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Very well executed

the audience applauded

Fresh and Exciting

Strong acting helps the film overcome an uncertain premise and create characters that hold our attention absolutely.

Let me start to say that i'm not keen of remakes, but like John Carpenter's upgrade of "The Thing from Another World" ('51) directed by Howard Hawks, in his horror cult classic "The Thing" ('82), Roger Donaldson's taking on Peckinpah's cult classic, "The Getaway" fares better in some points, except that without the original to serve as a guide, the movie wouldn't even exists.After "Junior Bonner" ('72), released early in the same year, McQueen and Peckinpah joined together again for another venture on screen, this time adapting the Jim Thompson's crime pulp novel, starring the then 42 years' old McQueen, and his mistress 33 years' old Ali MacGraw, then married with producer Robert Evans ("Chinatown").Peckinpah's gritty visual style, the use of frantic chases, slow motion shoot outs and well staged on-screen deaths are patent here and he don't disappoint in that matter, except the narrative is a bit messy, the editing is poor in places (some unnecessary scenes went on forever) and the characters lack juice.McQueen never needed to do much: his working class rudeness, but strangely attractive and gracious "screen persona"; his display of sarcastic humour; shy appearance, but sweating machismo at the same time and physical acting made his performances seemed naturally effortless and understated and that worked wonders in such movies as "The Magnificent Seven" or "The Great Escape" and even when he truly acted from his soul like in his only Oscar nominated role, "The Sand Pebbles" ('66) and his underrated performance as the title character in "Papillon" ('73).Here as Carter "Doc" McCoy, McQueen made more use of his tough guy star power (and his own major ego) than the method acting skills that allowed him and Martin Landau to have been the only 2 students out of 2000 to be accepted in Actor's Studio back in '55.Now don't get me wrong, McQueen is one of my all time favorite actors and always a riot to follow, even a not so good McQueen is way better than a lot of actors doing their best on-screen, but here he was paired with his real life lover, Ali MacGraw, who seriously lacked acting range, and he looked and acted more concerned about her and their relationship than the characters they were playing and the respective storytelling.Peckinpah was always plagued with problems on the set of his films, the majority due to his own self destructive bad behavior and alcoholism and the constant clash between him and the producers or the actors he was directing (like in the ill-fated "Major Dundee") and "The Getaway" was not an exception to the rule, he and McQueen disagreed and had different views about how the movie could be and the end result was more of a McQueen's film than Peckinpah's (or even Jim Thompson's) vision of it.Troubles and some low points aside, "The Getaway" still delivers the goods as an action / crime / drama / heist flick from a way influential (as much as controversial) filmmaker, which his techniques and visual style influenced a lot of future brilliant directors such as Walter Hill, William Friedkin, Michael Cimino, John Carpenter, Roger Donaldson or John Dahl.Now, comparing with the remake, the Donaldson's movie was undeservedly bashed by critics and i find it just a case of picking on the newly weds, Baldwin & Basinger's media attention, because the '94 version is better in those aspects:Alec Baldwin was good and credible as Doc, even if he wasn't McQueen, but Kim Basinger is a way better actress than Ali MacGraw and tops her as Carol McCoy.James Woods is way more sleazy and had more screentime than Ben Johnson, who was too nice and harmless for Jack Benyon and only had a couple of scenes, his character is forgettable, but not because of the actor's fault, Johnson was one of the best character actors that ever lived, i blame it on the screenplay and direction.Cool cat Michael Madsen presents Rudy here as a ruthless "Mickey Rourke-ish" rogue biker and acts circles around Al Lettieri, who was a too ugly, without style and brute criminal that it's hard to believe why Sally Struthers would fell in love with him, but Madsen gave Rudy an edge, the viewer will hate him and sympathize with him at the same time and he have a great on-screen chemistry with Jennifer Tilly which was also better than Struthers.Richard Farnsworth, Philip Seymour Hoffman (in an early screen role), Burton Gilliam & David Morse were all more memorable than their counterparts, the Peckinpah's stock actors: Slim Pickens, Bo Hopkins, Dub Taylor and the other guy that i can't even recall the name.Hill's screenplay on the remake gives early on an antagonism between "Doc" and Rudy and it's way more justifiable the consequent betrayal.The pacing and editing are a lot better, Donaldson shortened the chase that starts at the station and then through the train, that in the original ran for too much time, and have less of bland moments such as Ali's snail reacting to McQueen's dialogue or actions.The final shoot out is much more suspenseful, stylized and entertaining as well as violent in terms of deaths, but strangely the general mood it's way more lighter than the gritiness visual style of the original and in that matter, the '72 version takes the prize, because it was made in the 70's and the Lucien Ballard's cinematography is better than Peter Menzies Jr., no doubts about that.Last, but not least, Donaldson's creative change of "Doc" as a dark haired G.I. model-type of an anti-hero & Carol as a 40-ish blonde bombshell and Rudy as a long haired red / blonde biker & Fran as a "girl next door" brunette, the complete opposite of the two couples in the original film.In short, i give the same rate to the original movie and the remake, because i love them both and the creative team of Walter Hill / Roger Donaldson had all the work and motivation to study the Peckinpah's film and enhanced the more negative aspects, delivering then a more well-structured piece of work, but without the '72 version used as a lighthouse to compose the shots, sequences and mend the narrative, it would never have been done, so....

In the 1930s and 40s, quite a few heist films were made. However, due to the tough Production Code, the movies were amazingly non- violent and evil always was punished eventually. Starting in the 1960s with films like "Bonnie and Clyde", the studios changed the genre completely. Now, because of this films and a few other violent films of the era, bad guys could be anti-heroes, the violence level was cranked up several notches and the audience in many cases had no idea if evil would ever be punished. Director Sam Peckinpah benefited from this new film morality and "The Getaway" is a film in this new tradition...a tradition where the line between the good guys and the bad is DEFINITELY blurred!When the story begins, Doc McCoy (Steve McQueen) is in prison for his part in an armed robbery. When he comes up for parole after four years, he's denied...yet, oddly, the decision is reversed and he is freed. Why? Because the Warden is organizing a bank robbery and he needs Doc's skills. Unfortunately, many things go wrong in the robbery and folks involved in the holdup start dying. This is only the first third of the film and the final portion involves Doc and his wife (Ali McGraw) and their attempt to get away scot-free.With Sam Peckinpah and being made in the 1970s, it's not at all surprising that this film is violent and several gallons of blood are spilled. According to IMDb, the director and his notoriously difficult leading man argued a lot during the filmmaking...and the studio always backed McQueen. I assume had Peckinpah been SOLE director it actually would have been even bloodier. But like you'd expect in a McQueen picture, there is LOTS of driving mayhem...lots of shootouts...lots of action. It's like all the action of "Bullit" and a dozen other McQueen films shoved into one! Now this is not to say there isn't much in the way of story...there is. And it has enough novelty that it keeps the viewer wondering what's going to happen next. Well worth seeing, though if it has a fault that it is a tad overlong and the action seems a bit more important than the plot.By the way, Slim Pickens makes an appearance near the end...and it's VERY memorable!

Before watching "The Getaway," I thought it would be a decent, entertaining, 70s-style action film - not a classic, but a solid, enjoyable movie. Steve McQueen was known as one of the first "cool" movie stars, and rightly so. Sam Peckinpah was known for directing movies that were violent, stylish, and fast-paced. With "The Getaway" he scored one out of three. What little violence there is isn't even entertaining, since it's not "action," per se, but rather criminals murdering other criminals.For a story about bank robbers on the run from the police and other criminals, "The Getaway" is surprisingly lifeless and anemic. The plot has no drive or momentum. There are a couple of head-scratching segments that seem completely out of place, as if the screenwriter ran out of ideas and had to stop and think for fifteen minutes before writing the next scene. On top of all that, Steve McQueen and Ali MacGraw both play unsympathetic characters, and the numerous scenes with Al Lettieri and the woman who becomes his hostage/lover just hurt your eyes."The Getaway" has no redeeming qualities: it's boring, it's unpleasant, it's sleazy, it's too long, and the plot makes little sense. In fact, if this movie had been made with an unknown director and unknown cast, it's unlikely that it would be known today at all. That's how bad "The Getaway" is.

My first Peckinpah movie, and it's easy to understand how he became such a name filmmaker. Dude's a hard-nosed bastard. "The Getaway" has a sinister undercurrent from top to bottom. McQueen's a bank robber of the mean son-of-a-bitch variety, often berating and slapping around wife Ali McGraw (whose dubious acting ability is hard to miss). and then there's Sally Struthers, and if you've only known her from those '90s correspondence school commercials (as I do), you're in for a shock. Here, she's a chesty nympho. See what I mean? Stuff was crazy in the '70s. And then Slim Pickens shows up in a getaway ride (with an unexpectedly nice ending).It's not the greatest heist movie out there, but there's plenty of McQueen cool to keep one interested. And both the train chase and the ballsy shootout ending are quite memorable.7/10