A West beyond blood and guts

Sam Peckinpah’s Legendary Westerns Collection

(Warner Home Video, $60 for the set; $20 to $27 each)

THE mastery of the controversial, iconoclastic director is represented in this collection of four of his westerns: 1962’s “Ride the High Country,” 1969’s “The Wild Bunch,” 1970’s “The Ballad of Cable Hogue” and 1973’s “Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid.”

Ride the High Country

Working as a scriptwriter in the 1950s on such westerns as “Gunsmoke” and “The Rifleman,” Peckinpah created, directed and produced the acclaimed but short-lived 1960 series “The Westerner” starring Brian Keith. After directing a small film with Keith called “The Deadly Companions” in 1961, Peckinpah got to direct this “B” western for MGM and turned it into an “A” classic.

Veteran sagebrush stars Randolph Scott and Joel McCrea were already cast when Peckinpah was hired, and he gets tremendous performances from the old-timers as aging former lawmen who have fallen on hard times -- McCrea’s noble, honorable Steve Judd is fashioned after Peckinpah’s father, a well-respected attorney.

The film beautifully explores the themes Peckinpah touches on again and again in his best films -- friendship, betrayal, illusion versus reality and the dying of the West.

The strong supporting cast includes Mariette Hartley in her film debut, as well as James Drury, Edgar Buchanan and Warren Oates. Lucien Ballard, who would work with Peckinpah on several films, supplied the cinematography. Scott and McCrea retired after “Ride the High Country,” though McCrea later returned to Hollywood for 1976’s “Mustang Country.”

Extras: All the DVDs in this collection feature astute, passionate commentary from Peckinpah scholars and documentarians Nick Redman, Paul Seydor, Garner Simmons and David Weddle, who discuss the history of the film and what significant touches Peckinpah brought to the production. Redman’s new documentary, “A Justified Life: Sam Peckinpah and the High Country,” is a nostalgic, tender and frank reminiscence of the director by his sister, Fern Lee Peters.

The Wild Bunch

After having his 1965 film “Major Dundee” taken away from him in the editing process and being fired from two films (including “The Cincinnati Kid”), Peckinpah returned to Hollywood with a vengeance with his seminal western, which opened a new frontier in terms of screen violence.

Penned by Walon Green and Peckinpah -- who received his only Oscar nomination for the screenplay -- “Wild Bunch” tells the downbeat tale of a group of desperados who want to pull off one last big heist. William Holden, Ernest Borgnine, Robert Ryan, Edmond O’Brien and Ben Johnson are among the stars. Jerry Fielding supplied the landmark score, and Ballard provided the harshly evocative cinematography.

This is a digitally remastered anamorphic transfer of the 1994 restoration.

Extras: The two-disc set includes commentary from the Peckinpah scholars, who discuss how this film changed their lives and why it is a masterpiece.

The second disc includes several outtakes -- without any soundtrack; a fascinating documentary, “Sam Peckinpah’s West: Legacy of a Hollywood Renegade”; “The Wild Bunch: An Album in Montage,” another exceptional documentary, which features behind-the-scenes footage and explores how Peckinpah came up with the climatic shootout sequence; and a too-short excerpt from Redman’s documentary “A Simple Adventure Story: Sam Peckinpah, Mexico and ‘The Wild Bunch,’ ” which follows the filmmaker and the other Peckinpah experts on a pilgrimage in 2004 to the Mexican locations used in the film.

The Ballad of Cable Hogue

Peckinpah keeps the violent streak in check in this retelling of the story of Job. Jason Robards plays the title character, a wanderer who is double-crossed and left to die until he finds a watering hole near a stagecoach line. Stella Stevens and David Warner also star.

Extras: Commentary from the Peckinpah experts and a new interview with Stevens.

Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid

Peckinpah’s original vision for this elegiac western wasn’t realized upon initial release. Then-MGM studio head James Aubrey simply wanted a shoot’em-up, but Peckinpah envisioned the film more as a character study of former friends who chose opposite sides of the law. The film was rushed in postproduction, and an ending was tacked on that Peckinpah didn’t like.

In 1988, the Z Channel showed what is now called the “Turner Preview” version of the film, which was Peckinpah’s initial cut. The two-disc DVD includes the “Turner Preview,” as well as a 2005 cut, put together by Seydor from Peckinpah’s notes and discussions with the director’s colleagues, which includes scenes from the theatrical and the 1988 versions

Kris Kristofferson, James Coburn and a mumbling Bob Dylan in his film debut -- he also penned the score -- star.

Extras: The Peckinpah scholars offer lively, informative commentary on the 1988 and 2005 versions of the film. There are also two new documentaries, “Deconstructing Pat and Billy” and “One Foot in the Groove: Remembering Sam Peckinpah and Other Things,” which features Kristofferson discussing his career and relationship with Peckinpah.

-- Susan King