Editing of the picture: big fight

It would be interesting to see the version the director wanted to go with, but IMO, it ended up pretty fine with the 90% Duvall mandated.

That 90% claim is 100% crap, though, and the more I think about it, the more I begin to suspect that much of what Duvall had to say about the movie was, as well. Duvall claimed he was disgusted with the intial director's cut, that it wasn't the movie he'd set out to make, and that he'd simply restored the film, through his edit, to the working script as it had been written. New scenes to disgust Duvall didn't magically appear in the editing room after filming wrapped, though. They were filmed while the movie was in production, and Duvall participated in them, like everyone else.

The most likely scenario is that, in the Hill cut, some of the more energetic sequences were lengthened at the expense of some of the more lackadaisical scenes. The final product bears some severe editorial shortcomings, which seem to be a consequence of Duvall's interference. The most glaring is in the transition from the first part of the movie to the second. They battle their way out of town in a rush, standing down Big Rump Kate and her thugs at gunpoint while she shouts promises of vengeance. For all they know, when they return to camp at the beginning of part 2, half the town is now up in arms and hot on their trail, but, instead of packing up and hauling ass, they just sort of laze around the camp for a while. Eventually, they leave, move the horses for a while, then decide to camp out beside a creek for two days!