Review of Major Dundee (1965) by Stuart K — 05 Aug 2013

Directed by Sam Peckinpah, who had come into film from TV, getting his feature film career off to a promising start with old fashioned westerns like The Deadly Companions (1961) and Ride the High Country (1962).

Then, he was offered this big-budget western by Columbia Pictures, from a story by Harry Julian Fink, which Peckinpah subsequently rewrote, making it a complex character study. It should have made him a megastar, but it's troubled production marred it's reputation.

In 1864, during the American Civil War, Union Major Amos Dundee (Charlton Heston) is relieved of his post after a tactical error during the Battle of Gettysburg, and sent to run a POW camp in the New Mexico territory.

It's here where Dundee is given a chance to redeem himself, after a cavalry is massacred by a band of Apache's led by Sierra Charriba (Michael Pate), Dundee gets together a group of mercenaries, chosen by Dundee and Irish Captain Tyreen (Richard Harris) to go into Mexico to track down Charriba and his men and get them dead or alive, but it's to be a long journey, and a physically exhausting one too.

It's a grand old adventure, and Peckinpah gets the best out of his cast, and there's some great vistas and shots in this film. Peckinpah's original cut was butchered after it's original release, but attempts have been made to restore it to how it should have been.