Pat Garrett & Billy The Kid

Wednesday 26 February at 7.30pm

Sam Peckinpah | USA | 1973 | 117 mins | M violence & sex scenes

Trading ultraviolence for introspection, Peckinpah’s final western follows newly minted lawman Pat Garrett across the American West as he stalks his old friend, Billy the Kid.

“Sam Peckinpah’s cycle of genre-redefining westerns came to a close with this blood- and dust-caked elegy for the American West, which marries his renegade style with a fatalistic sense of finality. As newly minted lawman Pat Garrett (James Coburn) stalks the outlaw Billy the Kid (Kris Kristofferson) across the plains, their old friendship is twisted into rivalry, and mythic ideals of freedom come up against an emerging ruling-class order—all to the strains of a haunting soundtrack by Bob Dylan (who also appears as the mercurial Alias). Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid—presented here in a new 4K digital restoration of the 50th Anniversary release—stands as perhaps the maverick auteur’s richest, most mature work, a world-weary ballad that bears the solemn weight of history passing into legend.”—Criterion