Homesman, The (2014)

Caution: this post is rife with spoilers for the movie. If you haven’t seen it yet, I strongly suggest you watch it first, and then read this. I’ve love to hear what people think.

Normally it’s my intention to avoid overly pontificating over the highs and lows of a films quality, or to try to get wrapped up in pretentious presentation in a thinly veiled move to show people I know more about movies than them. I don’t enjoy people who talk or act that way, and it’s not a behavior I hope to be known for. But with the Homesman I do want to break a bit from my more casual approach of discussing movies, and offer an actual breakdown of what I got out of this great film.

There are a lot of reasons for considering the Homesman to be a great western. Items and details such as the language (particularly the swearing by Tommy Lee Jones when he curses the hotel owner), the weapons, even the paper town of Fairfield where the hotel is located, all lend to an accurate view of the era. The paradox of this is that due to a lot of these great elements people walk away enjoying it, in spite of the fact that many are confused by what they saw, or what the point of it all was.

I can’t speak for others, and I’m not the type to tell you how to feel, but I hope that my breakdown opens up some thoughts on how to receive this story.

So why do people get confused? First off, the movie was highly touted as a feminist western, but given that the movie is about women gone crazy because of the strain, and the fourth woman, the strong one, ending up killing herself after exposing herself as weak and desperate, how can that be? Given these portrayals, in the end, you would have to wonder what happened along the way. The problem with this line of thought is that it’s not a feminist western.

It does uniquely give the female perspective, and that is worth much more than a feminist fantasy brought to life, but this female view to the times is not the crux of the story; it’s a catalyst for what is. It should be noted, however, that this insightful and thoughtful woman’s perspective is another authentic quality of the era that makes the Homesman such a good movie.

Another point that I’ve heard made is that after switching focus from the female lead to the male (from Swank to Jones), people are confused as to what the point of Tommy Lee Jones’ journey was other than to maybe feel good about his eventual kind gestures.

What I have gotten out of this movie is that it is a tale of the western frontier, and of the times, through the embodiment of one central male figure. It is the story of the western man who survived the west, but came and went with the progress of days. Who had only a single moment in time that he was in his right place, and that time and place didn’t last long. Which, incidentally, I also believe is why westerns are loved so much.

Initially we’re introduced to Mary Bee Cuddy (Swank) and are set up to sympathize with her situation. It’s an impressive thing she offers to do and she’s easy to get on board with, but then she meets George Briggs and things are getting ready to shift. I believe that shift came once she asks him his name. He’s introduced to the audience as just a shifty drifter, possibly a good guy, possibly a bad guy; yes, he may have claim jumped, but beyond that he’s just a western character drifting in to the lives of those already established.

When Mary asks him what his name is he thinks up a name and offers George Briggs. He laughs as he says it, amused, and it clearly doesn’t mean a lot to him. But this is something I’ll come back to.

I’m going to revisit those previous obstacles but first consider his arrival to Iowa. The purpose of this trip was to get these women back to where they can be cared for, and where is that? Back in civilization because the west was too tough. After all that George has been through  he has finally made it to civilization. He delivers the women, buys new clothes, and even a nice tombstone for Mary Bee Cuddy. The regard the women were given by the ministers wife immediately counters the attitude shown by the one offered on the frontier. In the foyer he wants to tell of the hardship, but the cultured, caring woman asks him to please not speak of it. George Briggs is out of place here.

Bodies of water are often used to symbolize a rebirth or a purification. After all that they had been through, George Briggs was a new person. He began to care, and he wanted good things for people. In civilized Iowa he attempted to participate; it didn’t go well. The parsons wife was very polite, but once business was conducted she tells Briggs he can go now. After five grueling weeks it was all over, just like that. He went and got nicely dressed and attempted to sit in on a game of poker but was told his money was no good. Symbolically speaking, the vouchers of value that he earned on the frontier were told to be of no value. Then in clear language, he was told he was not welcome to sit in at the game. Western men are known for coming into town and sitting in at a game of cards. But in this civilization across the river, there wasn’t a seat for him, and his frontier money was literally no good. He had no value to them.

George Briggs learned to care about the women he was transporting, he had even tried once to cross a river, but he was followed by the women and had to turn back to help them. In short, he had left them behind, and couldn’t cross that river yet; the time for a crossing was still to come.

Once in the city he attempted to be respectable through dress and social engagement, and he even worked to bring dignity to the memory of Mary Cuddy by purchasing a tombstone, as well as buying shoes for a young lady and warning her of the frontier. But ultimately, having no luck, he gets drunk and boards a ferry back across the river. In keeping with the theme of water being the rebirth, he had been through it, and now returned to where he came from. The tombstone gets kicked off the ferry and floats down river, symbolizing all memory of Mary Bee Cuddy lost, and any attempt to record her struggle in life to be given up.

So as I said, the name George Briggs was not his real name. Like so many western characters that moved from one town to another they adopted a name to get by on. George Briggs wasn’t a real man, he was a symbol of all the men who came and went in the west, and could have never survived anywhere but the west. He gave a name that suited his situation, and then he encountered Indians, but survived, representing the trials of the earlier western men. Next he came upon a desperate character who would be ornery and fight for what he wanted with little regard for what anyone else wanted; this represented the proliferation of gun men on the range after the end of the civil war and the confinement of the Native Americans to reservations. He overcame that, too. Finally, he comes to a small hotel in the middle of nowhere. This represents the beginning of the end of the western character. Incredulously, these men of business have either no understanding of the code of the west, or they have no use for it, or probably even both. It was known on the frontier that when a stranger came to your door you gave them a meal, and if needed, a place to sleep. Here with this hotel were new ways of doing things, ways that were primarily concerned with a bottom-line benefit.

George Briggs couldn’t abide this; he represented a time and code that didn’t allow such un-neighborly behavior and so he cursed them (in period accurate swears) and then burned down their hotel. A purging fire to preserve his land.

Everything up to the initial ferry crossing at the river served to show who George Briggs was and what his world was about; fighting Indians, surviving desperate characters, not tolerating inhospitable eastern money-first ways; all these elements that prevailed against his life. He was able to overcome them all, but he could not overcome the one thing that lay just across the river, and that was civilization. It was only a matter of time before even that crossed into the west and George Briggs was no longer a welcome man anywhere. He left civilization, re-crossing the river, returning to what he knew, while firing shots at the city behind him, showing his contempt for their world. He would go out dancing and singing, embracing his time. And Mary Cuddy’s tombstone was let go of, drifting away. In the city he tried to be a different man, but returning to the frontier he would be what he really was, and it was the only time or place that he could have been who he was. George Briggs was the western character that disappeared towards the end of the 19th century.

Forsaken (2015)

This movie is a little incomplete, and by that I mean literally; it’s not got all it’s parts pulled together. What could have possibly been a great movie ends up being a decent movie, and barely even that. Really it’s just a movie, neither good nor bad, that has some good stuff to it. If only it had been allowed to reach it’s potential.

Kiefer Sutherland is the wayward son who has come home, carrying a reputation as an effective gunman. His father in the movie is played by his father in real life, Donald Sutherland, and in the movie he’s a bit of a sanctimonious, hard-nosed man. So when his son comes home he expects trouble.

Trouble comes in a couple of different forms, but mostly this is where the trouble for this movie starts to rear it’s head. There’s the classic bad guy causing trouble, but then there’s the hired gun for said bad guy. He and John Henry Clayton (Kiefer Sutherland) seem to have a connection as brothers-of-the-gun, if you will, and are not eager to engage each other in a showdown. But here’s the problem: what looks to be the most promising element of this would-be-moody film gets passed over in order to keep the movie as cookie cutter as the studio bosses see fit.

At the film’s completion I had guessed there must have been a doozy of a pile of film on the cutting room floor, and from what I’ve read, that seems about right. Apparently the original film was timed at around three hours, but the powers-that-be, in all their Hollywood wisdom, decided the movie would be better and an hour and a half, and therefor removed everything that would make the movie interesting. It’s a terrible shame, too, because it looked as if it might have been building up to be a little something in the vein of 1995’s Heat with Deniro and Pacino. Do I think at three hours they would have pulled it off? No, a movie like Heat is a rarity, but a western done in that vein, with the dichotomy of two like rivals could still have been a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, Gentleman Dave Turner (Michael Wincott, the rival gunfighter) pretty much slips out of the movie immediately after his set up, and then returns just enough at the end to look cool.

I really think the writer of this film knows his western stuff, I just think the producers wanted to make the safest formula-film they could. It’s worth a watch, but if anything it’ll probably leave you wandering what was left out that you didn’t get to see.

John Henry Clayton pulls his guns and demands the editors include the extra hour plus that would have made this movie great…!

Gunless (2010)

Canadian politeness meets grizzled American west

I expected to enjoy this movie based on the person who referred it to me, but I was surprised at both how much I enjoyed it, as well as how I enjoyed it. Paul Gross does a great job in the lead as a caricature of the hard-ridden desert gunslinger who lives his life on the edge of a gunfight. Ironically, he’s ended up in a quaint little Canadian town that’s never had one; a gunfight, nor a gunfighter.

They all take to their newly arrived hard edged gunman and see him more as a realization of contemporary celebrity than as a dangerous element in their serene little town. This is the point where most of the humor comes from. I doubt that this is very many people’s cup of tea, but I do hope that it’ll be given a chance by anyone who’s on the fence.

Keep in mind this is only a B western, and a Canadian produced one at that, so it’s not got the same feel as the typical Hollywood western, but sometimes a different perspective is a great way to look at something you’ve been looking at the same way for a very long time. However, it’s not to say that this is a jarring departure from familiar western standards; it’s more in the subtleties and sensibilities.

Some standout items, for me, were the blacksmith who doesn’t want to be involved in a gunfight. Tyler Mane does a good job staying appropriately tough, but on the flip side, somewhat reserved and peaceable; just not so much as to be an over the top aw-shucks-softy. His performance was one of the better connections, and his blacksmith felt like a real person.

For humor, the discussion in the school house, about what constitutes a weapon, was great. It was just self-referential enough, and had just enough tone of being a real, contemporaneous discussion between the locals of the town. And that’s what made this movie work for me: it was all about juxtaposition. How one thought or attitude compared when set against a differing backdrop than the usual.

I say again that I know it won’t be everyone’s kind of movie, but if you want something a little different, then definitely give it a try. It’s a comedy, drama, six-gun movie that doesn’t lean too hard on any one genre designation.

The Endless Ride

Billy the Kid: The Endless Ride

by Michael Wallis

Michael Wallis’ book, The Endless Ride, is an interesting piece to discuss. It’s a good book and an easy read, as well being accurate, but it’s not something I would tell everyone to read. If you want to read about Billy and get a great picture of where he went and what happened to him, and you don’t want to have to get into reading multiple books to really piece together a college level survey of his life, then this is a great book. Basically, if you want to pick up a good book about Bonney, read it and be done, and feel like you have the story…this book does that.

What’s interesting about Wallis’ book is that he doesn’t have a lot of new research or discoveries to bring to the table. What he does is use a lot of other authors, such as Utley and Nolan. He also does a lot of first-hand interviewing of present day specialist to get their insight and opinions on the matters at hand. This latter element is a definite break from the norm of western history biographies, but I find it to be a welcome touch.

Regarding his common use of Utley and Nolan, this is precisely why this book isn’t for every Billy the Kid student. If you’re going to read more than Wallis, then you might as well not read Wallis. Utley and Nolan’s deeply researched books are for the enthusiast who wants to really dig in deep beyond the first level, but Wallis is a great summation if you want to put it all together and move on to the next book on your western shelf.

Wallis is an accomplished writer, and for the average reader (the non-professional-critiquer) his writing style flows smoothly and creates an appropriate atmosphere. His use of specialists, as well personal thoughts and insights, add enough to the book to make it truly thoughtful and well-intentioned. Another plus is the illustrations. Fortunately, for the kind of book he’s written, he doesn’t leave the reader wishing for more photos to peruse.

Seeing as the latest Billy bio previous to Endless Ride was Nolan’s college level West of Billy the Kid in 1998, perhaps it was time for an everyman’s biography to be released again. So decide what kind of Billy the Kid reader you’re going to be, and then either grab Wallis’ Endless Ride, or go to Amazon and snag copies of Utley, Nolan, Burns, Garrett, and probably more. Either way you’re on track to a victory.

Short and Violent

Billy the Kid: A Short and Violent Life

by Robert Utley

By the time Utley first published his comprehensive Billy the Kid biography he had already written two books about the world surrounding The Kid. As he once told it, someone gave him the bright idea to write a book actually about Billy Bonney, since that’s what people really wanted. The result was the up-to-then most informative and most accurate account we had been given.

Utley’s book is a great starting point. Technically I have it as the number two book in a small list of Billy book’s one should read when giving themselves an education on the boy. Utley’s research is impressive to say the least. He was privy, through relationships, to some great information and documents that he is faithful to share with the reader, and this is how we get such a complete final product on Billy’s life.

One of the things about Utley’s writing that I love so much is that when it comes to points where it becomes incumbent upon the author to offer speculation he does so with explanation and alternate ideas. While he makes the case for what he feels is correct, he is essentially giving the reader the chance to disagree with him. This, to me, is one of the most underperformed acts of humility in the arena of western research and writing.

I fail to see why, if you believe your case is strong, and subsequently correct, you would not include the full picture with both sides of an argument for an intelligent person to discern for themselves if they agree with you or not. For to seldom does this happen in western biographies, and an author will often say something to the tune of “Some people say so-and-so got in a gunfight in this town…but we know that can’t be.” So why can’t it? Fortunately, Utley never utilizes this lazy form of argument, and I believe it to be one of the greatest strengths of his book.

On the flip side, one of the things that left me wanting more, was that after a step-by-step walkthrough of Billy’s life from his final Silver City departure up to the end of the Lincoln County War, he just breezes through most of 1879 and ’80. It could very well be that his research hadn’t yet turned up much for that time, or it could also be that he didn’t want to put out a four-hundred plus page biography, and wanted to put the full dissection on the years that defined The Kid; or that thought could even have belonged to the publisher.

Regardless, Utley’s trusted depth of detail returns for Billy’s final days as it picks up again around the time Garrett comes on the scene. Once again we have a relatively movement-precise tracking of what Billy Bonney was up to as he and Garrett played cat and mouse.

Utley is one of the paragons of Henry McCarty research and this book has to be read if you want to be taken serious, or if you seriously want to know about him.

Mysterious Gunfighter

by Jack DeMattos

For a being such a mysterious character, Jack DeMattos does a good job of revealing to us enough to make the man feel somewhat familiar. The knowledge we have is too limited to produce the volumes that you could find on the likes of Wyatt Earp or Jesse James, but for anyone wanting to round out their knowledge of the western gunfighters, Mysterious Gunfighter suffices well.

In what I would consider to be a worthwhile trade-off, the limits of our information are off-set well enough by the excitement of what we do know. Mysterious Dave was an interesting fellow, and I don’t believe it’s just because of what we do know. I would be willing to bet that the more we know about him, the more intriguing he would become. And that’s really the value in this book, learning about the man’s exploits in many different places, with an assortment of different characters, all while filling various roles with regards to the law and legal standing. He really was a fascinating character of the west, and mysterious applies from several different ways.

DeMattos offers a fairly straight-forward telling, which allows for easy following as the reader tracks Mather’s life. Some might consider the first and last chapters to be filler, but I couldn’t agree. The first chapter gives a thorough background of the Mather family from the very early days of the colonies up to the time Dave Mather left for the frontier, and the last chapter enlightens the reader to the family line following the disappearance of Mather. Were  the first chapter to run on for four chapters, or some other significant measure of the book, then I might be inclined to side with the view of excess, but as it is, the bookend chapters work to almost make the man more mysterious. When we have such a clear understanding of where he came from and the family that surrounds him, and then we get a full picture of the surviving family line, it deepens the mystery as to where he went and just how is it that nobody knows anything?

There were probably only one or two points in the book where I felt I might disagree with the authors surmising (which, I think, a little difference of view is healthy), but I always felt that DeMattos was giving us as best a study as we could get, short of new revealing information. If you’re working to put together a complete library of the gunfighters, this is the book you should have when it comes to Dave Mather.

A Look at Leon Metz’ Dallas Stoudenmire

The Story of Dallas Stoudenmire

 

Leon Metz is a qualified western historian author, but even so, there still just hasn’t been much to say about Dallas Stoudenmire. Pretty much everything that’s known comes from his time as the Marshal of El Paso, and so, given our limits of information, this book is, understandably, not a very long read. Fortunately, Metz still gives us plenty of reason to pick it up and enjoy.

To the delight of some, and to the chagrin of others, one thing that Metz doesn’t do is load the book with pages and chapters of social and economic conditions of the areas relevant to the life of Stoudenmire. I hear complaints, sometimes, of authors filling in a book with too much information about the history of said valley, or context on how a certain town was built up, and who moved in first, and how they all voted to build a well, and then the well couldn’t be built because of a municipal issue, and then, fifteen years later, our subject gunman finally came riding into town. This is obviously facetious, but the point being that some love more and more context, and some find it tedious.

Metz goes the less-is-more route in this book, but still gives plenty of context. In fact, I’d say his historical summation of El Paso was just the right balance. The strongest points in this area are probably his looks at the various players of the time in El Paso. In only roughly 130 pages he gives a great snapshot of the current climate that Dallas walked into, and connects you to the man and his dilemma’s.

The biggest problem I had with this book is wishing that there was more to say about Dallas Stoudenmire, but there just isn’t much known. Given Metz’s wonderful telling, and the intriguing nature of Dallas Stoudenmire, I really wish we could have a book two or three times the page count, but in absence of that, thank goodness we have what we do.

If Dallas Stoudenmire is a character you don’t know much about you should really get familiar. And this is just the gunfighter that you can learn about with out the inevitable continuous heavy involvement of the world of Wyatt Earp or Billy the Kid.

Saga of Billy the Kid

by Walter Noble Burns

This very well may be the most entertaining book about Billy the Kid that you’ll ever read. It is also probably the watershed moment in Billy the Kid historical research and publishing. Prior to Walter Noble Burns’ Saga, all that was known of Billy was from the greatly embellished Upson/Garrett book, and the even less accurate dime-novels that gave little-to-no concern for accuracy or truth. So while Burns account is still not a complete, nor completely accurate telling, it is a giant step forward to enlightening the general public to the idiosyncrasies of all the New Mexico tumult.

Having written and published in the early part of the century, Burns was able to speak with actual living participants in the Lincoln County feud. It, unfortunately, lacks a lot of our contemporary self-imposed morals of research. Not privy to many of the records (or the internet for that matter) that we are today, Burns form of research was more akin to the Herodotian model; meaning he went around and asked people what the heck happened. This is both a blessing and a curse. He gives us some great insights and perspectives, but he also leaves a lot of undocumented, or at least un-cited, details that historians had to either prove or disprove.

For the most part, it’s a pretty accurate account. He spends a lot of time giving helpful background, and balanced attention, to the different facets. While he doesn’t heap any praise on the Murphy-Dolan faction, he does a great job of making you wonder whose side he’s on, at times. And that’s a great compliment to someone wishing to stay, or at least appear, neutral; which he did quite well.

The writing style is a bit more inspired than a lot of modern writers. Right from the beginning when he opens with John Chisum and his move to New Mexico, and the description of his ranch and operations, it really sets a tone for the world these men stomped around in.

Ultimately, if you are an even half-serious reader of Billy the Kid, you have to read Walter Noble Burns book; you don’t have to read it first, but it is a great place to start. From there, when you dive into Utley and Nolan, you have set a wonderful foundation.

Notorious Luke Short

Sporting Man of the Wild West

Jack DeMattos and Chuck Parsons working together is enough already to tell you that it’s going to be a worthwhile purchase. Notorious Luke Short is a book that was long overdue and it was great to see a pair of veteran old west researchers finally giving us what we needed. The book covers all the pertinent ground, and even goes deeper into certain elements of Luke’s life, such as the Dodge City War, and his relationship with Hattie Buck.

Through the overview of Luke’s life we get a better understanding of the man than we’ve been able to piece together before now. His time traveling, his penchant for boxing, his relationships with both the highbrow crowd, as well as laborers, really gives a picture of how versatile and active he was in life. But don’t worry, his moments as a man of action are covered also, and it’s interesting to see how Luke handled his business.

The subject of his gunfights does, however,  bring up one of two areas that I would cite as areas that I thought could have been stronger. As much as I enjoyed the book (a lot), I felt at times that some of the gunplay moments were almost treated as asides during the study of his business and sporting ventures. The worst of these moments was when an alleged fight took place and it was, honestly, glossed over. It was something to the effect of: …over here he was involved in a gun altercation, and then moved on to this place…I was left thinking “Well, what was it? Did it happen or not? What do we know, and what do we not know? And why?”

The other gripe (and this happens with most all authors) is when they have a lack of evidence of something, they conclude it didn’t happen, when in actuality, it should only lead them to the conclusion that a determination can not be had. Absolute statements in historical research should be made very carefully, and sometimes they get put forth a little too easily.

That said, this is a great book and I am so glad that Parsons and DeMattos set forth to getting it done. Given the plethora of books covering Wyatt Earp and Billy the Kid, not to mention, even Doc Holliday, it’s nice to have one for Luke Short that can be the definitive go-to. Which, it should be pointed out, this is the third biography, so just to give some context, the first was Cox in 1961, and it had a lot of errors due to the fact that there just wasn’t as much info uncovered at the time, and then Wayne Short’s biography in 1997. Wayne Short receives, and deserves, a lot of credit for his efforts to bring Luke’s story to the masses, but with Notorious we get an advanced picture, as well as assurance that there is no bias from family descension.

Over fifty years since the first biography, and almost twenty since the last, as well as nearly a hundred pages more than the previous book, it’s great to finally have such a comprehensive look into the notorious gunman and gambler, Luke Short.

Young Guns (1988)

Young Guns will draw a lot of different reactions. It was really a pretty popular movie, yet anyone who has studied the true events of Billy the Kid and the Regulators will be quick to express their chagrin at all the inaccuracies. Lucky for me this movie came out when I was still too young and too uneducated on the west to be bothered by any of it. And since ignorance is bliss, it has remained an all time favorite of mine.

I don’t deny the movies mistakes, sure it has plenty, but even now, after having read books a plenty on Billy the Kid, I still think it does an ok job. For having to try and cram so much story in to two hours of screen time, I think they did an overall good job of condensing events and putting across broad points in concise moments.

Granted, Young Guns should probably win an award for the most occurrences of dramatic gun-cocking in a western…ever, but for a young guy like me, I thought it was pretty darn slick; the scene of taking turns cocking their guns and then posing in the barn before storming out is probably a highpoint in western cheese, but man did I think that was cool. And just as well, there are plenty of genuinely quality scenes.

Billy and the guys all camped out and deciding what they were going to do next is a generally true event. Some decided to ride away, some decided to stay, with Billy leading the contingent choosing to remain. Likewise, although the time is sped along, Frank Coe tells a story of Tunstall taking Billy to town and buying him a new suit and guns and gunbelt and how happy Billy was about it. He said it was the first time anyone had done anything like that for him, so those little touches in the movie are a real plus.

Of course the not-so-subtle moments are pretty great, too, like the scene with Morton and Baker and McCloskey. No one alive knows for sure what happened on that backtrail to Lincoln, but this scene is a great depiction of what most likely occurred.

I would really love to see Billy’s life played out over the course of a three or four part series of movies, or even TV movies, but in the meantime, Young Guns is still a pretty fun way to take in a visualized depiction, in spite of some cheese.

Tombstone (1993)

Let’s all say it together: I’m you’re Huckleberry

Ok, now with that out of the way we can begin…

It’s been almost twenty-five years since Tombstone’s release and still it remains as an oft-quoted piece of easily recognizable Americana. It’s hard to find a person who even moderately enjoys westerns and hasn’t already seen the movie, so I don’t see any need to offer a review and critique, but instead, let’s just talk about it.

Tombstone was the first major movie to get mustaches right! This is a huge thing for me. As much as I love the old classics, and the old TV shows, I can never get past how clean shaven and pretty everyone was. Tombstone unapologetically hoisted upon the un-expecting American movie-going public a whole cast of men with testosterone laced sweeping ‘staches. And upper-lip coiffing was only the beginning. From this bold point the creators set forth to bring us one of the most accurate historical westerns we’ve seen.

True, some will highlight this or that element that isn’t accurate, but movie makers have to be allowed to be succinct in pulling together certain moments in order to get the point across when the alternative is to leave significant elements out altogether. But the amount of things that Tombstone gets right overrides any petty nitpicking of details that the average movie goers wouldn’t be aware of, anyway. Probably the only way to be able to get more accurately detailed would be if they were to make a week long mini-series of the whole ordeal; which would be a welcome endeavor, to my way of thinking.

Tombstone is the western for a generation. In the late 60’s Clint Eastwood teamed with Sergio Leone and re-presented westerns, changing people’s attitudes for a whole generation. Until Tombstone came along Eastwood’s spaghetti westerns were considered template of what westerns had come to mean for the world at large. But Tombstone came along and did the same thing, changing people’s notions of what westerns should look like, and their characters should act.

People like Doc Holliday and Johnny Ringo illuminated a truth about the gambling, gun-slinging men of those wild days. Wyatt and Virgil and Morgan gave us a real insight to what lawing was really like, and the challenges facing a society working hard to establish itself. Yes, these elements have been done before in westerns, but never with the accuracy and sleek style of Tombstone. It’s mix of history lessons with cool appeal imbedded itself in the minds of American consciousness.

Now, nearly twenty-five years since it’s original release, we can hope that someone is yet again up to the challenge and present us with another cinematic marvel that embodies all that Americans have loved about westerns, and define it for this generation, giving new viewers a reason to be awed by the west and the men and women who lived it.

Doc (1971)

There’s a lot that can be said for this movie, but I doubt that any of it can be good. Released right at the peak of the Revisionist Era, Doc goes so far as to be a deconstructionist film, and by that I mean a trend of self-righteously deconstructing all of the western tropes and standards; not necessarily the philosophical theory of Jacques Derrida.

Although it’s titled Doc, it’s really a story about the Vietnam War and the hippies versus the authoritarian capitalists. If that doesn’t make a person want to watch a western I’m not sure what would, right? In all seriousness, that approach might be fine if a writer wanted to create some characters and then an allegorical story, but in using Doc Holliday and Wyatt Earp, it’s not only insulting to them but to the audience member.

Very little true history is left by the time the final product hits your senses for reception; it isn’t as bad as Dirty Little Billy, but it’s still one of the least impressive movies I’ve seen. The problems start with the want-to-be spaghetti western caricatures that everyone must have been directed to portray. Doc and Wyatt are the worst, speaking almost every line through barely moving teeth, with a monotone cadence that just slightly exceeds a whisper. It’s like every line was meant to be delivered as though they just thought of a malevolent plan and needed to keep cool while explaining it.

The absurdities abound, such as Doc winning Kate in a card game with Ike Clanton, or Wyatt telling Doc, seriously not cynically, that “We are bad men”. But on the plus side, I think they did a good job casting Stacey Keach. He has an actual hairlip which was a feature of Doc Holliday’s, even if it was covered up by a mustache. And I really think that Keach did a good job of playing sickly, but not too sickly. As much as I love Val Kilmer’s Doc Holliday, he was so darn cool that I almost forget sometimes that he was sick. And in Wyatt Earp Dennis Quaid was so sick that I expected him to shave his hair and tell everyone he was dying of cancer. Both were great performances, and way better movies than Doc, but his coughing fits seemed very well timed and presented, and probably the best done element of this film.

Even with a few notable turns by Stacey Keach this movie is still not worth the time. I finally made myself sit down and watch it just to see if there were any nuggets to take away, and the answer was a resounding no.