Main Cast: Bill Callaway, Cliff Robertson, Robert Duvall, Luke Askew, R.G. Armstrong, Dana Elcar
Release Year: 1972
Country: US
Run Time: 91 minutes
MPAA Rating: PG
Plot
The oft-told story of the rise and fall of the James Younger gang is given the Dragnet treatment in The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid. With meticulous attention to detail, the film recreates the outlaw gang's most infamous escapade: the September 7, 1876, robbery of "the biggest bank west of the Mississippi" in Northfield, MN. Cliff Robertson plays Cole Younger, and Robert Duvall appears as Jesse James, herein depicted as a pair of vengeance-driven sociopaths, but no worse than the greedy railroad magnates who've driven them into a life of crime. Younger is also quite the manipulator, convincing the immigrant farmers of Northfield that the bank is completely impervious to robbery, thereby increasing the deposits that he intends to steal. Duvall's Jesse James is a cold-blooded murderer, but, like Younger, not without his own personal charm. The climactic raid is filmed cinéma vérité style, looking more like a haphazard CNN news event than a well-oiled machine (this film is not, thankfully, the standard "slick" Hollywood product). Though it drags in spots, The Great Northfield, Minnesota Raid is a superb, iconoclastic reproduction of an era long past. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Donald Moffat - Manning; Anne Barton - Clell's wife; Nellie Burt - Doll Woman; William Challee - Old Timer; Elisha Cook, Jr. - Bunker; Royal Dano - Gustavson; Liam Dunn - Drummer; Marjorie Durant - Maybelle; Robert H. Harris - Wilcox; Erik Holland - Sheriff; Herbert Nelson - Chief detective; John Pearce - Frank James; Arthur Peterson - Jefferson Jones; Mary-Robin Redd - Kate; Inger Stratton - Singing whore; Wayne Sutherlin - Charley Pitts; Barry Brown - Henry Wheeler; Matt Clark - Bob Younger; Jack Manning - Heywood; Madeleine Taylor Holmes - Old Granny Woman; Craig Curtis - Chadwell; Robert Gravage - Farmer; Bill Callaway - Calliopist
Credit
Alexander Golitzen - Art Director, George C. Webb - Art Director, Helen Colvig - Costume Designer, Ralph Sariego - First Assistant Director, Philip Kaufman - Director, Douglas Stewart - Editor, Dave Grusin - Composer (Music Score), Bruce Surtees - Cinematographer, Jennings Lang - Producer, Hal G. Gausman - Set Designer, Waldon O. Watson - Sound/Sound Designer, Robert L. Hoyt - Sound/Sound Designer, Melvin M. Metcalfe Sr. - Sound/Sound Designer, Philip Kaufman - Screenwriter
