Peckinpah: A Portrait in Montage

by Garner Simmons

“Sam Peckinpah is, by his own admission and that of almost everyone else in this richly entertaining book, a director who needs adversity to get the juices flowing. As shooting goes on, complications multiply and tensions increase. The wild man, fortified by booze and shots of vitamin B12, rides the whirlwind he creates firing the incompetents beneath him, baiting the ones over him, and bullying and testing and goading the rest...âThis book givesã a nuts and bolts account of the...complex interplay of power and art or movie and myth-making as practiced by an idiosyncratic but skillfull manipulator.” – New York Times Book Review

Genres: Biography, Film

332 pages, Paperback

First published November 30, 1982

Reviews

[Boris Lermontov · Rating 2 out of 5]

Decepcionante.

Ni es una biografía propiamente dicha (salvo los primeros capítulos) ni un análisis exhaustivo de su carrera. Más bien es una recopilación de declaraciones y datos que el autor recogió tras varias entrevistas con el propio Peckinpah y sus colaboradores, pero el resultado es demasiado superficial y no me da la sensación que ahonde como se merece en un personaje tan apasionante. Incluso si uno pretende centrarse solo en las películas, no se pueden entender sin contextualizar mínimamente el estado del western en la época y los cambios que estaba sufriendo Hollywood en los convulsos 60.

Además está pobremente escrito, añadiendo declaraciones que no aportan gran cosa ("¡Sam era un tipo cojonudo!") y en ocasiones fragmentos enteros de entrevistas (la de James Caan) o textos escritos por colaboradores suyos que rompen el ritmo y no son demasiado sustanciosos. Paradójicamente los capítulos dedicados a las dos películas en cuyos rodajes Simmons estuvo presente - Alfredo García y Los aristócratas del crimen - son de los más aburridos, una especie de diario de rodaje que combina anécdotas divertidas con hechos rutinarios explicados sin mucha gracia.

Por otro lado la forma como introduce a los diferentes actores/implicados es extrañamente torpe, haciéndonos saber en el caso de Jack Nicholson que es el actor de Chinatown y Mi vida es mi vida como si alguien no supiera quién es, atreviéndose a afirmar que la obra cumbre de la carrera de Joel McCrea es Duelo en Alta Sierra o yéndose extrañamente por las ramas. Mi momento favorito es cuando nos dice que Monte Hellman iba a ser el realizador de Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid y nos aclara que es el director de culto de Carretera asfaltada en dos direcciones (OK, un dato relevante para situarlo), película en la que aparece el cantante de folk James Taylor (esto no creo que aporte mucho)... ¡el cual fue portada de la revista Time! ¿Qué importancia tiene que James Taylor fuera portada de la revista Time en una biografía de Peckinpah?

¿Es un libro interesante? Sí, pero porque Peckinpah y su cine son apasionantes. ¿Es recomendable para fans del director? Sin duda, pero literariamente es pobre. Me he quedado con ganas de buscar otro libro que le haga realmente justicia.

PD: en el prólogo Simmons tiene la honestidad de explicar cómo Peckinpah leyó el primer borrador del libro y le dijo que no estaba muy bien escrito y que debería usar a un colaborador externo, a lo que él se negó. Aunque teóricamente mejoró el manuscrito, no me extraña que a Peckinpah no le entusiasmara el resultado.

[Adrian · Rating 3 out of 5]

The style of this biography is pretty pedestrian - Peckinpah himself is quoted as saying the author couldn't write worth a damn - but that's not always an issue with portraits of artists. There's more than enough stories and vernacular flavour from the various contributors to make this worth a read for anyone interested in old-school directors. The parallels with John Huston's life are clear, and the two men shared a genius for casting that means the book itself is populated by people who are more than just actors and film technicians - they are people who survived Peckinpah's various personality tests, and the strength of character and humour they bring to the book is priceless.

[Charles Veley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Unforgettable

Kudos to Garner Simmons for bringing his seminal work on such a renowned director up to date. This version has more photos and more detailed essays, but with the same emotional wallop and insights. If you still get chills when you remember that iconic last walk of American bandits Holden, Borgnine, Oates and Johnson, side by side, guns at the ready, resolved to rescue or avenge their Mexican friend Jaime Sanchez, you will be grateful for this book.

[Jamison · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is one of those books you want to refer to after watching the films it covers. sam peckinpah is an interesting character, and it's great to be able to see his motivations, and how he tries to find a message in all his films, even the lightweight "convoy."

[Stephen Hughes · Rating 3 out of 5]

I like this book a lot, but it can't hold a candle to David Weddle's "If they move, kill 'em!" or Paul Seydor's 'Peckinpah: The Western Films'.

[David Brimer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A thorough analysis of Peckinpah’s oeuvre that neither gets too deep nor remains too shallow.

[A Cesspool · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant | Exhausting | Definitive

An expansive and expertly updated memoir for one of cinema's finest & greatest -- requisite reading for cinephiles and Peckinpah fandom alike.
If Akira Kurosawa's Something Like an Autobiography is my favorite filmmaker biography, then A Portrait in Montage is the Best, imo.

[Kecia · Rating 2 out of 5]

I dated a man in college who was dreamed of being a film critic and was a huge fan of westerns. He told me that "The Wild Bunch" was the most perfect western ever made. He gave me this book about his hero Sam Peckinpah. I enjoyed it enough at the time. The only thing I remember about is that "The Wild Bunch" is the most perfect western ever made. Too bad I don't like westerns.

[José Vicente]

Interesante biografia de este chalado "genio". No aporta mucho nuevo pero su estructura por films anima a revisar su impresionante filmografia con un poquito mas de luz. No decepciona para nada y se disfruta bastante.

[Joe Faust · Rating 3 out of 5]

As interesting as Peckinpah was, this is a disappointment - more an inventory of his work than a look at the man's personality and creative process.

[Sandy Peckinpah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a true, insightful, and honest biography of Sam.