Will Penny, le solitaire

Not many people think of WILL PENNY when they think of the great westerns, but it certainly deserves to be remembered. A simple tale of an aging cowboy (Charlton Heston) being nursed back to health by a woman (Joan Hackett), and then having to protect her and her young son (Jon Gries, son of the director) from the slimy characters who left him to die, the film is headlined by a wonderful, understated performance from screen veteran Heston, undoubtedly one of his finest. Joan Hackett also gives a great, if somehow delicate, performance. Donald Pleasence is a delight as always as the sadistic Preacher Quint, and there's good support from Lee Majors (in his major film role), Anthony Zerbe and Ben Johnson (both of whom, sadly, never really get to do much), character actor Slim Pickens in a small role, and Bruce Dern in one of his countless villain parts. And Gries is good as the boy.

The cinematography is beautiful, especially once the story moves to the snow-covered terrain where much of the film plays out. A little slow at first, but the pacing soon picks up and moves nicely. My only complaint is that the film's score is at times overbearing and distracting, but not enough to ruin the enjoyment of the film. All together, a fine little gem of a movie that should be remembered if AFI ever does a 100 Greatest Westerns special.

The tough, lonely life of the cattle drover (as it really was) is briefly related in the ideal opening scene of Tom Gries' "Will Penny" with an aching Charlton Heston compelled, at the end of an exhausting cattle drive, to take a humble winter job in the cold bleak hillside... His turbulent, crude, oppressive - virtually celibate existence - is marvelously exposed by Gries...

Heston portrays with honesty and sensitivity, a middle-aged cowhand "free and easy" who ignores everything about farming... He is a lonely rider who takes his bath eight or nine times a year, and mends his own clothes... He is a "good steady hand" concerned for Mrs. Allen and her son but "bad scared before, and bad sorry after." He is also a helpless man with uncertain future, a sincere cowboy extremely sensitive...

"Will Penny" is an extraordinary film... Not only does it feature Heston's most sincere and sensitive performance, it has a fine supporting cast and is one of the most adult Western scripts ever written...

Joan Hackett portrays Mrs. Allen with strength and dignity, never collapsing beneath the strain of her tribulations...

Donald Pleasance is the most dastardly villain to grace the screen in many long years... He is mean, unkind, and slightly insane... Bruce Dern is equally effective as one of his sons, the psychotic who "handles a knife just fine."

Realistically spared, "Will Penny" is a straightforward and honest film, a sincere attempt to recreate the Old West, and, more important, the "mighty good men" who lived therein...

If any western that I have seen feels authentic to the old west it is "Will Penny". The Inyo County, California locations are wonderful and the cowboys at work scenes are refreshingly honest.

The basic storyline serves as a template to work more on character development and the cast (full of western stalwarts) do not disappoint.

Charlton Heston as Will Penny is on great form as the vulnerable, middle aged man of the plains. He is a little backward but unfailingly truthful and decent. He and his friends "Blue" and "Dutchy" represent the best principles of old west comradeship and his approach to Mrs Allen and her son "H.G" shows with tenderness what he has craved to have all his life but knows it is too late to embrace.

I found Donald Pleasence a bit over the top as the evil "Preacher Quint", but his portrayal is entertaining if nothing else. Ben Johnson, Slim Pickens and Lee majors all do a good job in support and Joan Hackett is completely convincing as the lone mother in search of a better life.

Very much a film for those viewers who like to experience, feel and be touched by a well written story and its characters.

A mature range-wandering loner named Will Penny (Charlton Heston) gets a job as cattle drive cowboy when he encounters his isolated cabin in high mountains is already occupied by a love-hungry mother (Joan Hackett) and her young son , they have appropriated when their guide to Oregon has deserted them. Too ashamed to kick the frontier husbandless and child out just as the cold winter of the mountains sets in, he lets to share the booth until the spring slowly thaws. Both of them developing a warm and touching relationship . But when Penny offends a family of outlaws (Donald Pleasence , Bruce Dern) they seek vengeance , come after him and menace his happiness along with the mother and her son.

Wonderful performance by Charlton Heston as aging cowboy , he considers this movie his personal best giving a realistic portrayal . Joan Hackett is memorably over-the-top as as the woman who forms a strong axis to Heston. Marvelous relationship between the lonely man and the mother who soon forget their mutual hostility and start developing a deep love for one another. Magnificent plethora of secondaries as Bruce Dern ,Ben Johnson , Slim Pickens , Anthony Zerbe , William Shallert , Luke Askew and special mention to Donald Pleasence as psychotic preacher , and introducing Lee Majors. Superbly photographed by Lucien Ballard on spectacular outdoors from Bishop and Inyo County California . Evocative musical score by David Raksin with emotive song at the beginning and the ending titled ¨the lone rider¨ .This elegiac motion picture is stunningly directed by Tom Gries though flopped in theatres . Tom was an expert director of Western as¨Breakheart pass¨ , ¨100 Rifles¨ ,and ¨Will Penny¨ that is the best work ever made ; Gries also directed other successes as ¨Breakout¨, ¨The glass house¨ and TV series as ¨QBVII¨ . Rating : Above average . Worthwhie watching .

This is a good, good movie..underrated & under appreciated....and somewhat largely unseen. Never a Heston fan....I was very pleasantly surprised & taken by his "Will"....he gives a fine, understated performance as the aging loner just looking for his next job..to get through the winter till he can hook up with a cattle drive in the spring. Heston is excellent, free of the melodramatics & overacting found in some of his other work. Will is an aging cowboy, a loner, an illiterate, faced with the prospects of a dim future. He is someone who realizes that he can't do anything else but what he has been doing all his life..he punches cattle because it's the only thing he's ever done, and the only thing he knows how to do......even as railroad tracks laid on the prairie indicate that time may be running out for the cowboy way of life. Nearing fifty, he has never learned to read or write, and existed moving from one job to the next...

Along the way..there's a chance encounter w/ Quint ....the psycho preacher and his degenerate sons, Rafe , Rufus , & Romulus..featuring Donald Pleasance in a maniacal..over the top performance.., & Bruce Dern as one of his loony sons. These guys could give the Hammond Brothers ("Ride the High Country") a run for their money.

There's also Joan Hackett, in a lovely, subtle, yet solid performance as Catherine Allen , a woman travelling across country w/ her young son, in search of her husband, who had gone on ahead ...through whom Will sees a life he never had..& never thought possible. The film is notable in that it presents not at all a romantic image of the West..Cowpunching not being a glamorous profession....not a lot of 'Yeehas' here... it's a life of solitude and hard work.. The work is brutal..., hired one day and out of work the next....... Yes..there is action..fistfights..gunplay & violence...but the first fistfight..shows us the kind of territory we're in...get it on..get it over with.. Here we see the kind of people who must really have inhabited the West..cowpunchers,.families looking for a better life... (sure, there were bounty hunters, bank robbers, marshalls...shootouts at High Noon..the OK Corral etc.) .....but this is more of a character study of people very much like us. In one of the gunfights...a cowboy sustains a bullet wound in a way that's atypical of western movies..but probably pretty typical of the real West.

Another nice touch is the "town" Will, Blue, & Dutchy ride into...many "towns" really did consist of nothing more than a couple of buildings ..a few shacks and a tent. The direction was superb; Lucien Ballard's cinematography added to the splendor of the story. ..filmed in the glorious Inyo Mountains of California.

The music in the movie is mostly uninspired , although by no means terrible or distracting..

Some fine, familiar character actors are here.. the can't be anything but great Ben Johnson appears as the top hand at the ranch where Will takes a job riding line... William Schallert, Clifton James, and Anthony Zerbe all deliver good performances. Lee Majors is passable.

In short.."Will Penny" is a film that deserves to be seen & enjoyed.. & savored.