Author Description

One of the most colorful, innovative and controversial film directors of the 60s and 70s, Sam Peckinpath is best known for the challenging classic western The Wild Bunch. It epitomizes a style that was uniquely his and that marked such other Peckinpah films as Ride the High Country, Major Dundee, Straw Dogs and Junior Bonner. In their cool but fevered view of conflict, they all reflect the character of Peckinpah himself, as it is revealed in this incisive and deeply informative book. Garner Simmons, television and screen writer who served on the set of two Peckinpah films, spent ten years researching the definitive biography of his sometime mentor. He interviewed Peckinpah himself at great length, and talked candidly with such co-workers as Jason Robards, Steve McQueen, Ali McGraw, Charlton Heston, Dustin Hoffman and Kris Kristofferson, as well as with various film executives and technicians. Their words - sometimes outraged, sometimes loving, always lively - enhance Simmons's vivid portrait of a complex, intuitive near-genius who, believing that creativity can be born only out of turmoil, was always prepared to cause it.