Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1969, George Roy Hill)

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is often compared to Sam Peckinpah’s The Wild Bunch. In both films the main characters are outlaws who are expelled from their home country by advancing civilization and are killed in a bloody shoot-out with federal troops of a Latin-American country; both movies tell a story of people who have outlived their time, but while Peckinpah's movie is often called a 'dirty western', George Roy Hill's movie has a more gentle reputation.

Cassidy and Sundance are members of the historic Hole in the Wall gang. Cassidy (Paul Newman) is the gang's leader and mastermind, Sundance (Robert Redford) his fast-drawing lieutenant. The opening credits are shown alongside a fake sepia-colored newsreel about their exploits, suggesting that these guys belong to another era, are part of a world that has disappeared. 

The narrative begins in medias res: we see the two men at the height of their criminal career: Sundance playing cards and showing his skills as a gunslinger, Cassidy kicking a gang member (who challenges his leadership) in the groin and making a bike ride with Sundance’s girlfriend. When they're not robbing trains or banks, they're having a good time, but the mood changes when the train company puts a super posse on their trail. Cassidy’s repeated question ‘Who are those guys’ emphasizes the growing concern of these two men on the run. They finally manage to escape by jumping of a high cliff into a river, but their glory days are over.

When Butch and the Kid move to Bolivia - chased by 'those guys' from the posse - they  immediately start robbing banks again, and soon they are known as the ‘Yankui’ bank robbers and have their faces up on walls. Unlike her two friends, Etta (Katharine Ross) knows their days are counted and there’s nowhere left to go now. Not willing to see them die, she departs. From this moment on, the tone really turns sour. In a desperate attempt to escape their fate, the boys accept a regular job as payroll guides, but they are recognized in a town they have previously robbed and surrounded by an immense force of government troops. Significantly, the film ends with a freeze frame. Modern times have arrived. These guys have become a memory. A still picture.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid was an immediate success and became one of the most successful westerns in history; it won four Oscars and nine British Academy Film Awards. Some reviewers had reservations at the time of release: they thought William Goldman’s script was too jokey and the mid-section – the ‘who are those guys’ posse – was too long. Some of these objections still hold, but the movie is helped enormously by the charisma of two leads and Conrad Hall’s breathtakingly beautiful cinematography. Hall chose a very pleasing autumnal color palette for the happy days back home, more subdued colors during the posse sequence - the heroes’ Twilight of the Gods -  and strong, harsh colors for the grand finale in Bolivia. Often called a superfluous musical interlude, the bike ride on Burt Bacharach’s ‘Raindrops keep fallin’ on my head’ underlines the care-free lifestyle of the duo, and the finale, culminating in the famous freeze frame, is truly mesmerizing. It’s one of those cinematic experiences you never forget.

Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid is a more complex movie than one would say at first glance: Its serio-comic tone and sophisticated look may give you the idea that it's an optimistic, gentle movie, but in reality it's a tragedy and as such it's more radical than The Wild Bunch: in spite of all the blood-letting, Peckinpah’s movie is at heart a romantic tale, glorifying the old code of ethics of those men who have become obsolete. Butch and Sundance are simply cornered, they have no ideals, they don't give their life for a gang member, they remain what they are, and will be remembered for what they were.

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References:

* Paul Simpson, the Rough Guide to westerns

* Edward Buscombe, 100 Westerns

* Phil Hardy, The Aurum film Encyclopedia: The Western

* Philip French, The Western

Butch and Sundance, both sitting, Sundance on the left, Butch on the right