Metacritic reviews

Not enough identity is given Clint Eastwood in a New Mexico land struggle in which no reason is apparent for his involvement, but John Sturges' direction is sufficiently compelling to keep guns popping and bodies falling.

Not particularly complicated, and sometimes as confused as it is concise, 1972’s Joe Kidd is nonetheless a lean, reasonably satisfying slice of Clint Eastwood outlaw badassery.

For perhaps its first half-hour, John Sturges's new Western, Joe Kidd, looks surprisingly good. It seems restrained, relaxed, unfashionably out of the current mode in its commitment to people and horses rather than to sadistic monsters and machines. Nothing remarkable, but modestly decent—a feeling that persists, with continually diminishing assurance, almost until the climax, when everything is thrown away in a flash of false theatrics, foolish symbolism and what I suspect is sloppy editing.

The photography is undeniably beautiful, but there comes a point when we've had too many mountains and too little plot. All that holds the movie together is the screen persona of Eastwood, who is so convincingly tight-lipped that sometimes you have the feeling he knows what's going on and just won't tell.

Photographed by the admirable Bruce Surtees, but a curiously strangled Western which can't make up its mind whether it wants to wring straight action out of the range war between poor Mexicans and a tycoon rancher (Duvall), or to explore the moral standing of the disreputable character (Eastwood) who takes law and order into his hands.

Bad editing, uninspired direction, and a script that teetered precariously on the verge of parodying a John Wayne movie combined to make Joe Kidd nothing more than a plodding shoot-em-up.