new essays on the films of Sam Peckinpah / edited with an introduction by Michael Bliss... regards as the darkening path that Peckinpah’s artistic odyssey took him on Here, then, is Peckinpah Today: not just a collection of essays but a collaborative attempt to evoke the essence of the films