Bad Company

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Bad Company

PG,

1972,

1h 33m,

Western/

Comedy/

Adventure/

Drama

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Watchlist

84%

25 Reviews

Tomatometer

71%

1,000+ Ratings

Popcornmeter

84%

Tomatometer

25 Reviews

71%

Popcornmeter

1,000+ Ratings

Out of the frying pan and into the fire: Civil War draft dodger Drew Dixon avoids the horrors of war by fleeing west, only to become mixed up with a gang of lawless youths led by the debonair con man Jake Rumsey. The allure of a free-spirited desperado life is quickly spoiled by a series of mishaps that leave the bandits lacking food and money, and in constant fear of more sinister criminals like Big Joe.

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Critics Consensus

Well-acted and pleasantly gritty, Bad Company is one of the more authentic Westerns of its era -- and an auspicious debut for director Robert Benton.

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Budd Wilkins

Slant Magazine

Aug 15, 2024

Robert Benton’s Bad Company is a downbeat revisionist western that deflates generic mythmaking while also saying a few choice things about its own day.

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Pauline Kael

The New Yorker

Sep 21, 2023

You can perceive the dazzle in the script, but what’s on the screen is pictorial and lifeless.

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Charles Champlin

Los Angeles Times

Sep 22, 2021

Despite some interesting ideas and some random achievements, "Bad Company" never really gets itself assembled.

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Brian Orndorf

Blu-ray.com

Mar 23, 2025

B+

Benton shows some level of grit and surprise with "Bad Company," which is always interested in the impulsive ways of inexperienced men taking on an incredible challenge of self-preservation.

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Richard Schickel

LIFE

Jul 18, 2023

It's a hard movie to summarize and a hard movie to forget -- soft-spoken, hard-headed, stylistically singular. Bad Company is good company, the best I have found at the movies in a long time.

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Candice Russell

Miami Herald

Sep 22, 2021

Jeff Bridges' overweening pride in his position of power is the perfect foil to Barry Brown's quiet, well-mannered approach.

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Draco P

Apr 12, 2019

Missing something but 2nd tier watchable. (Musical score could be better..and softer in spots!).

Hermione W

Jul 4, 2018

Saw this when it 1st came out. Goddamn, I'm old. One of my favorite off-the-beaten path westerns of all time...

Ron W

Feb 13, 2017

I'm normally not a fan of the 70's revisionist or "acid" westerns because they normally just revel in their mire and "authenticity" and demythologizing the west in favor of making an interesting film. Bad Company is clearly a product of that era, but it escapes the traps that makes most of those movies a snore. The characters are great and the story is fun. We laugh at the lack of knowledge these young city guys have about all the stuff other gruff n tough guys in the western movies have known all their lives. The film has a lot to say about youthful inexperience in general. Also of importance, Gordon Willis (of The Godfather fame) does the cinematography here and it is worth the price of admission alone. This came out the same year The Godfather did, and that same super cool lighting technique is here in its entirety. It looks like a western Godfather. I kept saying it looked like The Godfather before I was even aware Willis had actually worked on it. Really superb work from him. Also, can't beat a good young Jeff Bridges performance!

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Robert Benton

Director

Jeff Bridges

Jake Rumsey

Barry Brown

Drew Dixon

Jim Davis

Marshal

David Huddleston

Big Joe

John Savage

Loney

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Synopsis

Out of the frying pan and into the fire: Civil War draft dodger Drew Dixon avoids the horrors of war by fleeing west, only to become mixed up with a gang of lawless youths led by the debonair con man Jake Rumsey. The allure of a free-spirited desperado life is quickly spoiled by a series of mishaps that leave the bandits lacking food and money, and in constant fear of more sinister criminals like Big Joe.

Director: Robert Benton
Producer: Stanley R. Jaffe
Screenwriter: David Newman, Robert Benton
Production Co: Paramount Pictures, Jaffilms
Rating: PG
Genre: Western, Comedy, Adventure, Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Streaming): Jun 15, 2011
Runtime: 1h 33m

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