the groundhog day project

Electric guitar... a bunch of young actors. The Western is being reborn (or attempting it anyway) with Young Guns . But then they've got to go and have 50-year-old Terence Stamp as Tunstall. Tunstall was 24 when he met Billy the Kid... Emilio Estevez (Billy) is 26, about 8 years too old. Kiefer Sutherland at 22 is actually 7 years younger than his character, Doc Scurlock. Lou Diamond Phillips is about the right age for Jose Chavez y Chavez (Phillips 26, Chavez 27). Charlie Sheen, at 23, is 5 years younger than his character Dick Brewer. Casey Siemaszko, 27, is 3 years younger than his character, Charlie Bowdre. (Odd detail, that I only noticed because I was recently there. Tunstall tells Billy he can stay at the ranch or, if he wants, the Santa Fe leaves out of Albuquerque in the morning. That's a good distance to get by morning. Tunstall's ranch was south of the town of Lincoln, not sure how far, but from Lincoln to Albuquerque is 185 miles. The Pony Express riders were ...

Today, Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid . (But first, a story: Meant to be home in Los Angeles tonight. Stuck in Arizona instead. Car trouble. Up until the car trouble, today was going pretty well, though. We stopped off at Meteor Crater-- --and hiked down into Walnut Canyon-- --and that was before lunch. Car was making noise and I figured I'd get back to LA tonight, get it looked at in the morning. But, the car had other plans. Instead, we are still in Arizona, about 30 yards from this: And, really that's all you need to know about that.) That this film begins with old man Pat Garrett getting gunned down and, plotwise, is much the same as the later Young Guns II makes for a nice echo of that later film, starting, as it does, with Brushy Bill Roberts, AKA (claiming to be) old man Billy the Kid. Immediate impression of the casting... Coburn is good as a "lawman" and Kristofferson seems good as the outlaw but both seem a bit old for their roles, by...

Billy the Kid was likely a teenager when he hooked up with Tunstall. Tunstall was only 24. Here, though, in The Left Handed Gun Paul Newman, age 32, portrays Billy. Colin Keith-Johnson, age 62, portrays Tunstall. But, maybe the bigger problem right off the bat is the title. Billy the Kid was not left handed. The famous tintype of Billy-- --was reversed and, I guess, no one noticed for a long time. So, Billy was "left handed" even though he wasn't. By the way, that gun is on display at the Autry here in Glendale: But, let us return to that first image for a moment. Back in... the early 90s--I forget which year for sure. A couple of my sisters were in college out of state and we drove to visit them or drop them off or pick them up... This isn't much of a story, this part, with all these vague details. Anyway, we drove through Fort Sumner, New Mexico, where Billy is (allegedly) buried. (More on that detail in a few weeks when I watch Young Guns II .) In a little...