It feels like... times have changed

A fatally wounded Slim Pickens knockin' on Heaven's door in Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid... I mentioned to someone last week that Peckinpah's film was my all-time favourite American western and with that in mind, I revisited the film earlier today, and one screening later the film is now elevated to my all-time favourite Western, American, Italian or otherwise, elbowing The Good the Bad and the Ugly from the top slot. Today's screening was fortuitous for one particular reason - among Pat Garrett's legendary cast is Gene Evans whom I watched just yesterday in Sam Fuller's 1952 film Park Row. And watching the film again today I couldn't shake the idea that Kris Kristofferson in 1973 would have made a tremendous Jim Morrison, far better that Val Kilmer I think. And I love Peckinpah's cameo as a man who refuses a drink. Favourite line of Rudy Wurlitzer's brilliant dialogue is courtesy of R.G. Armstrong playing another of Peckinpah's brutish God-fearing men, "I got my shotgun full of 16 thin dimes. Enough to spread you out like a crazy woman's quilt."