The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Paul Newson is William Bonney, a wandering cowboy who stumbles upon the Tunstall ranch and right into the Lincoln County range war.

Tunstall gives him a job and becomes his mentor of sorts. But he’s a mentor who doesn’t wear a gun and opposes violence.

That worries young Billy, and his worst fears come true when Tunstall is ambushed and killed one day on his way to Lincoln.

Bonney declares that he must do something. And he decides that something will be finding and executing the men responsible for Tunstall’s death — Sheriff Brady and three deputies.

He finds and kills two of the men in sort order, an act that puts him on the wrong side of the law.

A new acquaintance named Pat Garrett suggests he go into hiding. A new amnesty proposal gives him an opportunity to get back on sound legal footing.

Billy ignores the first suggestion and the killing of another deputy ruins his chance at amnesty.

And when Bonney kills the final man on his hit list at Pat Garrett’s wedding, he makes a new enemy, a man determined to bring him to justice.

Paul Newman as William Bonney, in anguish again in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

John Dehner as Pat Garrett, trying to steer William Bonney clear of trouble in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Review:

The Billy the Kid story had already been told several times on film, but promotion for this movie promised “the screen’s first real story of the strange teen-age desperado.”

Well, Newman nailed the strange. His Billy the Kid is a tortured and tormented young man, who insists he only truly feels free once he’s completed his quest for vengeance.

Or course, by that time he’s also a notorious outlaw, thanks partly to his own deeds, thanks partly to the tales told in dime novels.

This marked Arthur Penn’s directorial debut. And he serves up several scenes more memorable than the film itself, partly because his “hero” doesn’t stir much sympathy in the eyes of the viewer.

Oh, and about that title. It stems from the mistaken notion that Billy the Kid was left-handed because of an oft used photo of the famous outlaw that was printed backwards.

Penn didn’t have say over the final cut of the film and wasn’t pleased with the results. Gore Vidal, who wrote the story, was so displeased, he remade the film in 1989 as simply “Billy the Kid” starring Val Kilmer.

Colin Keith-Johnston as Tunstall with Paul Newman as William Bonney in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Lita Milan as Celsa, the young woman who finds herself reluctantly consumed by William Bonney in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Directed by:
Arthur Penn

Cast:
Paul Newman … William Bonney
Lita Milan … Celsa
John Dehner … Pat Garrett
Hurd Hatfield … Moultrie
James Congdon … Charlie Boudre
James Best … Tom Folliard
Colin Keith-Johnston … Tunstall
John Dierkes … McSween
Robert Anderson … Hill
Wally Brown … Deputy Moon
Ainslie Pryor … Joe Grant
Martin Garralaga … Saval
Denver Pyle … Ollinger
Paul Smith … Smith
Nestor Paiva … Pete Maxwell
Josephine Parra … Bride
Robert Foulk … Sheriff Brady
Anne Barton … Mrs. Hill

Runtime: 102 min.

Ainslie Pryor as Joe Grant, about to cross William Bonney in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Hurd Hatfield as Moultrie, the dime novelist following William Bonney’s exploits in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Memorable lines:

William Bonney, after Tunstall’s murder: “Mr. McSween, I have to do something.”
McSween: “You’re not his kin. You didn’t know him.”
Bonney: “I knew him.”

Celsa: “It’s the same as before. Wherever he goes.”
Saval: “What?”
Celsa: “Pain.”

Pat Garrett to Billy the Kid, as he sits out on the street: “Billy, you gotta keep down. I know. I hid. I was a kid. I hid half my life. You just gotta dig a deep hole and get in. I mean it.”

Pat Garrett, after Billy kills a deputy at his wedding: “I swear by the living God that I’m going to put you away. I’m going to hunt you down and put you away.”

Moultrie: “You’re not like the books. You don’t wear silver studs. You don’t stand up to glory. You’re not him.”

Paul Newman as William Bonney with James Best as Tom Folliard in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Paul Newman as William Bonney and James Congdon as Charlie Boudre, watching Pat Garrett’s posse close in in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Robert Griffin as Morton and Robert Foulk as Sheriff Brady, the first two men William Bonney hunts down in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

John Dehner as Pat Garrett, meeting a rambunctios William Bonney in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Paul Newman as William Bonney, showing the cartridges he took from Joe Grant’s gun in The Left Handed Gun (1958)

Paul Newman as William Bonney, cornered when Pat Garrett finds his hideout in The Left Handed Gun (1958)