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List Price: $14.98 | | Label: MGM (Video & DVD)
Salesrank: 16926
Released: May 25, 2004 |
| Our Price: $3.65 |
| Used Price: $2.95 |
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MPAA Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
Steve McQueen is at his "rugged best" (Entertainment Today) in this "totally captivating" (Leonard Maltin) tale of a fading rodeo champion from acclaimed director Sam Peckinpah and screenwriter Jeb Rosebrook. Co-starring Robert Preston and Ida Lupino in "excellent, well-turned" (Variety) performances, Junior Bonner is "an extraordinarily graceful yet unflinching rendering of a slice of Americana" (Los Angeles Times). With his bronco-busting career on its last legs, Junior Bonner (McQueen) heads to his hometown to try his luck in the annual rodeo. But his fond childhood memories are shattered when he finds his family torn apart by his greedy brother and hard-drinking father. Now Junior must break the wildest bull in the West to bring his family togetherfor one final moment of cowboy glory in the roughest, rowdiest ride of his life!
Description of Junior Bonner:
Junior Bonner is director Sam Peckinpah's lovely, elegiac look at the world of the rodeo--and his only film with nary a bullet wound. Steve McQueen, engagingly easygoing but determined, is the title character, a rodeo rider out to win a big bull-riding contest in his hometown. Even as he confronts his dwindling days on the circuit, he also must deal with his feuding parents, marvelously played by Robert Preston and Ida Lupino. Preston is particularly good as the randy old con artist; he and Lupino strike real sparks. Peckinpah's slow-motion camera is put to particularly good use filming the balletic violence of the rodeo, at once more terrifying and awe-inspiring than any gun battle. A lovely country-western valentine to a dying breed. --Marshall Fine
Junior Bonner Reviews:
Yikes! Small screen movie! 
2009-12-09 - I can't believe nobody prominently mentioned that this dvd is a cheat! Why the weasels put out a film with no mention that it's shrunk to half size on your plasma is beyond me.
Why can't Obama do something good and require federal legislation to put warning labels on movies that are cheaters?
One of Peckinpah's Best 
2009-08-17 - This is an exceptional film. great script, superb acting, and as they say in the commentary, "not just good editing, perfect editing." Peckinpah was a great director. Unlike most, I am not a huge fan of The Wild Bunch - The Original Director's Cut (Two-Disc Special Edition). My favorite Peckinpah films are Junior Bonner and the The Ballad of Cable Hogue. Both character studies show that Peckinpah could do drama, as well as action/violence.
Junior Bonner shares a characteristic with Downhill Racer starring Robert Redford. Both of these sport films seem more realistic than a documentary. They capture the truth about a sport and the athletes that compete to win. Redford and McQueen also never had better roles or acted with more subtlety. Even if you don't care about rodeo or skiing, these films bring you into a fascinating world very unlike the way most of us live. If the film does get you interested in the real thing, try a documentary about the sport Professsional Bull Riders: 8 Second Heroes - Legendary Bulls
The DVD also has an excellent commentary that ought to be listened to by every film student or film enthusiast.
This is Sam Peckinpah's Masterpiece
2009-08-13 - This is an exceptional film. great script, superb acting, and as they say in the commentary, "not just good editing, perfect editing." Peckinpah was a great director. Unlike most, I am not a huge fan of The Wild Bunch. My favorite Peckinpah films are Junior Bonner and the The Ballad of Cable Hogue. Both are character studies show that Peckinpah could do drama, as well as action/violence.
Junior Bonner shares a characteristic with Downhill Racer starring Robert Redford -- both sport films seem more realistic than a documentary. They capture the truth about a sport and the athletes that compete to win. Redford and McQueen also never had better roles or acted with more subtlety. Even if you don't care about rodeo or skiing, these films bring you into a fascinating world very unlike the way most of us live.
The DVD also has an excellent commentary that ought to be listened to by every film student or film enthusiast.
No Country for Old Cowboys. 
2008-01-28 - After completing two of my favorite Peckinpah films, The Wild Bunch in 1969 and Straw Dogs in 1971, Sam Peckinpah turned his attention to Junior Bonner in 1972, before going on to make other great films like The Getaway, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid and Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia. Although I am a fan of Peckinpah's films, Junior Bonner is not among my Peckinpah favorites. Still, it is a worthwhile experience. Filmed in Prescott, Arizona, the film chronicles a week in the life of veteran rodeo rider Junior "JR" Bonner (Steve McQueen), who returns to his hometown to compete in the annual Independence Day parade and rodeo competition, and to reunite with his brother and estranged parents. Upon his arrival in Prescott, he finds his family home being bulldozed by his younger brother Curly (Joe Don Baker), a sleazy real-estate developer. His hard-drinking father Ace (Robert Preston) dreams of moving to Australia to raise sheep and mine gold. Junior bribes rodeo entrepreneur Buck Roan (Ben Johnson) to ride Sunshine, the same bull that just threw him in a previous rodeo, promising to give Roan half the prize money. Sunshine proves to be the last ride of Junior's career. The film is an elegy for aging rodeo riders in a changing world (symbolized by bulldozers and earth-moving equipment). Steve McQueen brings an engaging performance to the film, and his scenes with Robert Preston during which they drink and despair over modern times and the state of the world are especially memorable. Junior Bonner could have been titled No Country for Old Cowboys.
G. Merritt
Stunning!
2007-11-21 - This is a superb movie with excellent performances. I lived in Pendleton, Oregon, the home of the famous Pendleton Roundup, for nine years, and I think that this is the best rodeo movie ever made. The actors all give true to life performances, and it seems so real that one can smell the dust of the arena. There is no sparkling, brittle dialogue, because rodeo men don't talk that way; but a great deal is said in a few words.
