Wednesday, March 11, 2009

The wild bunch

Two things caught my attention in this movie, the apparent lack of values in everyone in the movie and the tension between the characters in most of the scenes. From the begging the wild bunch seemed to me as a group of American bandits with a code of honor that kept its members from betraying each other but with no ideological purposes."The wild bunch" was full of drunk, violent, macho men, who mistreated women and killed innocent people. However, it was no clear to me if they attacked the American town only to get gold or if there were other reasons.

The tension between the characters was present in almost every scene. The Americans who leaded the militia seem to be in conflict all the time. I think that the battle leader was involuntarily in charge of the military and therefore his opinions were ignored by the old-town-owners. I think he was actually like the "Wild bunch" but he was imprisoned and forced to serve the police and flip sides. He was also in conflict with his soldiers because they did not have the spirit of "the warrior" and only fought for money.

The wild bunch seemed to have a lot of internal problems as well. Its members kept arguing all the time. Obviously they also had a problem with the General Mapache who seem stupid and weak to them. Finally, the General Mapache and the revolucionarios had their own war going on.

The end of the movie changed my mind about the lack of morals of the wild bunch. I thought that the wild bunch valued friendship highly and that is why they killed general Mapache. I think that the Wild bunch saw the spirit of the warriors on Angel and the revolutionaries hence when they saw little posibility to escape gloriously and their lives sourounded by cheap prostitutes and solitude they did not mind to die for Angel's cause.

I also found interesting the theme of prostitution. I think prostitutes have appeared in every movie we have seen and I think that desire and sex work are an essential aspect of mexican culture and mexican representations. I thought that mexican women survived best being prostitutes and even when they weren't getting paid they were trading their body for mercy, acceptance and protection.

3 comments:

Jon said...

"The end of the movie changed my mind about the lack of morals of the wild bunch."

Indeed. Isn't the pre-eminent value here that of loyalty?

elena said...

I agree that the movie showed a lack of values between the characters,and also that the end showed their commitment for each other, especially since it contrasted to earlier scenes where they want to shoot the weak people in their groups, and in one case they want to leave him there without a burial.

Unknown said...

Its interesting to contrast between Pike's gang as being loyal to each other and sticking together to the end and Deke's gang as they are looking out for only their own interests as Deke later abandoned them after he got what he wanted..his freedom.