The Ballad of Cable Hogue
1970, R, 121 min. Directed by Sam Peckinpah. Starring Jason Robards, Stella Stevens, David Warner, Strother Martin, L.q. Jones, Slim Pickens.
REVIEWED By Marjorie Baumgarten, Thu., Oct. 28, 1999
This eight-part film series dedicated to a reassessment of Sam Peckinpah’s career is curated by local access TV’s Show With No Name and runs through Dec. 16. Also featured in the series are rare screenings of some of Peckinpah’s TV work and a monograph put together for this series by some of the top writers on Peckinpah in the country. The Ballad of Cable Hogue is one of the best and most lyrical (not counting the saccharine theme song, “Butterfly Morning”) Peckinpah films on record. It’s an elegiac tale about a desert rat who finds water where there shouldn’t be any and becomes an entrepreneurial American individualist. Jason Robards shines in one of his most touching and humorous performances, and David Warner is memorable as a sinning preacher man. Peckinpah, himself, has called Cable Hogue possibly his favorite film.
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Louis Black, Dec. 2, 1999
Marjorie Baumgarten, Nov. 24, 1999
The Ballad of Cable Hogue, Sam Peckinpah, Jason Robards, Stella Stevens, David Warner, Strother Martin, L.q. Jones, Slim Pickens
