And Starring Pancho Villa as Himself is a 2003 television film starring Antonio Banderas as Pancho Villa. At the time of production, this was the most expensive 2-hour television/cable movie ever made, with a budget of over $30 million. The film concerns the filming of The Life of General Villa and is seen through the eyes of Frank N. Thayer, a studio boss's nephew who gets a career boost when he is placed in charge of the project. The resulting film became the first feature length movie, introducing scores of Americans to the true horrors of war that they had never personally seen. Thayer... sold the studios on making the film despite their concerns that no one would sit through a movie longer than 1 hour, by convincing them that they could raise the price of movies to ten cents, doubling the going price at that time. The actual contract that Pancho Villa signed with Frank N. Thayer and the Mutual Film Company on January 5, 1914 to film the Battle of Ojinaga still exists and is in a museum in Mexico City.
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| Release date: | September 7, 2003 |
| Directed by: | Bruce Beresford |
| Runtime: | 112 Minutes |
| Producer: | Tony Mark, Diane Sillan, Sue Jett |
| Editor: | Mark Warner, Edward A. Warschilka |
| Music by: | Joseph Vitarelli, Stephen Endelman |
| Cinematography: | Peter James |
| Genre: | Biography, Western, Adventure |