Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid

Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (1973)

Timing: 1:56 (116 min)

7.185/10
379

All about film

Video 2

Photo 29

Actors and characters

Release date

1973-05-23

Country

United States

Production

Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer

Genre

Western

Budget

$4 638 783

Revenue

$11 000 000

Website

Director

Sam Peckinpah

Actors

James Coburn, Kris Kristofferson, Richard Jaeckel, Katy Jurado, Chill Wills, Barry Sullivan, Jason Robards, Bob Dylan, R. G. Armstrong, Luke Askew
All actors and roles (10)

Scenario

Producer

Gordon Carroll

Operator

John Coquillon

Composer

Bob Dylan

Artist

Audition

Patricia Mock

Editing

Roger Spottiswoode, Richard Halsey, Robert L. Wolfe
All team (41)

• The film was Bob Dylan's first acting role, and he also composed the film's music.
• By the time filming began, director Sam Peckinpah (1925-1984) was already suffering from alcoholism to such an extent that every morning he seriously reached for the bottle to alleviate involuntary tremors. This continued until he became too drunk to continue filming. According to actor James Coburn, Peckinpah was only more or less coherent for about 4 hours a day.
• Due to a technical malfunction with a lens, one of the Panavision cameras became unusable. Director Sam Peckinpah had requested a camera repair technician for the film crew from MGM studio from the very beginning, but his request was denied, so the technical defect of the lens was not discovered immediately. Eventually, the lens was replaced, and a technician was even sent on a permanent basis, but by that point, filming had fallen behind schedule and exceeded the approved budget (due to the need to reshoot footage taken with the malfunctioning camera).
• The role of Billy the Kid was offered to Al Pacino, but it turned out he couldn't ride a horse, and he was also uncomfortable with the director's reputation.
• Sam Peckinpah was gradually removed from working on the film, and MGM company president James T. Aubrey (1918-1994) ordered the film's runtime to be reduced from 2 hours and 4 minutes to 1 hour and 46 minutes. As a result, the film was released in this “castrated” version, to the great displeasure of the actors and crew, and flopped with critics and at the box office.
• The uncut version of the film miraculously survived because a copy was stolen from the projectionist's booth before James T. Aubrey's subordinates finished their work on shortening the film.