The scenery and photography were at times breathtaking in this film. Too bad there's wasn't a film attached to it that was also breathtaking.
I found myself laughing too many times at the many ridiculous turns of events in this bloated Western.
Such as...(SPOILERS AHEAD!)
A forty-something year-old nurse (Annette Bening) who is perhaps the prettiest woman in a town filled with men, and yet she's not married, engaged, or even dating anyone. In fact, the men in the town are so lacking in testosterone that they don't even try to chat her up. Maybe the town is a homosexual haven in the West? Perhaps, she herself is lesbian? Nah, can't be because when a cowboy with very little charisma (Kevin Costner)shows up she suddenly discovers she has a libido and falls in love with him.
Gunfights in which guns always have a never-ending supply of bullets and hit with pinpoint accuracy. (Back in those days most guns were highly inaccurate and unreliable. The same can be said for the men shooting the guns, but you wouldn't know it from this film. You might think that Costner was a sharpshooter who had some kind of S.W.A.T. training.) Of course, when it comes to shooting the main villain (Michael Gambon), no-one can shoot straight. At one point almost the entire town is shooting at him while he's holed up in a little room and yet miraculously he isn't killed. (Perhaps, I was watching a Westernized version of Pulp Fiction where an act of Divine Intervention had taken place!)
A near-dead character named Button (who hours before was in a coma with little chance of ever recovering) somehow gets the strength, determination, and ability to take part in the final shoot-out.
The old coot (Duvall) who turns into Superman. He even gets the upper hand on and successfully beats up a group of young men more than half his age. And when he gets shot in the stomach in the final gunfight, somehow he's able to stop himself from bleeding to death and continue on making speeches and shooting at the bad guys.
I could go on and on (like this film does), but I think I'll take this time and rewatch a true Western directed by John Ford.
I found myself laughing too many times at the many ridiculous turns of events in this bloated Western.
Such as...(SPOILERS AHEAD!)
A forty-something year-old nurse (Annette Bening) who is perhaps the prettiest woman in a town filled with men, and yet she's not married, engaged, or even dating anyone. In fact, the men in the town are so lacking in testosterone that they don't even try to chat her up. Maybe the town is a homosexual haven in the West? Perhaps, she herself is lesbian? Nah, can't be because when a cowboy with very little charisma (Kevin Costner)shows up she suddenly discovers she has a libido and falls in love with him.
Gunfights in which guns always have a never-ending supply of bullets and hit with pinpoint accuracy. (Back in those days most guns were highly inaccurate and unreliable. The same can be said for the men shooting the guns, but you wouldn't know it from this film. You might think that Costner was a sharpshooter who had some kind of S.W.A.T. training.) Of course, when it comes to shooting the main villain (Michael Gambon), no-one can shoot straight. At one point almost the entire town is shooting at him while he's holed up in a little room and yet miraculously he isn't killed. (Perhaps, I was watching a Westernized version of Pulp Fiction where an act of Divine Intervention had taken place!)
A near-dead character named Button (who hours before was in a coma with little chance of ever recovering) somehow gets the strength, determination, and ability to take part in the final shoot-out.
The old coot (Duvall) who turns into Superman. He even gets the upper hand on and successfully beats up a group of young men more than half his age. And when he gets shot in the stomach in the final gunfight, somehow he's able to stop himself from bleeding to death and continue on making speeches and shooting at the bad guys.
I could go on and on (like this film does), but I think I'll take this time and rewatch a true Western directed by John Ford.