TODAY'S NUGGET: Ride the High Country (1962) - Revealing Motive at p. 75 & Raising the Stakes

[Quick Summary: Bank security gunslinger who is escorting mine gold and a woman back to town fends off mutiny and abductors.]

TWO THOUGHTS:

1) WRITERS. Until this interview, I didn't know Peckinpah appreciated writers:

Writing was what opened doors for you, wasn’t it?

Yeah, but it was hell, because I hate writing. I suffer the tortures of the damned. I can’t sleep and it feels like I’m going to die any minute. Eventually, I lock myself away somewhere, out of reach of a gun, and get it on in one big push. I’d always been around writers and had friends who were writers, but I’d never realized what a lot of goddamn anguish is involved. But it was a way to break in. I paid my dues in this business.

2) RAISING STAKES. We know Judd is very determined to escort mined gold to the bank. He hires his former partner Gil who only agrees in order to steal the gold.

I was surprised that we don't know WHY Judd is so determined until around p. 75. 

I was also intrigued that this late reveal of his motive is what sets us in a different direction for the last 1/3, i.e., raises the stakes since it sets Gil off.

EXT. HIGH SIERRA - MOVING SHOT - DAY

...NEW ANGLE

Gil listens in silence.

JUDD: Then one night Paul Staniford picked me up. --He was Sheriff of Madera County then--there had been a fight and I was drunk --sicker than a damn dog. Well sir, he dried me out in jail, then we went out back and he proceeded to kick the bitter hell right out of me.

GIL: That took some doin'..

JUDD: Not much. You see - he was right and I was wrong. That makes a difference.

GIL: Who says so?

JUDD: Why nobody...That's something you just know --. (then) By the time I was able to walk again I found I'd learned a lesson --the value of self-respect.

GIL (dully): What's the worth on the open market?

JUDD:Nothing to some people - but a great deal to me. But I lost it--. These last years the only work I could get was in the places like Kate's back there...bartender, stick man, bouncer, what have you...Not much to brag on.

They ride in silence, then:

JUDD: Now I've got a back a little respect for myself. I hope to keep it...with the help of you..and that boy up ahead.

They ride on, neither one looking at the other, absorbed in his own thoughts. Finally:

JUDD: Pretty country, Gil--

GIL (after a moment): Yeah. (then:) Partner, you know what's on a poor man's back when he dies? (as Judd looks at him) The clothes of pride--. And they're not a bit warmer to him dead than they were when he was alive. (after a moment) What do you want, Steve.

JUDD (finally): To enter my House justified.

Gil looks at him. Then wheels his horse, rides back toward Heck.

WHAT I'VE LEARNED: I would've never thought to have hold off on a motive reveal until p. 75, but it does raise the stakes.

Ride the High Country (1963)(10/3/61 draft)
by Sam Peckinpah and N.B. Stone