Review of Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974) by Zoran S — 13 Sep 2008

Though not his most technically accomplished filmâ??as it is sloppy in its editing and photography in many momentsâ??this is nonetheless Sam Peckinpahâ??s best work. It also certainly is one of the grimmest and nihilistic American films of the 1970s.

Warren Oates is brilliant as a drunken piano player named Bennie, who in order to collect a bounty on the recently deceased Alfredo Garcia, digs up his body and brings his head to the crazed rich man who wants it.

(Alfredo Garcia impregnated his daughter before dying.) The scenes with Bennie mumbling drunkenly, talking to Alfredoâ??s head in a bag (which is collecting flies) are darkly funny and unnerving at the same time.

By the end of the film, Bennieâ??s only meaningful connection to the world is with the head in the bag. After all, as the final image reminds us--a close up of the barrel of gunâ??we are all doomed to fall apart in the end.