The Wild Bunch (1969)

The Wild Bunch is a 1969 American epic Western film directed by Sam Peckinpah about an aging outlaw gang on the Mexico–United States border trying to adapt to the changing modern world of 1913.

Directed by Sam Peckinpah. With William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien. An aging group of outlaws look for one last big score as the "traditional" American West is disappearing around them.

Trailer for Sam Peckinpah's film starring William Holden

Sam Peckinpah's controversial revisionist Western takes place in Texas and Mexico in 1913, a transitional year when the Old West was giving way to the New West. The titular outlaw bunch, headed by ethical-in-his-fashion Pike (William Holden), continues staging violent bank robberies in their old, time-honored tradition. After a particularly brutal holdup in the town of San Rafael, the gang -- or what's left of it -- heads for the hills of Mexico, pursued by a posse led by Thornton (Robert Ryan), an old friend of Pike's. The gang discovers that the bank had been set up to be robbed by Thornton's railroad-executive boss Pat Harrigan (Albert Dekker), and that their booty consists of worthless metal washers. Meanwhile, the conscience-stricken Thornton seethes over Harrigan's scheme, which has cost too many innocent lives, but he is powerless to leave the railroad baron's employ lest he be sent back to jail. While hiding out in a Mexican village, the gang is engaged by corrupt general Emilio Fernandez to steal a huge shipment of guns from the U.S. Army. Like Thornton, Pike agrees against his will: his right-hand man Jaime Sanchez is being held hostage by Fernandez, who in turn is being manipulated by a pair of war-mongering German officers. More violence -- both justified and gratuitous -- follows, leading to a final blood-spattered confrontation between the Wild Bunch and 's posse. For many years, no one audience was privy to a

In an early scene of "The Wild Bunch," the bunch rides into town past a crowd of children who are gathered with excitement around their game. They have trapped some scorpions and are watching them being tortured by ants. The eyes of Pike (William Holden), leader of the bunch, briefly meet the eyes of one of the children. Later in the film, a member of the bunch named Angel is captured by Mexican rebels, and dragged around the town square behind one of the first automobiles anyone there has seen. Children run after the car, laughing. Near the end of the film, Pike is shot by a little boy who gets his hands on a gun.

The Wild Bunch (1969) is director/co-writer Sam Peckinpah's provocative, brilliant yet controversial Western, shocking for its graphic and elevated portrayal of violence and savagely-explicit carnage, yet hailed for its truly realistic and reinterpreted vision of the dying West i

Sam Peckinpah's epic Western tells the story of a bunch of aging outlaws who collude with a crooked Mexican general, leading to ugly bloodshed. Watch trailers & learn more.

Trailer for Sam Peckinpah's "The Wild Bunch" (1969), starring William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O'Brien, Warren Oates, Jaime Sanchez, and ...