Interesting story about a rodeo star who goes home is deliberately paced by Sam Peckinpah

ma-cortes

A modern-day Western, Junior Bonner is a director Sam Peckinpah's lovely effort, feeling look at the world of the rodeo. Steve McQueen, engagingly easygoing but obstinate , is the title character, a rodeo rider out to win a big bull-riding competition in his hometown called Prescott. The rodeo champion works rodeo circuit contest , as the has-been rodeo star trying to make it big again. McQueen is a drifter who returns his small town and he strives to preserve his values in an often harsh modern world. McQueen decides to raise money for his father's journey towards Australia by challenging a formidable bull whose owner is Ben Johnson.

Peckinpah's slow-motion camera , his usual trademark,is put to particularly nice utilization shooting the balletic movement of the rodeo, at once more splendidly and awe-inspiring than any gun battle. An enjoyable country-western , Junior Bonner is lovely directed by Sam Peckinpah as an elegiac perspective at the world of the rodeo . Steve McQueen turns in an excellent acting as a drifting rodeo star who is searching in a changing world for values that have long time disappeared. He also must deal with his feuding parents, and selfish brother wonderfully performed by Robert Preston, Ida Lupino and Joe Don Baker. Robert Preston is particularly fine as the old veteran, he and Ida Lupino strike real sparks. Furthermore, it contains an emotive score by Jerry Fielding , Peckinpah's usual, and colorful cinematography by Lucien Ballard. An agreeable country-western with marvelous interpretations and exciting rodeo footage including slow-moving images and a much quieter movie than habitual from ¨Cross of Iron¨,¨The getaway¨, ¨Wild bunch¨ , ¨Major Dundee¨ director Sam Peckinpah.

score 6/10

ma-cortes 11 May 2010

Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw2248085/