New style of western movie
937899
Great movie if you enjoy westerns. Definitely not for the faint of heart, I had difficulty watching some of the gory scenes but my husband loved the realistic effects.
3224647
Except for the Colorado scenery, this is not your standard Western.  The  emphasis is on character rather than action.  James Cagney plays a tough  rancher who is actually not such a bad man.  There is an interesting  romantic triangle involving Cagney, Irene Pappas, and Don Dubbin.  There is  an excellent supporting cast, including Lee Van Cleef, Stephen McNally, Vic  Morrow, and Jeanette Nolan.
Justice is one of the main themes of this  excellent film.  Cagney is a loner who is used to delivering his own  peculiar kind of justice.  Once Cagney gets the "hanging fever"  nothing can stop him, Irene Pappas comments.  In the end, the film has much  to say about love, justice, and humanity.  Most Westerns deliver much less.
2636789
Kurt Russel is a natural for westerns and it was great to see him in this film. A good group of characters and a good story. Wish they would make more like this, a western with a touch of horror. When this film comes out on dvd, I will for sure be adding it to my collection. Awesome.
2798052
This movie is very good, very funny in places, and with a really original story, especially for a western. You may not think so, because like many old movies, it has been imitated a good bit since, in movies and TV episodes.

A young and very handsome James Stewart is Tom Destry, son of the tough former sheriff of the wild frontier town of Bottleneck. Marlene Dietrich is Frenchie, who sings in the saloon and bounces her golden curls, and helps the local bad guy cheat at cards and win the ranches all along the pathway that cattle going to market must cross. Now that he's got the last one, he is charging 25 cents a head for cattle to cross his land. All supposedly legal, but as I say, the deeds were gained by cheating at cards, and suckering the owners into putting up their ranch as stakes.

The previous sheriff (long since Destry Senior was sheriff) disappeared, and the town jokingly appointed the town drunk as sheriff, who had been the deputy back when Destry was sheriff. So he sends for Destry Junior, who is known to be very good with a gun. That's James Stewart, who arrives on the stage and turns out to be nothing like anyone expected, least of all the sheriff. But he is sworn in as deputy, and announces that he will not carry a gun.

OK, that's the premise, and I'll not give anything away about how this slow talking, mild-mannered young deputy turns Bottleneck into a law-abiding town. It's just too good to spoil it for you.

One song from this movie got famous, "See What the Boys in the Back Room Will Have." Frenchie sings it, of course, in that deep, seductive voice those who remember Marlene Dietrich know so well.
2242282
Typical 1940s cowboys and Indians style movie. It takes place in the south-west in 1876 against a backdrop of the recent defeat of Custer and the claim of Indian insurrection under the alleged direction of Sitting Bull. Captain Brittles (John Wayne) must lead a column through hostile Indian country but is forced to return to the Fort in defeat on the eve of his retirement from the Army. He is retained as a scout and he undermines the Indian resistance by driving their pony herd away while they're in camp and thus they are forced to return to the reservation. I was a little uncomfortable with the black and white good guys versus bad guys plot. Also, of slight annoyance to me were the numerous errors with the uniforms. I understand the tan hats didn't come into use until the 1880s. May of the men were wearing the kepi hats in the Civil War style with the insignia on top of hat instead of the 1872 style crossed sabers on the front. Enlisted men were wearing officer's hat cords on the slouch hats. As well, I think the salutes were still the palms out in those days instead of the hand flattened as it is nowadays.
A fun movie to be taken with a grain of salt.
3757848
What can I say that has not already been said?

Story line is interesting, Actors are all first rate, production quality is excellent. Perhaps the most underappreciated movies of recent films.

This is a very funny movie set in the old West, er, North. It centers on an American gunfighter that just cant seem to get a fight going no matter how hard he tries. Its full of kooky characters that you cant help but like. It's a lot of subtle humor much like a British comedy. This is one of those movies that you just cant help but like. There is a common sense message here that is the underlying theme of the movie.

This has the potential to become a cult classic. It has become one of my favorite movies. As a matter of fact I stopped by Amazon to pick up 3 copies of the DVD, one for me and two as gifts.

It's a shame I'm not a skilled writer, this movies deserves a better review than I can post. Do yourself a favor, check out this movie.
2414397
This film is an artfully crafted vision of the old west.

By any measure one of John Wayne's better movies.  I really can't feature this movie being made with anyone else in the lead.  He fits the character like a glove as a tough gnarled and aging rancher.

Roscoe Brown is another inspired piece of casting as the sagely cook.  His was a Oscar caliber performance.

In my book, this picture has Bruce Dern's best performance as an evil doer.  His psychopathic rustler is a flawless jewel.

And despite these excellent qualities what really makes this film so good and sets it apart is it's concept-

Cowboys herding cattle that are really boys, facing the harsh unforgiving environment of the old west and dealing with it as best they can.

Casting the cowboys they used a mix of Hollywood child actors and kids that grew up on ranches and had riding and roping skills.  This worked out incredibly well.

The script is tight and the movie does not have one flabby moment.

To top it off- the musical score is by John Williams.

All of these things converge to create a perfect gem of filmmaking.
1250875
I am not a Van Damme fan but this movie worked for me. If you don't like westerns then you should skip this one. But if you do then this a modern western film and it is for you. There is a storyline that makes sense and is easy to follow. There are one or two surprises and the acting was acceptable across the board. I am an action fan by habit and this had just enough to keep me happy. My wife enjoyed this movie also and we will be watching it again in the future.
3448774
This could have easily been a very cheesy movie with a silly title but there's actually a descent story here.  It's more western than sci-fi but the aliens provide a nice twist to the story telling.  Craig and Ford are enemies but put aside there differences to fight the aliens.  Plenty of action and fire power.  I liked it.
4492680
Amongst so many western movies it's always wonderful to view something that does not follow the traditionally established scripts that never seem to deviate from hundreds of established norms.  The authors certainly brought forth a scenario that holds the attention of the viewer.
832409
I just watched this movie and I must say that I thought it was very good. Excellent acting and just an all around good western and movie. And one thing that I was getting worried about was that it was going to be a 'standard western' using a lot of the same stories and same situations that you have seen over and over and over. Well this movie had enough things that  you wouldn't expect that made it not stale at all and very fresh. Good action but not overwhelmed with it and good drama but not too much dialogue that it got boring in its approx 2 hour length. I was thoroughly satisfied and enjoyed it beginning to end.
241063
I'd never heard of this low-budget, talky and politically-minded western until I saw it new in the video store. Though it's far from being one of the greats I'm glad I checked it out - mostly for lead Dan Duryea, one of my favorite seedy leading men/bad guys from noir, in the first western I've seen him in.

Duryea is Ned McCarty, riding into the town of Silver Lode on July 4th, after a man named Dan Ballard (John Payne, yet another face familiar from noir), who is in the process of being married to Rose Evans (Lizabeth Scott - a third noir icon!), daughter of the town's big cheese. Ballard is an upstanding citizen who's done well for himself in two years in the town and has become well-loved by everybody, but when McCarty comes in claiming that he's a US marshall charged with bringing Ballard back to California (I guess Silver Lode is probably in Nevada though I don't think it's ever stated) for murdering his brother, the town starts to turn against him. Ballard being the straight-shooter kind of guy admits to the killing - though he claims the other guy drew first - and people start to remember that it was always kind of odd that he pulled into town with loads of money out of nowhere years ago. Soon the whole town, except for his bride-to-be, is against him, as he tries to prove that McCarty isn't a real marshall and turn McCarty's mean against each other.

A well-done, taut and economical little thriller with very little gunplay until the last act, with the only real problem being that Payne is just too obviously the good guy and Duryea just as obviously the bad one. Perhaps with other actors not as stereotyped at that point there would have been more ambiguity; then again ambiguity seems to run counter to the obvious political McCarthy undertones - Ballard standing in for accused Communists, of course. Still quite nicely done, the two leads are fine (I've never been a fan of Lizabeth Scott, a low-rent Lauren Bacall to my mind, but she has little to do here and can't be faulted) and there are a couple of great tracks across the town as Ballard tries to escape the citizens turned against him. Dwan was one of the great action directors back in the silent days and he still had it in the mid 50s.
735317
A very decent werewolf movie with a Western setting.  This is a new twist on the Skinwalker Navajo legend.  On the night of the blood moon the skinwalkers are all the more powerful.  There is this abandoned town that is now being used as a stagecoach way station where most of the movie takes place.  It is to this place that the Skinwalker is targeting.  You have several people from the stage and a down on his luck gunslinger that come to this town.  The bandits that come later are the only characters that weren't played all that well.  I think the rest of the characters were well played and believable. All in all I would recommend this movie.
2874149
A Good Movie. I would recommend this movie to anyone who is into vintage western movies. Lots of fun, and entertaining.
4396693
A violent and unflinching depiction of the American West. This is how you make a low budget western. Concentrate on characters and story. The cast is excellent and well suited to their roles. You get a great sense of the west being a vast wasteland interspersed with pockets of fragile civilization. The action is easily followed and tense. There are scenes that are  uncomfortably violent and the camera captures them with an unflinching clinical gaze reminiscent of films such as men behind the sun. These moments are shocking and they are meant to be. incorpoarting concepts of both the western and horror genres, the film is entertaining, shocking, and if you can look past the seminal moments you will see some very good performances and excellent writing. Overall I recommend, but there are several scenes, one in particular, that are not for the squeamish or feint of heart.
2041777
Good acting, good character development, and subtle humor within a unique Western plot. If you like "cowboy and Indian"-type Westerns, this is a must see.
4388821
It's a good Western.  The usual tropes are there, sometimes it's played straight, sometimes ironic.