Dirty Little Billy (1972)

Dirty Little Billy is not a movie I talk about because I want to, but because I feel that if this post can help even one person to not do drugs, then it’s worth the time thinking about it. You see, I do it because I care. I care about the viewer who doesn’t know, I care about Billy the Kid, and I care about the old west. And that’s why I write this post.

This is probably my least favorite western I’ve ever seen; there’s problems all over the place. The lighting is bad, the characters are bad, and it prides itself on being a true look at Billy the Kid. Not to mention simple logistical items that seem ridiculous.

Let’s start with the logistical. In the revisionist era of westerns it became important to show how dirty everything was. Nobody ever swept. Nobody ever dusted. And according to a lot of these movies, people who lived in the 1800’s seemed to think that splattered mud was an attractive look. Dirty Little Billy supports this notion by having Billy and his family arrive in town and proceed to walk straight up a mud sloshed road, going in up to their knees, when they could have easily moved left by about six feet and walked on solid dirt. Clearly the director had them do this for effect, but it was extremely silly watching them struggle through the mud, making a point of getting dirty, when anyone with half a brain would not even alter their course, but begin it on the sensible path.

Almost any scene shot indoors is a challenge to discern. I understand there wasn’t electricity at the time, but if you overcame that by using a modern camera to shoot the film, then you could probably also do the same to find away to allow us to see the indoor scene clearly. I’m not certain, but I’d be willing to wager that this was another effort by the director to show just how dark and dismal the west was, on top of being a mud-hewn mess.

Other than a simpleton named for William Bonney there weren’t really any characters tied to the true life of Billy the Kid. He hero-worships a fella named Goldie and then the story spirals down from there. Since this Billy is so far from the actual Billy the Kid, you could watch it and just consider the name a coincidence, but it still isn’t worth the time. Michael Pollard, who plays Billy in this movie, is a fine actor in a lot of roles (he was great in Roxanne) but he ends up playing the Kid as a half-brained nit wit. If this Billy the Kid was in your high school you automatically know that he would be in the special class, bordering on hanging out with the full on mentally handicapped students. It may sound like a facetious joke, but this a sincere effort to give context. It was bad.

From the movies promotional efforts: A more realistic, based-on-reality, unsensationalistic portrayal of the gritty early years of one of the most famous Wild West outlaws in history, Billy The Kid.  They’re very wrong.

Red Dead Revolver (2004)

Red Dead Revolver was the first game in the Red Dead series and pre-dated Gun by a year.  And while Gun was able to improve upon what Red Dead Revolver did, RDR certainly deserves praise for what it did for the proliferation of old-west gunfighter games. Starting with it’s first person shooter dynamics to it’s focused targeting mode, Revolver showed what was possible in the arena for old west gunfighters.

It’s strongest attributes were the gunfights, in which you could take cover, and/or temporarily enter a slow-motion view. Once you cleared an area, or were in some other way able to make sure there were no more bad-guys lurking to ruin your day, you could advance forward to the next important area. Some of the areas made a little more sense than some of the others, but that leads to the next significant observation.

Red Dead Revolver borders precariously on the edge of being a vaudevillian weird-west story. Many of the characters are extreme caricatures of western tropes, utilizing names such as Bloody Tom, Ugly Chris, Pig Josh, Jack Swift, and Shadow Wolf. The game often times gives the feeling that the game creators were inspired by Clint Eastwood’s spaghetti westerns, and then they got high to complete the final touches.

The real significance to RDR is that after almost being abandoned for good, it was picked up by a new developer and finally released. This then led to the improvements in the genre, including Gun, released the next year, and then the Red Dead sequel Red Dead Redemption coming out five years later and blowing away video gamers everywhere. Which will, in turn, lead to the soon-to-be-released sequel and part three in the Red Dead series, Red Dead Redemption 2. Based on the progression of western gunslinger games so far, Red Dead Revolver deserves a nod for what it’s brought to fans of both gaming and the old west.

Gun (2005)

I won’t be trying to include every old west gunfighter game that was ever produced, since, unlike board games, they get dated pretty quick and become irrelevant, but Gun was a pretty cool title and still has some fun replay-ability. It was originally launched on PlayStation 2 and the Xbox original, but was also made available on the new Xbox 360’s. However, it was never up to snuff against Red Dead Redemption, for which its gameplay was a bit of a precursor.

At the time that Gun was released it was really pretty groundbreaking. It was the first time you could actually mount up, load your guns, and make your own decisions about where you wanted to go. In short, you could finally simulate free-roaming through the old west. Previous competitive titles had some nice features, but none offered the opportunity to simply wander the open ranges. With Gun you could roam and explore to your hearts content, with no directive that had to be adhered to.

Voice talent was one of the cooler investments in this game, featuring Thomas Jane as the main character Colton White, and Kris Kristofferson as his father Ned. Additionally, Ron Pearlman, Lance Henrickson, and Tom Skerrit each voice characters. Some of which are loosely based on actual old westerners. Along the way you’ll run into Clay Allison, Luke Short, Hoodoo Brown, and Dave Rudabaugh (may be some others I’m not remembering). It’s nice that they borrowed from reality, but the in-game versions are not strong in their resemblances.

All-in-all it’s a great game and if you don’t mind a game that isn’t the latest in graphics quality, this is definitely worth the time to play. You’ll engage in many shoot-outs, Indian fights, buffalo hunts, gold mining, and hero work in general.

A List of Towns of the Old West

Please note: This page has trouble supporting the format for the Towns list, therefor a front “card” has been inserted as placeholder when clicking on the Fundamentals link. Please click HERE to be taken to A List of Towns of the Old West.

 

Better just keep moseying folks…

Me

My interest in the old west began when I was just a wee tyke. I had picked up some comic books at a yard sale and in the small group was one called Rawhide Kid. Inside, the Kid was helping Wild Bill Hickok get control of an out-of-control stagecoach. This was the start for me.

Fortunately I had parents who took us on lots of road trips and so at a young age I was able to experience the plains-states and get familiar with the old haunts of some of the heroes I had heard about. We traveled several times through the Dakotas, Wyoming, Nebraska, and Kansas, so needless to say, there were plenty of roadside attractions that kept the fire stoked; most notably would be Deadwood SD.

I remember visiting Deadwood in a summer of the mid-80’s. It was quite a thrill, but most of all I remember seeing a man wearing a gun on his hip for the first time. It was an odd balance of both thrilling and scary. In a scene straight out of some movie, I played the part of the young kid star-struck by a seemingly real gunman, and the fella wearing the gun played the part of the swaggering pistoleer. It was just outside the modern Saloon No. 10 and he was leaning against the wall, wearing his black cowboy hat and talking to someone. I stopped when I saw his pistol and I must have stared for too long (taking in this unusual site of seeing an actual living breathing man wearing a hat and gun), because his partner in conversation said something to him and he looked at me and laughed. It wasn’t a particularly friendly way to greet a big-eyed kid awed by you, but then, perhaps it was fitting, since many of the gunmen of the old days were not usually known for their active participation in the local chamber of commerce.

Deadwood was a fascinating next step in my growth of wild west interest, but the next level was reached a few years later when Young Guns came out. I wasn’t old enough to go see a rated R film in the theaters, but fortunately, one day I was at a friends house of my sister who had rented it and put it on. No one paid attention to that movie but me.

I was mesmerized; things were coming to life for me. Inaccuracies aside, this was a huge moment for the early teenager that I was. And it was a huge shift because I now started reading books about Billy the Kid. I had finally graduated from the thrilling adventures of the twenty-cent comics.

Over the years I continued to read more and more books, whatever caught my fancy. And in 1993 I got my first chance to perform as a gunfighter. During the 90’s me, my brother, and several of our friends spent as much time as we could doing shootouts in the old town of Shaniko Oregon (which you can read about in it’s own section by clicking HERE). Those were the days.

I’m older now, still just as interested in the Old West as I ever was, and I continue reading and studying to this day. But since I felt I needed an outlet I decided to start a blog. So please think of this blog as the same for yourselves, an outlet for that spark of the old west that still holds your interest.

 

*Picture above is of me with my sister at a show I was apart of in Ellensburg, WA quite a few years back. I’m not that young anymore…much to my sorrow.

Kid Colt’s

                                           Back row, left to right: Tatonka, Tomahawk Rob, Oso, Rawhide                                              Front row, left to right: Little Boy Suede, El Chico Malo, Paco

 

Kid Colt’s.

This was the name we had ascribed ourselves when we embarked upon our first foray as pretend gunfighters. The first year we went it was me, my brother, Suede, and Tomahawk. It was on a whim and we had talked to no one in advance. We simply packed up the truck and drove the two-and-a-half hours, trusting that if a group of guys dressed as gunfighters showed up they’d be welcomed. Fortunately we were.

We didn’t arrive until almost midnight so we camped out by a deep river canyon, and then rode into town the next morning. A small parade procession was making the rounds through the tourists on main street (the only paved area) and as soon as we arrived they asked us to please be in the parade. From there it was all fun and gunfighting.

Originally there was me, my brother Rawhide, Tomahawk Rob, and Little Boy Suede. The following year, we added Paco, Oso, and Tatonka. And after that there was always a mix of part time guys who would join up for a trip or two. Little Boy Suede was named ironically, similar to Little John of Robin Hood and his merry men. But he didn’t like the name so we usually just abbreviated it to Suede, and in later years he came to be recognized as Big Jim Swede. It was an interesting thing because he was never little, and certainly became the most stout and strapping of all of us, but he always had a boyish demeanor. In the end, either name fit.

We went back to Shaniko as often as we could, usually two or three times a year, hitting the big events, and putting on shows to please the tourists. One of our favorite things to do was when a visitor would come in to the sheriff’s office, which became our unofficial quarters whenever we were there, and ask us to make an arrest. We had mocked-up warrants, and then we’d serve ’em to whatever family member or friend they had chosen to playfully harangue; it was always a kick.

Other than our forays into Shaniko, we, the Kid Colts, made a trip to Tombstone Arizona in the fall of 1994. Having seen the movie just less than a year previous we determined that we were obligated to make the trip and visit.

Coming from Washington state, it was no short jaunt, but worth every mile.Unfortunately, we’ve never made any other long group trips, but Suede and I have made several by motorcycle, and my brother and I have done some visiting to key old west locales.

Shaniko, OR

Shaniko Hotel and Restaurant

Billy the Kid is known for hanging around Lincoln and Fort Sumner; Wyatt Earp for Dodge and Tombstone; Wild Bill for walking the streets of Abilene or Deadwood, and in that same romantic vein, I’d have to say that Shaniko is the old west town that I came out of. I didn’t live there, but every summer for a long time, we would show up and put on gunfights for the tourists on the weekends.

It’s a great little town and is probably one of the best authentic old west locations in the state of Oregon, but unfortunately not a lot goes on there these days. The hotel was always the main attraction, but it’s closed now, and without it operating, tourists just aren’t staying overnight. Don’t let that stop you, though, you can still stop into town for a sandwich or a soda and stroll the boardwalks.

Am I sounding like a PR guy for the place? Probably so, but it’s somewhat intentional because it’s a big part of my past and I don’t want people to forget about it. There’s a lot of great buildings you can see, such as the old jail cell and firehouse, the original livery stable, the post office, the old church, and even the old original school house.

Unfortunately the hotel owner had a dispute with the locals and eventually gave up and shut down, but if you have some extra money sitting in your account and you decided not to by yourself a Lamborghini this year, you could put it towards buying a piece of history.

In it’s heyday Shaniko was a sheep town, and a bustling one at that, but as with most old west ghost towns, the train eventually took business elsewhere and Shaniko dwindled. And staying in the vein of “most old west towns”, it caught fire long ago, and almost the whole town was burned down. Fortunately the hotel and other buildings still remain, and are definitely worth a look if you’re anywhere in the area.