Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on December 4th, 2005
Hondo is something of an oddity among John Wayne films. For starters, it was a western not directed by Howard Hawks or John Ford, but by John Farrow, a director Wayne only teamed up with one other time in his career (a WWII film called The Sea Chase). This is also a very tightly edited film, clocking in at just 83 minutes, including an intermission! Though he had certainly performed in his fair share of westerns by this time, Hondo came a couple of years before the release of the long series of w...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 28th, 2005
Synopsis
The film begins with the gunfight at the OK corral, making this something of a sequel to director John Sturges’ earlier film that ended with that famous battle. Here we see the aftermath, as the vengeful Ike Clanton (Robert Ryan, doing the Robert Ryan Villain thing) arranges for the shooting of the brothers of Wyatt Earp (James Garner). When legal means of redress prove fruitless, Earp progressively becomes more and more of a vigilante in his quest for vengeance, just as his best friend and ...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 21st, 2005
Synopsis
During the crippling drought of the 1930s, con man Burt Lancaster arrives in a small town, promising to make it rain (for, of course, a small remuneration). Present here too is Katharine Hepburn, apparently doomed to spinsterhood. She will blossom under the care of Lancaster’s charming rogue.
Though very open and energetic, the film’s stage origins are apparent in the lengthy monologues and frequently artificial construction of the scenes. But Lancaster and Hepburn attack their rol...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on November 13th, 2005
Synopsis
Lee Van Cleef, often a villain, incarnates a sneering hero in Sabata (1969). He uncovers skullduggery at the highest levels in a small town, and proceeds to blackmail the crooked, sadistic, and rather effeminate Colonel at the head of the criminal racket. Plenty of gadgety gun battles are involved.
Yul Brynner steps into the role for Adios, Sabata (1970), and this time he defends Mexican villagers against their tyrannical Austrian masters. Brynner cuts a fine figure i...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by Archive Authors on August 19th, 2005
Synopsis
Charlton Heston is the title character, a Union officer who determines on his own hook to track down a group of Apache raiders. He gathers together a ragtag group of raw recruits, criminals and Confederate prisoners, and heads off to Mexico. His second-in-command is Confederate officer Richard Harris, and the two men have a long history of mutual hatred and respect. Heston forges ahead despite all obstacles, and despite the costs both to his men and to the civilians they encounter.
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Posted in: Disc Reviews by Gino Sassani on June 12th, 2005
Synopsis
One of the unique parts of the Western film genre is the lore behind Buffalo Bill. And while the western has faded as a favored film genre through the years, it’s still the subject of various films, stage plays and other adaptations. This particular film tells the story of a white man living in the West who was sympathetic to and friends with the Native Americans, Bill Cody, who later became a scout for the Army and was the head of a sideshow in the later years of his life.
The film stars...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on March 21st, 2005
Synopsis
During the gold rush, Miriam Hopkins arrives in the lawless new city of San Francisco, onlyto discover that her fiancé has been killed. Penniless, but determined to make her way, she hastop-dog casino owner Edward G. Robinson fall in love with her, though she strategically holdshim at bay. She makes a financial killing, but the price she has paid is driven home when sheencounters poet/prospector Joel McCrea.
McCrea is an odd casting choice as a poet, and he is a poe...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on November 6th, 2004
Synopsis
As a young man, Mike Blueberry (Vincent Cassel) falls in love with a prostitute, but theirtryst is rudely interrupted by the black-hearted Michael Madsen. The woman is killed, andBlueberry is badly wounded. He is taken in and nursed back to health by Native Americans, andthus taps into a bunch of mystical hugger-mugger as well. Years later, he is the town marshal,and who should ride into town but Madsen again, now possessed of supernatural power andintent on capturing the s...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on August 23rd, 2004
Synopsis
Cate Blanchett is rearing her two daughters in 19th-Century New Mexico. The youngest isa pleasant tomboy, the eldest is a whiny young woman who wants fine things (they seem to havebeen lifted straight from Mildred Pierce). Appearing at their home one day is TommyLee Jones, Blanchett’s father who walked out when she was a little girl. The stiff, unforgivingBlanchett wants nothing to do with him, until her eldest daughter is kidnapped by a roving bandwho sell women into prosti...
Posted in: Disc Reviews by David Annandale on April 20th, 2004
Synopsis
Three men are after a fortune in gold, and they will stop at nothing to get it. Boiled down toits essentials, that is the plot of TGTBTU. Granted, there are all sorts of betrayals anddouble-crosses along the way, but they don’t change the fact that the story is essentially a verysimple one, and you might wonder how the film takes up three hours. It certainly doesn’t throughcharacter development. In fact, there is very little that sets the characters apart (which is par...
