A Lot Of Good Things In It, But Overall I Just Didn't Find It That Interesting

Rating: 4/10 (31 December 2011)

Overall I have to confess that in spite of its very high rating this movie didn't really strike a chord with me. It's partly the genre I suppose. I've just never been much into Westerns. Horses and gunfights and saloons have never been of much appeal. Beyond that, though, I simply didn't find the story here to be particularly interesting, nor did I find the movie to be as much fun as a lot of people think it is. I can't give a movie that I don't find interesting a particularly high rating or much of a positive endorsement. Having said all that, though, I do want to acknowledge that it's just my personal bias, and that there's a lot about this movie that I liked in spite of the fact that when it was all put together it didn't appeal to me that much. So, let me offer the positives.
First I appreciated the honesty right off the top. There really was a "Hole in the Wall Gang" and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were real figures in the Old West as a part of it. The movie follows the basic outline of their life - early bank and train robberies, the escape to Bolivia and the relationship with Etta (Katharine Ross) are all based on reality. But the movie was honest. Instead of saying "Based on actual events," I loved that the opening caption was "Most of this is true" - thus acknowledging dramatic licence in a way that most "based on actual events" movies don't do. I liked the pairing of Paul Newman (Butch) and Robert Redford (Sundance). They worked very well together and offered pretty good performances in the title roles. The movie did a good job of creating some tension as Butch and Sundance were being pursued by a mysterious posse. The question that kept being asked by Butch ("Who are these guys anyway?") hung in the air quite well. There were a handful of amusing scenes - especially the train robberies involving Woodcock (George Furth) which I enjoyed. A sense of fun was also created by the use (only once, mind you) of the song "Raindrops Keep Fallin' On My Head." In one sense, that song seems totally out of sync with the movie, but the scene in which it was used, in which Butch takes Etta for a ride on a bicycle, was a silly, fun scene, and a silly, fun song fit that scene, if not the overall feel of the movie, quite well.
But for as much as I liked all that, what I have to keep coming back to is that I just didn't really find the movie to be all that interesting. Just a personal opinion and reaction. Obviously most people disagree with me. (4/10)