Movies for Guys » Western

3:10 to Yuma

Alex — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 04:58:02 +0000

Would I trust the man who wrote and directed the Johnny Cash bio-pic “Walk the Line” to make a good western? Sure! Why not! And so I sauntered into the theater, my spurs jingling with every step. My expectations were high and my ten-gallon hat’s brim was pulled low. And nearly two hours later, when the dust settled, I was satisfied with what I’d seen.

Yes, it’s the return of “the BIG western”, the one film genre that is more identified with Hollywood and American film making more than any other. As a huge fan, I’ve been more than a little annoyed that westerns have been out of fashion for many years. I guess our America-hating producers, directors and studio heads can’t stand the idea of being associated with movies that portray traditional values and inspire love for our country. But I digress…

Russell Crowe really stretches himself here as he plays Ben Wade, a violent, sociopathic leader of a gang of outlaws who royally screws up and allows himself to get caught by the local constabulary. Christian Bale is the poor rancher Dan Evans whom fate places right in the middle of the situation. Being rather desperate for a break, he uses the opportunity to try and turn his luck around and clear his debts by helping escort Wade to the town of Contention where he’ll be placed on a train (the 3:10 to Yuma, you reckon?), shipped out, and tried for a zillion murders.

The movie unfolds as a great “cat and mouse” game between the makeshift posse escorting this most deadly of outlaws…and his loyal, dedicated gang who are hell-bent on rescuing him. To that end, Ben Foster does an OUTSTANDING job as Wade’s right-hand psychopath, Charlie Prince, who reveals himself to be one seriously bad-ass mofo.

The action is top notch and the surrounding scenery is exquisitely shot, as is expected in “the BIG western”. More importantly, the acting is better than amazing. Crowe and Bale were perfectly cast and Peter Fonda is great as the grizzled old Pinkerton hired gun and, as already mentioned, Ben Foster rules the screen anytime he is on it.

All these positives aside, however, the movie has a serious flaw that I found to be aggravating enough to pull this down from a 5 star rating to 3 stars. Several times in the movie something would happen on screen that would cause me to wrinkle up my face and want to yell, “Bullshit!” Everything from characters acting WAY against their nature…or doing something WAY too stupid for their position…or just violating the laws of nature (such as a character that gets a really NASTY gunshot wound to the gut, loses a ton of blood, but suddenly seems good as new right after a bandage is placed around his belly).

These things were so glaring…and so UNNECESSARY! You could have easily written around all of these things without affecting the story in any way. But, no, they chose to be stupid and expect us, the audience, to be stupid as well. Sorry, but I ain’t buyin’ bushel of bat guano.

The John Ford Film Collection

J.C. Edwards — Mon, 10 Jul 2006 21:11:22 +0000

In critical circles (other than ours) John Ford is frequently considered the single greatest director in history; I of course beg to differ but fear not because I am going to explain myself… in great detail. I know this might come as a shock if you are a film student or classic film aficionado, but it’s true. Yes it’s true John Ford won 4 Academy Awards for Direction. Yes it’s true that John Ford is the only director to be nominated for 2 films in the same category, in the same year and win. And yes it’s true that he is partly responsible for the iconic presence that is, or was John Wayne. So why could I disagree with his greatness? Simple, he needs John Wayne and John Wayne doesn’t need him. The John Wayne featured Ford films are the most known and revered among men and the other films are pretty boring if you ask me.

There are 2 sets of John Ford movies available from Warner Home Video, this one, The John Ford Film Collection, and a John Wayne/John Ford Collection. In my opinion if you are a man you would be a complete schmuck to choose this collection over the Duke’s. John Ford could bring cinemascope to life better than anyone, his eye for sweeping majestic landscapes and attention to natural lighting are second to none (except for maybe Spielberg or Ridley Scott), Cheyenne Autumn will prove that by itself, but I don’t think the movies in this collection bring that to life (other than Cheyenne), and since that is his claim to fame this set left me flat.

Anyway, enough complaining let’s get to the positives in this set! This collection of DVD’s features 5 films from different periods in Fords movie making career, which featured a wide range of period specific stars and film making tricks used even today. The first in the collection and probably the best is the 1935 film, The Informer. A movie about a cast out IRA operative that betrays his blood and brothers in arms to the English in 1922; In an attempt to save his neck and rescue his wife from a life of homelessness and prostitution, he gives up his boys for a mere 20 pounds and has to live with his choices. The film has a lot of biblical overtones with the whole betrayal angle and the performance from Victor McLeglan landed him a best actor award to go with Ford’s directorial nod. It won 5 total but those are the two most important ones.

The set from here went downhill, but there were moments in the 1934 film, the Lost Patrol, that I would perk up between naps. Lost Patrol is about a squad of British soldiers caught behind enemy lines during WWI and their sergeant that leads them into an ambush. Pretty good but not great!

The last film in the collection that I watched all the way through was Cheyenne Autumn. John Ford’s final western which in a real switch is told from the indians point of view… Sadly Kevin Costner told a similar story a few years later and it was better. Maybe it had something to do with Costner using real indians and John Ford using Mr Rourke! Bad casting ruined this one for me, the story was good, the scenery amazing but the casting was not good, not good at all.

If you love John Ford’s films by all means add it to your collection, but if you just remember the westerns like I did, buy the John Wayne collection and rent the couple of standouts I listed above. You can’t lose with The Searchers and Fort Apache but you will want to stick your head in a waffle iron during the Hepburn snoozer, Mary of Scotland.

One final note, Admitting that you watch Katherine Hepburn movies that don’t star John Wayne is worse than watching any movie with Meryl Streep and that’s saying something.

Silverado

John — Sun, 12 Dec 2004 04:00:00 +0000

DVD QuickTake

Silverado has always been one of my favorite westerns. Instead of concentrating on one major plot line the writers decided to give us no less than five distinct stories to keep up with, and they did an excellent job of weaving them together into one cohesive story.

Westerns are the perfect way to tell a story of good vs. evil, and this particular western does it very well. Instead of a villain that you hate right from the beginning you get one that is actually somewhat likable, though you know he’s gonna turn out bad eventually. I don’t want to give anything away about the storyline in case you haven’t already seen this movie, but suffice it to say that just about every western clichÃ© is touched on at some point in the film, but you really won’t mind.

Highly recommended to say the least.

Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid

Billy Bob — Sat, 11 Dec 2004 04:00:00 +0000

DVD QuickTake

Quite simply one of the best movies ever made. It could be argued that this is also the original buddy movie. Paul Newman and Robert Redford are excellent together, and this is the original pairing of the two and in fact this is the role that made Redford a star.

“Most of what follows is true…” is how the movie starts out. It is roughly based on the lives of the real Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid with alot of liberties taken for dramatization of course. But what we end up with is one of the best westerns ever filmed.

The DVD earned THX certification and is a wonderful remastering job including spectacular anamorphic enhancement for widescreen TV’s. The video is sharp, I only noticed a little video noise in a couple of really dark scenes. I’ve seen this DVD listed as Dolby Digital 5.1, unfortunately that is not the case, it’s 1.0 with everything right out of the center speaker. That doesn’t affect the enjoyment of the movie at all as it doesn’t really scream out for surround effects, but I would’ve at least liked to have heard the musical sequences in stereo.

Nonetheless, this one’s a keeper if you like classics, westerns or Newman and Redford.

Pale Rider

John — Sat, 11 Dec 2004 04:00:00 +0000

DVD QuickTake

Pale Rider may not be follow the most original storyline in history, but it makes for a darn good story anyway, and is one of my favorite westerns.

Clint plays a the answer to a young girls prayers, a character only known as “Preacher” who mysteriously comes to town to help out a group of miners. These miners are being harassed by the local “rich guy” who wants to mine their land. Seems like most westerns seem to have that one “rich guy” who owns almost everything in the town. He can’t own everything of course, or the good guys wouldn’t be able to get supplies.

The performances are good, and Clint certainly knows how to direct a movie. My only complaint was with how dark the movie was. It seems that it was done on purpose to create a certain sense of ambiance. I just found it annoying, and any movie that causes me to adjust my TV’s settings is gonna lose a star. Otherwise as a big Clint fan this one would have gotten 5 stars.

American Outlaws

Billy Bob — Thu, 09 Dec 2004 04:00:00 +0000

American Outlaws is an attempt at a western for the 21st century. However, I do not think you’re going to be hearing this one mentioned in the same breath as movies featuring Clint Eastwood and John Wayne. Although I didn’t hate the movie, I’m reluctant to even put it in the same class as Young Guns.

American Outlaws is a very, and I do mean VERY, loose interpretation of the story of Jesse James, portrayed here by Colin Farrell. As perhaps the most famous outlaw of the old west, there have been many stories written about Jesse James and his gang, so over the years it has become a bit unclear whether he was a good guy, a Robin Hood type character, or just a cold blooded killer. The truth probably lies somewhere inbetween, but in this movie James is a good guy all the way, driven to fight the railroad who is attempting to take his land. He and his gang take the fight to the railroad and it’s Pinkerton security agents by robbing their trains and stealing their money from banks.

All of the ingredients of a good western are here, although they do not exactly cover any new ground. However the execution leaves a bit to be desired. I guess my main problem is Colin Farrell. He’s definitely a pretty boy and this is his first major role, and it’s really hard to accept him as a bad ass outlaw. And in fact the story here shows him to be somewhat compassionate even when he really should go ahead and bust a cap in someone who deserves it. The rest of the casting and portrayal of these rough frontier outlaws is just as bad. Gabriel Macht, as Frank James, is even prone to quote Shakespeare! Scott Caan, as Cole Younger, is the only character who really shows a decent amount of color, but even he comes across as the same basic cocky wise ass character he has portrayed in his earlier roles. I think the entire cast should’ve been locked in a room and forced to watch The Good, The Bad and The Ugly followed by The Outlaw Josey Wales and concluding with Unforgiven to really get a good understanding of how to play an outlaw.

This film apparently wanted to gain appeal to the females by throwing in alot of beefcake. If the fat chicks sitting behind us at the screening were any indication, they succeeded. Here’s a tip on yet another type of person you want to avoid sitting near in a theater. If you see two fat chicks sitting together by themselves, get as far away as you possibly can. They’ll overreact to absolutely everything on screen and generally make alot of unnecessary noise as they try to entertain each other. I could’ve really done without the “whoo hoo’s” from Bertha and her sasquatch friend everytime one of these guys came on screen with his shirt off. And I really really hate it when someone talks to the screen.

Anyhow, despite the flaws and the distractions from the crisco twins, the movie did provide some really slick action sequences and enough good laughs to be enjoyable and worth the price of admission. For that, we give it 3 stars. However, I just hope this really isn’t what we have to look forward to in the future in terms of westerns from Hollywood. This is more of a western for the Dawson Creek watchers.