Will Penny is a 1968 western film directed by Tom Gries starring Charlton Heston and Donald Pleasence. It was based upon an episode of the 1960 Sam Peckinpah television series The Westerner called "Line Camp," which was also written and directed by Tom Gries. Heston mentioned that this was his favorite film in which he appeared.
Plot
Will Penny (Charlton Heston) is an aging cow hand who at the end of a long trail hires on to ride the boundary of a ranch over the winter. He immediately comes across a woman (Joan Hackett), Catherine Allen, and her son using one of the remote cabins to over-winter, having been deserted by the guide that her husband paid in advance to lead her and her son over the mountains. Despite his boss' instructions Penny lets them stay in the cabin and gives them a week to move out.
Later, Penny runs afoul of a sadistic family called the Quints, led by Preacher Quint (Donald Pleasance) who is after him for killing one of the Quint sons some time before, defending his comrades. While out checking the territory, Penny is ambushed and savagely beaten up by the Quints, who leave him for dead. Penny manages to drag himself back to the cabin, where he is slowly nursed back to health by Catherine, with whom he has little choice but to stay afterward.
As Christmas and winter pass, the lonely Penny and sexually repressed Catherine fall in love, and Penny begins to develop fatherly feelings towards the young boy Horace. The three have lived together as a family unit, during which Penny has caught poignant glimpses of everything that has been missing from his own nomadic, rootless life. For a while it seems there is a possibility that he can settle down with the woman and child and continue this happy arrangement. Part of Penny desperately wants to put down roots and end his lonely existence as an itinerant cow hand. Ultimately, however, Penny realizes that he is simply too old to keep on living like he used to (he is around 50) and too set in his ways to ever settle down in a domestic setting. Deeply regretful about what he is leaving behind, he rides away from the woman and child, never to return — though not before having to face the Quints again, and this time defeat them with help from fellow ranchers.
Production
The film features a David Raksin and Robert Wells song "The Lonely Rider" with vocals by Don Cherry. The exteriors were filmed in Inyo County, California, USA.
Cast
Reviews
"The admirable thing about the movie is its devotion to real life. These are the kind of people, we feel, who must really have inhabited the West: common, direct, painfully shy in social situations and very honest." — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times [1]
"...Will Penny ranks as a superior Western for a multitude of reasons. Heston, so often required to play larger-than-life characters throughout his career, here delivers a sublime performance in a role that is the exact opposite." — Reel.com DVD review [2]
Other reviews for this and other Heston films can be found in the very fine bio "Charlton Heston: An Incredible Life: Revised Edition" by Michelel Bernier. Published by Createspace in 2009.
External links
