disinterested_spectator This is an uneven movie. It begins with Paul Newman playing Billy the Kid as a borderline simpleton who somehow acquires a normal intelligence by the end of the movie. The first half of the movie is manic, with Billy and his two sidekicks talking loud, acting silly, and laughing at things that are not funny, probably because they are drunk, but ends as some kind of overwrought, psychological melodrama. I think it's called Method Acting.This movie would have us believe that we are seeing a demythologized version of this character from the Old West, but it depicts all his killings as being justified, and when he is shot by Pat Garrett, he has no gun in his holster, so he really is not beaten to the draw, all in keeping with the traditional mythology.I have an idea. Why not make a movie in which Billy the Kid is an evil scumbag? That would be some serious demythologizing.

AaronCapenBanner Arthur Penn directed this obscure(and umpteenth) filming of the story of Billy The Kid(William Bonny) Paul Newman(utterly miscast) plays Billy as a misunderstood and pensive youth who merely wanted to avenge the death of his employer, an expatriate Englishman and cattle rancher murdered by a corrupt sheriff and his men because they didn't want the competition. Billy hunts down and kills the men responsible, but becomes a wanted criminal as a result. His friend and lawman Pat Garret(played by John Dehner) reluctantly pursues him, as Billy's fame grows... Terrible film is unbearably slow and uninteresting; a real chore to sit through, and misinformed title makes it look even worse!

alexandre michel liberman (tmwest) I had a problem seeing this film because I could not accept Paul Newman's performance as Billy the Kid. He was such a great actor, but in this film he overacts. I decided to see it again and was glad that I did it because you have to place a film in the time it was made. This is what I read in a print of a poster for the film published in the book "The Western" by Phil Hardy :"This is William Bonney, a juvenile "tough" from the back-alleys of New York...a teenager wanted dead or alive throughout the West. This is the screen's first real story of the strange teen-age desperado known to legend as "Billy the Kid..." By seeing this ad it becomes obvious that there was an idea at least in the publicity of the film to move "The Wild One" and "Rebel Without a Cause" to the West. Probably this kind of performance was demanded of Newman. The film is far from perfect, but has many qualities, the main one that it makes us understand very well Billy's internal conflicts. Billy here is an open book, compared specially to Kris Kristofferson' s unpredictable Billy. Same goes for Pat Garret. Considering what was made before, including the awful "Freudian" version "The Outlaw" and what came after,Peckinpah's excellent film and both "Young Guns" "The Left Handed Gun" stands up quite well.

kenjha Billy the Kid seeks revenge for the murder of his employer. This oft-told tale gets the psychological treatment in this account based on a play by Gore Vidal. Newman replaced first choice James Dean, and seems to be doing a Dean impression of the misunderstood youth, along the lines of "Rebel Without a Cause." Since Newman was rarely guilty of overacting, the blame here must fall on Penn, directing his first film after years of "playhouse" work on TV that encouraged exaggerated acting. Furthermore, the film is choppy and drab looking. Penn of course got better with experience. The biggest joke is that Billy the Kid was actually right handed.