User Reviews

**SPOILERS** Coming across like a combination between "The Searchers" and "Wild Bunch" the western revenge movie "The Hunting Party" never quite matches, in blood gore and bullet ridden body's and body parts, either one of those movies. Not that it lacks the vital ingredients of both but because it's so ridiculous that you have a hard time believing it.

Riding through the town of Ruger outlaw Frank Calder, Oliver Reed, and his gang of desperado's kidnap Mellissa Ruger, Candice Bergen, for the sole purpose, in mistaking her for an elementary school teacher, of teaching Frank to read! It seems that Frank wants to read about his exploits in the newspapers besides looking at the pictures and comic-strips in them. As this is happening Mellissa's old man that the town of Ruger is named after Brandt Ruger, Gene Hackman, is out on a train trip with his millionaire friends to gun down wild game with this new high powered, that can hit its targets at 800 yards, and telescopic rifle that he gave his friends for a present for going on the trip with him. Getting the shocking news that his old lady, Mellissa, had been kidnapped Brandt shoots right back to Ruger, with his not too willing friends, to track and gun down Mellissa's kidnappers as well as save her from a fate worse then death; Being gang raped by Frank and his motley crew.

Gunning down, at long range, most of Frank's men Brandt is shocked to later find out-from one of them- that his pretty and abused, mostly by him, wife has fallen in love with that dirty foul mouth and illiterate slob Frank Calder! By then most of Brandt's men, who are still left alive, decide to call it quits knowing that saving Mellissa is no longer worth their effort. Since she's been stricken not only by Frank's both charm and rugged good looks, not to mention his wild animal-like body odor, but the Stockholm Syndrome, a kidnap victim falling in love with his or her kidnapper, as well. Only Brandt's good friend, the only friend he now has left in the world, Matthw Gunn, Simon Okland, decides to go along with him on his mission to rescue his wife who in fact doesn't want to be rescued by him.

The film ends with a one on one confrontation between Frank and Brandt in the Mojave Desert with Matthew Gunn having by then come to his senses and checked out of the movie. With the big winning prize, since by then a couple dozen persons had been killed over her, being non other then Brandt's kidnapped wife and Frank's lover the beautiful and now suffering from a serious case of sun stroke Mellissa Ruger!

Not that bad of of film if you don't take it at all seriously and just watch it for laughs which I think that "The Hunting Party" was really intended for. The most moving and at the same time tragic scene in the movie had nothing to do with it's female star-whom everyone was killing themselves over-Candice Bergen but one of Frank's gang members Doc Harrison, Mitch Ryan.

***SPOILER ALERT***Badly wounded and dying Doc begged his good friend Frank to put him out of his misery which he didn't have the heart to do. Finally not being able to take it, Doc's groans of agony, anymore Frank did what he had to do but with both deep regret and apprehension. The way Frank did it would literally blow you, like it did Doc, completely away!

Something like "The Hunting Party" wouldn't be for everybody. With all of the slo-mo gunshot wounds, the sight of various victims in agony, and the element of rape rearing its ugly head more than once, some people are going to find it unappealing and unendurable. Still, those who are big fans of "The Wild Bunch", and don't mind stories with a nihilistic feel, should find this to be somewhat interesting.

Oliver Reed (oddly cast, but not bad) plays Frank Calder, an American outlaw whose gang kidnaps Melissa Ruger (Candice Bergen), a young woman married to rancher Brandt Ruger (Gene Hackman). As the story plays out, she actually becomes more attached to Frank, because her relationship with Brandt is not a loving one. Brandt is an extremely determined man, so when he gets wind of Melissas' kidnapping he swings into action, using a revolutionary high powered rifle and his hunting buddies as the rest of his posse.

We'll see that, for all of his flaws, Frank has a sensitive, caring side, and is really a more appealing character than Brandt, who doesn't so much care for his wife as get angry that his property was taken from him and will get "spoiled".

Only some draggy pacing ("The Hunting Party" doesn't need to be quite as long as it is) works against the film. It's a viscerally effective experience that may have the viewer fascinated in spite of themselves. The evolving relationship between outlaw and wife forms the core of the story, and Reed & Bergen play it very well. Hackman is solid in a cold-blooded true force-of-nature role (who lines up his victims as if they're game) and the supporting cast includes such familiar faces as Simon Oakland, Mitch Ryan, L.Q. Jones (in one of his most depraved roles ever), William Watson, and G.D. Spradlin. It's extremely well shot, at wonderful locations throughout the desert of Spain. It actually doesn't miss an opportunity for humour as Reed and Ryan tease the hungry Bergen by eating peaches in front of her, but for the most part it's a *very* sobering film all the way to its ending. The train with the bordello is a rather amusing touch. The music by Riz Ortolani ("Cannibal Holocaust") is absolutely beautiful.

This one doesn't seem to be too well known nowadays, so Western fans who can take a lot of blood and unpleasantness would be well advised to seek it out. You certainly don't come away unaffected after watching this.

Seven out of 10.

I wonder if this film doesn't have pretensions to art. Maybe not, but it's evident that someone went to the trouble of thinking up some novel variations on the usual conventions.

We've seen a number of movies before -- the posse or the revenge party pursuing somebody across harsh terrain -- "Tell Them Willie Boy is Here," "Three Godfathers", "Chato's Land," and so on -- but this is the only one I can think of offhand in which each party -- pursued and pursuer -- changes its attitude towards the other.

About two dozen cowboy roughnecks led by Oliver Reed and including the bad L. Q. Jones and the good Mitchell Ryan kidnap the bride of the wealthy Western entrepreneur and big game hunter, Gene Hackman. Hackman hears about this while on a train, after banging a Chinese hooker, and, man, is he mad. He fantasizes the gang will rape Bergan repeatedly, impregnate her, and then sell her back as damaged goods. So he forms a posse of half a dozen friends, arms them with telescopic rifles that will outshoot any existing rifle by twice the range.

Nothing much new there, except that instead of an outraged groom, Hackman has revealed himself as a stark materialist and a rather rough lover. But then Hackman's group gradually find themselves within range of the kidnappers after a long chase through some extremely picturesque mountains, badlands, and desert scrub. The kidnappers have no idea anything is up until a couple of them get shot by rifles too far away to see.

Here's where somebody put some thought into the script. Ordinarily, in an ordinary Western, the convention is that when you are shot, you die. They may shoot your horse instead, but then the horse gets up with an irritated look and trots off unharmed. If you are only wounded, you get away and, if you're a good guy, you recover the use of your gun hand.

Not here. A wound is intensely painful and your buddy can't always pluck out the offending bullet, no matter how much mescal you drink or how hard the praying Padre holds your arms down. If they're mortally wounded the victims just don't flop down and lie there. They twitch a little before they kick off. The horses don't get up if they're hit, although they're definitely horse de combat. (Apologies. The voices make me do it.) They jerk their heads and legs and whinny. The first kidnapper to get shot has his head blown off while taking a dump.

Hackman treats all this as a hunting party. And one or two of his posse smile as they take pot shots, especially G. D. Spradlin. What they don't know is that Bergman has been scared out of her wits after the kidnapping but when she seeks comfort in the arms of the stolid Oliver Reed, he roughly rapes her. Then she falls in love with him. (I said it was artistically ambitious, not that it was politically correct.) The others in Hackman's party realize what's happening and leave. "It's not worth it," shouts Simon Oakland, the least likely cowboy you're ever likely to see, but he's right. Nevertheless, all the gang die except Reed who, along with Bergman, is reduced to trekking through the vastness of the desert, horseless, until they collapse. Their hopes in ruins, they murmur about plum trees and grapes in California, until the shimmering image of an equally horseless Hackman appears. He shoots both of them dead and collapses to wait for death.

Hackman is always fine, either as bad guy or good guy. Oliver Reed, with his hoarse mutter and eternal scowl, is hard to place. Candace Bergen isn't given much opportunity to act. She looks (1) wary, (2) distressed, or under stress, as when being raped, (3) shocked and surprised. You can tell because her mouth opens and she screams, "Oh, oh, oh!" She's so staggeringly beautiful that it hardly matters. Her long loose blond hair is always immaculately brushed and lustrous. What would happen to your hair and mine under those circumstances does not happen to hers. As an actress, she labors under the same disadvantage as some other actresses -- like Kathleen Ross and Jane Fonda. She sounds like she just graduated from some classy school like Sarah Lawrence.

There's a misplaced semi-comic incident involving canned peaches that the musical score, a sprightly banjo, tells us is supposed to be funny, but it's not.

There may be an occasional wince while watching this but it's not a bad film. It's at least interesting all the way through.

I managed to get an uncut version of this rare western, and I thought it was very engaging. Now, I will freely admit that the screenplay is full of holes (like: How does the party know what Oliver Reed's character looks like? Why doesn't Hackman kill Reed when he has the chance? Why won't Reed admit defeat?) which definitely prevent this from becoming the epic, sweeping western it is obviously trying to be. (As well, most of the main characters are written poorly.)

Yet at the same time, I was immediately hooked and engaged until the end credits started. Though the movie has all of those above faults (and more), there is some really good stuff here. The locations... photography...production values... are all top-notch. And whoa, all of that violence! The bloddy shootouts and sniper attacks give Sam Peckinpah a real run for his money. People who don't like westerns probably won't like this movie, but western fans like myself will likely embrace it, flaws and all

Oliver Reed is an outlaw, Frank Calder, and along with his rugged brood, swipes a cattle baron's wife, and lives to regret it. The cattle baron is Brandt Ruger(Gene Hackman), his wife, Melissa(..the lovely Candice Bergen). So Ruger assembles a group of his friends as a hunting party to seek after Frank and his outlaws, not knowing until much later that Melissa has become quite attached and affectionate towards her kidnapper. This indeed drives Ruger over the edge and there'll be hell to pay before he's through.

I'll be honest, the stale plot isn't earth-shattering, and even though the movie results in a bleak, uncompromising, and tragic manner, it's pretty predictable. But, if you want your fix of bloody violence with plenty of people blown away by long range rifles(..mostly by Hackman, who's a crack shot), then "The Hunting Party" might just be what the doctor ordered. It has plenty of familiar faces. LQ Jones a sleazy scoundrel who, while in a drunken high, attempts to rape Bergen, getting his medicine(..what she doesn't complete, Hackman sure as hell does), with Mitchel Ryan as Reed's compadre, Doc, who is gut shot, but lives on the brink of death for damn near an hour as the group move from territory to territory seeking a town physician to pull the bullet buried inside him.

The major problem with this western is that you kind of have no one to really side with. Hackman, understandably so, becomes so bloodthirsty, that he alienates those who accompany him on the quest to find Reed. We don't really spend a great deal of time with him, either, so we have little real time to get to know him all that well. He very well could be a disaster of a husband which might explain why Bergman responds so passionately eventually to Reed. We do recognize a friction between the Rugers, and it's visible how Brandt treats her as a prize no one but can claim, but still, Frank isn't exactly the greatest substitute, now is he? But, that scene where Reed forces himself on Bergman is hard to watch, and, despite the fact she succumbs to his desires, that rape does tarnish any sympathy one might have in his favor.

The film seems to side with Reed, though, as Hackman just continues to shoot down his men, picking them off in intervals, and we follow them as they grow more weary, their tempers tested due to the fact that they are dying because of a broad. Simon Oakland(..who I consider to be one of the finest television actors in the history of the small screen, his face recognizable across all genres, particularly in the 60's and 70's, most notably, "Kolchak The Night Stalker") is well cast as Matthew Gunn, attempting to be a voice of reason for Ruger, trying to talk some sense into him, especially after it's realized that Melissa has chosen Frank over Brandt. But, it's obvious that Brandt isn't a man to lose any property that's his to anyone, much less an outlaw whose life has been about stealing and killing. Like a lot westerns coming out in the 70's, I reckon "The Hunting Party" suffered as the genre was starting to wain, it very much an example of "The Wild Bunch" influence.

The Hunting Party is a very simple movie. Really, it's just Gene Hackman chasing the bandits who kidnapped his wife. But what makes it special is how bleak and immoral it is. Candice Bergen's character escapes her sadist husband through kidnapping only to fall into the arms of Oliver Reed's character who isn't all that much better than her husband was. Apart from the kidnapped wife there really is no character you can root for in this movie. You feel sorry for her but you feel nothing when Hackman and his band mow down the outlaws that kidnapped her with no remorse. And you don't want her to return to him as he will probably kill her anyway.

This is a rare movie that is truly devoid of any moral lesson. Really, there is no point the movie is trying to make apart from maybe showing that everything is hopeless and that humanity is doomed to behave like beasts until we go extinct. Bergen's character kind of falls in love with Reed's character but I never bought the romance as more than a means to escape her husband and a kind of lesser evil option. Normally in such a movie the outlaw would turn out to be better than expected and the two love interests would ride into the sunset together but that's not the case here. The ending is perfect in that everyone dies and no one gets a happy ending because such a thing was impossible. This move is just pure bleak exploitation and I can understand how it's not for everyone. However, as much as I can appreciate an uplifting movie a la Spielberg I can also appreciate a movie that doesn't try to preach any message and is just pure mindless violence with no moral core.