Butch Cassidy & The Sundance Kid - George Roy Hill
This is a bizarre film that riles against all the norms of story telling as well as the norms of the western and the rise of the anti-hero. When we follow a hero it is normally at the height of their career or the rise to that height.
We focus on the most interesting part of their journey and tell it in detail. Where we are looking at a longer career we would focus on the formative or most important parts. This film does none of this.
The End Of Their Story
The story proper starts at the end of their careers. This isn’t the rise of the notorious duo. This is the end of them – if this was the story of their lives this would be deep in the third act.
The tracking scenes are fantastic as the Kid and Butch put their best plans into action only to see the horsemen follow them perfectly – even over uncrackable terrain. These scenes are so good because we are with our heroes having no idea who is chasing them.
As their careers wane they fend off challenges. When they mount their next robbery they are met by a strange train that is carrying a group of horsemen that quickly dispatch all but Butch, Paul Newman (The Color Of Money & Cool Hand Luke), and The Kid, Robert Redford, (Ordinary People & The Sting).
The Unknown Villains
This is the meat of the story. The group of almost supernatural bounty hunters tracking our anti-heroes. They find out who is tracking them and that they have no escape so decide to flee the country.
This is the biggest down fall. A hero cannot face an opponent that they cannot beat. Not just an opponent that they cannot beat but one they won’t try to fight.
The tracking scenes are fantastic as the Kid and Butch put their best plans into action only to see the horsemen follow them perfectly – even over un-trackable terrain. These scenes are so good because we are with our heroes having no idea who is chasing them.
Sundance
We are introduced to the Sundance Kid in a typical scene in at a card game in a saloon. Nothing special but his shooting is special.
We quickly realise why everyone is terrified of him. He is something with a gun. Magnificent to behold.
You Cannot Tell This Story
At least not in this way. If you are going to tell the story of Butch & Sundance Fleeing these guys we need more impetus from the heroes. They need to want to stop the leader or the person who is paying them.
As soon as Butch & Sundance decide to just run away we don’t have a normal story anymore – they aren’t trying to change the world in which they find themselves – they accept it and just run away.
If you are going to tell this story it needs to be to the backdrop of a great plan of return or revenge. Butch & Sundance plan to return the states to take down the head of their adversaries. But there is no such plan and without this there is no story.
Archive Footage
The setup at the start of the film using ‘archive’ footage is an interesting touch to set the scene. Cassidy and the Kid are already famous.
When they decide to flee the US we cut to a weird montage of photo stills that tell the story of their flight from the US to Bolivia. Cool Photoshop skills but such a weird way to tell the story. We are watching a film right?
The rest of the story is about their escapades in Bolivia until their final stand off against the Bolivian army. Really this is a movie of set pieces and the creative team really couldn’t care less about what comes in between.
