Sidney Poitier’s directorial debut Buck and the Preacher (1972) began with Joseph Sargent at the helm, but due to “creative differences,” producer and star Poitier took the reins for this Black Western set in the Reconstruction era following the Civil War. Poitier is Buck, a wagon master leading a caravan of Black pioneers from the fields of Louisiana to unsettled lands in the West.
A dangerous journey to begin with, the trek is made all the more treacherous due to white bounty hunters—led by the film’s villain, Deshay (Cameron Mitchell)—who aim to force the would-be settlers back to Louisiana.
Deshay is particularly keen on stopping Buck and sets an ambush for him early on that fails. During the escape, Buck comes across the “Reverend” Willis Oakes Rutherford (Harry Belafonte), a con artist carrying a pistol in his oversized Bible. Buck steals the Reverend’s horse (although he offers to pay) and eats some of the man’s rabbit-on-a-spit dinner before riding off, which understandably causes a bit of bad blood between the pair.
When the Reverend later encounters the self-appointed posse led by Deshay, the latter agrees to pay a $500 reward for Buck—dead or alive. But even a rapscallion like the Reverend will eventually see the brutal injustice that Deshay and his ilk represent.
Made in an era when deep social unrest divided America over issues ranging from civil rights to Vietnam, “Buck and the Preacher” is hardly a militantly activist film; it is first and foremost a studio picture (Columbia) that is meant to entertain, which it does reasonably well.
Poitier’s strong, mostly silent type nicely meshes with Belafonte’s grinning-while-conniving trickster and one or both are onscreen nearly all the time. But room is made for Ruby Dee in a small but affecting role as Buck’s partner, who makes a poignant speech about escaping to Canada rather than continuing to live in an irredeemably racist America. And Belafonte’s wife, Julie Robinson Belafonte, is featured in a subplot, playing a bilingual spouse to a Native American chief who aids Buck in trying to safely shepherd his wagon train to a green valley promised land in Colorado.
Presented with a new 4K digital restoration, extras include a new interview with Mia Mask, author of Black Rodeo: A History of the African American Western; behind-the-scenes footage featuring director and actor Sidney Poitier and actor Harry Belafonte; interviews with Poitier and Belafonte from 1972 episodes of Soul! and The Dick Cavett Show; a new interview with Gina Belafonte, daughter of Harry Belafonte; and a leaflet with an essay by critic Aisha Harris.
A rare Black Western from the ‘70s, Buck and the Preacher is a solid buddy dramedy with a bit of a social bite. Recommended for classic film collections in public libraries and for film programming on Black cinema.