PG, 88 min.
Director: John Sturges
Writer: Elmore Leonard
Starring: Clint Eastwood,
Robert Duvall, John Saxon, Don Stroud, Stella Garcia, James Wainwright, Paul
Koslo, Gregory Walcott, Dick Van Patten, Lynne Marta, John Carter, Pepe Hern
I did my part this past
weekend to pass on the great tradition of the western. I feel I haven’t
instilled it enough in my first three children, so I decided to start early
with our latest edition. This weekend I sat down with my youngest (2½ mos) and
watched a Clint Eastwood western.
“Joe Kidd” is the only one I
had yet to see. One of those films that’s been sitting on my nightstand for
decades in the “to see” pile. I don’t really know why it has escaped me for so
long. The pedigree behind it is phenomenal. Director John Sturges was
responsible for such classics as “The Great Escape” and “Bad Day at Black Rock”
as well as western classics like “The Magnificent Seven”, “Blacklash”, and
“Gunfight at the O.K. Corral”. Screenwriter Elmore Leonard is a legend of American
literature whose stories were responsible for such westerns as “Hombre” and not
one, but two excellent versions of “3:10 to Yuma”.
Then there are the stars. Of
course there’s Eastwood, who was well established by the release of this film
as the premiere star of the western genre. John Saxon was a popular heavy
throughout the 60s, 70s and 80s, although his heavy here isn’t quite so heavy.
Robert Duvall was hot off “The Godfather”—released earlier that year—and is
still a frequent western collaborator.
Yet somehow, all this
pedigree leads to a merely good movie. I knew “Joe Kidd” wasn’t some sort of
classic of the genre, otherwise it wouldn’t have taken me this long to see it,
but it’s hard not to think it should’ve been better considering the parts of
the whole.
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