New Mexico

The Deadly Companions is one of those star produced vehicles, in this case unofficially by Maureen O'Hara although her brother Charles Fitzsimmons is the nominal producer. According to her memoirs she wanted Brian Keith as her co-star, but Keith wanted Sam Peckinpah to be given his first shot at directing a feature film. O'Hara agreed much to her regret.

The film is an interesting and most adult western. Keith is a Union army veteran whose thrown in with a pair of ex-Confederates, Steve Cochran and Chill Wills. But he's also got a mission to avenge a scar given him by a former Confederate sergeant in a brawl. Still he takes his time as he believes as that revenge is a dish best served cold.

While stopping over at a town where the three are contemplating a bank robbery, some other robbers beat them to it. Keith, Cochran, and Wills shoot it out with the others, but in the process Maureen O'Hara's son is killed by Keith.

The grieving widow is determined to take her son's body back to a place that is now a ghost town and the way is through Apache territory. Keith agrees to accompany her out of obligation, Cochran has his hormones in overdrive and Wills goes along for the ride. These are not three guys I would want to be out on the trail with and they prove it soon enough.

Given all that happens to them and the characters that Peckinpah develops, they all should have died on the trail. There's violence enough in The Deadly Companions, but Peckinpah had not yet developed one of those slow motion violence ballets he would later use to great effect in The Wild Bunch.

Peckinpah didn't like the film, he preferred to think of Ride The High Country as his cinematic debut. O'Hara didn't like the film and doubly didn't like Peckinpah. In this she echoed Charlton Heston who had a similar opinion, though Heston gave Peckinpah his due insofar as talent was concerned. Both thought he had a screw loose. O'Hara also said he didn't have a clue as to how to direct a feature film his experienced crew carried him along. I would say he learned though.

But for this film I have to agree with Sam and Maureen. It really is quite mediocre.

This film made by Sam Peckinpah (126-1984) , a Westerned himself from ranch-land in North Fork and it tells about an ex- North soldier (Brian Keith) from Ohio, as he meets a pair gunslingers (Steve Cochran and Chill Wills). When spontaneously a wild bunch attacks a gold purchased store he accidentally kills a woman's son . She's a dance hall's woman (Mauren O'Hara) and decides head to Siringo with her dead son , the village where was murdered her husband in an Apache raid . Brian Keith with a dark past under his hat and a guilty feeling for inadvertently killing , Chill Wills as a boozy ex-south soldier and Steve Cochran as an outlaw , escort the funeral procession along a dangerous journey into Indian territory until arriving in Siringo with adobe houses (similar sets to ¨Rio Bravo¨) where is developed the exciting final duel .

This is the Peckinpah's first feature , since years before he was soon involved in TV westerns , he wrote several episodes of ¨Gunsmoke¨and other Western television series , directing some episodes and he created ¨The Westerner¨ with Brian Keith and the successful ¨Rifleman¨ . Posteriorly , losing no opportunity , he made an enormous impression with ¨Deadly companions¨ filmed in Arizona . The movie was produced by Charles Fitzsimons (Carousel production) , Mauren O'Hara brother , who realized an excessive edition control and Peckinpah complained himself about ending result and especially on a no-sense final showdown . The producers found it very difficult to get financial backing for the picture due to subject matter : carrying a dead child in a coffin throughout the film , but they refused to change the story . Based on the success of the novel, Yellowleg , on which the film is based, Pathe America was persuaded to co-finance the film along with the Theater Owners of America and it was distributed by Pathe-America Distribution though went immediately bankrupt . Splendid cinematography -though being necessary a right remastering- by the Western expert , William H Clothier , he was usual in John Wayne films (Train robbers , Big Jake, Rio Lobo , Undefeated , El Alamo) and John Ford movies (Cheyenne Autumnm, Man who shot Libert Valance , Horse soldiers, Donovan reef). The film achieved a moderate success, although it was nothing to the stir he caused with his next work and most popular ¨Ride the high country¨ with Joel McCrea and Randolph Scott that lift him as the peak of popularity . The picture was well directed by Sam Peckinpah and its rating is better than average .

Sam Peckinpah , after beginning his career as a writer , he was soon involved in TV Westerns . Filming popular Western series as ¨Rifleman¨ , subsequently moving into pictures in 1961 giving fine impression with his first one , ¨Deadly companions¨ . After that , he did the prestigious ¨Ride the high county¨ that along with ¨Wild Bunch¨ , at the peak of his popularity , remain Sam's best films . Later on , he made ¨Major Dundee¨ that was heavily re-cutting . He subsequently filmed tougher-than-tough action movies , including gushing blood and guts with particular images in slow-moving , such as : ¨The getaway¨ , ¨the killer elite¨, the most popular ¨Straw dogs¨ , Convoy¨, and ¨The Osterman weekend¨ , until his early death .

This film is best seen as an apprentice work, falling neatly between Peckinpah's TV work (The Rifleman etc), and the string of Western masterpieces that began with Guns in The Afternoon/Ride the High Country. For the only time in the director's work there is no sense of the 'old West' passing, as Peckinpah still works broadly within the established Western tradition - one which he would shortly transform and make his own.

Brian Keith and O'Hara work surprisingly well together, even though in the light of the director's later work the insistance upon a strong and sympathetic female co-lead seems uncharacteristic. Apparently Maureen O'Hara's role in producing the film influenced the emphasis and development of her role.

The film suffers from a poverty of budget (most noticeable in the opening scenes where the bar room appears cramped and two dimensional), as well as over-insistent musical score - one which occasionally detracts from the rhythm of the film. The trademark Peckinpah montage editing has yet to make itself felt and, very unusually for this director, the first few moments of the film seem (to this viewer) slightly rushed and confusing - almost as if Peckinpah is just finding his feet, sketching on a larger canvas than he had previously been used to.

Peckinpah fans will find much to enjoy here, though: the character of 'Turkey' (played by Chill Wills) is as colourful and as rounded as any of the minor low-life characters that appear in the later films. He even hides a 'Major Dundee' military cap under his coat, - in retrospect one which can be seen as an appropriate cinematic "embryo". Even with a limited budget, the film is always in safe hands, the story intriguing and ironic. Riding into town, the desperate trio see a group of children playing and mildly tormenting each other - another Peckinpah trademark. When the desperadoes are confronted by a frontier prayer meeting, the anticipation of the grander meeting at the beginning of 'The Wild Bunch' is obvious. The preacher is in fact the first in a long line of religious failures and bigots featuring in Peckinpah's films.

Perhaps the biggest surprise to those used to Peckinpah's work is the lack of violence (even the end shoot out, although effective, is somewhat muted). Peckinpah, it seems, had yet to discover the stylistic hallmark which later was to mark his career in controversy.

Produced by Maureen O'Hara's brother,in order to recharge his sister's career,Sam Peckinpah did not like this film.O' Hara sings on the cast and credits and at the end of the movie.It's strange to see this par excellence Fordian heroine on Peckinpah's territory.

But you do not have to be a Peckinpah fan to enjoy this crepuscular western (Peckinpah is not my cup of tea as far as western are concerned;give me Ford,Daves,Walsh,Mann instead).If there had been problems between the director and his star,the movie did not suffer for it.

It is a good western but be warned: it's a gloomy one.The story begins with the death of a dancehall girl's child ("He was all I loved in this world" she would say later).THe movie looks like a long funeral ;it's a long way to the place where the boy must be buried in his father's grave.It's difficult to tackle a sadder subject.

Another great moment is O'Hara's and Keith's arrival in the ghost town,searching for the grave.Often filmed at dusk or in the darkest night,this film is also a story of redemption,of forgiveness.

For fans of Sam Peckinpah, there's little to recognize of the legendary director in his first movie. Yes, it's a western featuring a morally compromised protagonist (Brian Keith), and Chill Wills plays the first of many bat-guano crazies in the Peckinpah canon. But there's a lot that's different.

Maureen O'Hara stars as a woman who loses her son in a bank robbery gone awry. Keith plays a guy named "Yellowleg", the Union Civil War vet who shot the boy and tries to help her bury him while working in some revenge on the side. There's some shooting and horseback riding, too, but Peckinpah's hard-edged humanism and iconic visual sensibility have yet to arrive.

Keith is the guy more in command of this film. "I hear they got a new bank and an old marshall over at Gila City," is the way Yellowleg frames his outlaw pitch to Turkey (Wills) and Billy (Steve Cochran) at the start of the film. Tough but sly, Yellowleg asserts his authority without the slightest sign of strain.

"You givin' the orders now?" Billy asks him.

"Looks that way, don't it?" is the reply.

O'Hara is more of a problem. Her character, Kit, wants to bury her boy in a ghost town deep in Apache country, and could care less about the danger to herself or others. O'Hara frequently played stubborn characters, but few as unrelievedly serious as Kit. Her manner grates as the film goes on and she seems more put out by the idea Yellowleg might not think she was married to the boy's father than the fact her boy is dead.

It's possible O'Hara's performance suffered from a lack of communication with her director. It's said that the producer, O'Hara's brother Charles B. Fitzsimons, forbade Peckinpah to talk to her on set, then fired the director before editing began. This could account for the fact her scenes never gel with the rest of the film.

I'm reluctant to judge the film too much by its look and feel. The version I saw, part of the "Maureen O'Hara Collection" put out by St. Clair, seems to be a pan-and-scan lifted from a TV print and was possibly edited for commercials. Certainly the film jumps around a lot.

Some blame must fall on either Peckinpah or Fitzsimons. The score is both mediocre and idiotic, soft mariachi music playing while Billy assaults Kit or a lame rendition of "When Johnny Comes Marching Home" playing whenever Turkey goes off on one of his rants about creating his own republic complete with "slave Indians". At one point we are asked to believe Yellowleg walking into a camp of sleeping Apaches to steal a horse without getting caught.

Keith reveals himself here as a worthy lead. He worked with Peckinpah on TV shows and would have been an excellent talent for the director on screen. His loss was Warren Oates' gain. You do get the great Strother Martin as one of Peckinpah's few-ever positive religious figures, turning a bar room into a "preach house" and telling Yellowleg and company to take their hats off to the Lord. Moments like that lift the film from being the muddy genre exercise it otherwise is.