Regie:
Kevin CostnerScenario:
Craig StorperCamera:
J. Michael MuroMuziek:
Michael KamenActeurs:
Kevin Costner, Robert Duvall, Annette Bening, Michael Gambon, Michael Jeter, Diego Luna, James Russo, Abraham Benrubi, Dean McDermott, Kim Coates (meer)Samenvattingen(1)
Boss Spearman (Robert Duvall), Charley Waite (Kevin Costner), Mose Harrison (Abraham Benrubi) en ‘Button’ (Diego Luna) zijn vrije veehouders en trekken met hun kudde over de wijde, uitgestrekte prairie. Zo kunnen ze ver van de beschaving ieder hun verleden achter zich laten en leven zoals zij dat willen. Dat rustige bestaan is voorbij als ze het plaatsje Harmonville naderen. Daar worden zij aangevallen door de bende van Harmonvilles corrupte sheriff, die het dorp terroriseert en geen vreemden in de omgeving duldt. Mose overleeft de aanval niet en de jonge ‘Button’ balanceert op het randje van leven en dood. Bij de plaatselijke dokter kan Button worden geholpen aan zijn verwondingen. Daarnaast weet zuster Sue (Annette Bening) iets los te maken bij Charley… De aanval van de sheriff was bedoeld om de heren weg te jagen, maar nu zinnen de cowboys op wraak. Zij zullen er alles aan doen de eer van hun vriendschap met Mose en Button niet te verloochenen. (Independent Films)
(meer)Recensie (5)
A small, modest, intimate western with few characters and few things between them. A more complicated plot wouldn’t have hurt anything, but that’s also true of the level of viewer appreciation. Kevin Costner has a feel for the characters’ psychology and he knows how to direct actors. And I don’t care that the sky in the background looks like a studio screen lit with floodlights. If Costner had had a bigger budget, maybe he wouldn’t have paid so much attention to the essentials.
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The first half is filled with beautiful, almost kitschy imagery (I almost expected a sharp cowboy face to appear and invite me to enjoy a Marlboro) and a free-flowing plot with well-written dialogue and likeable main characters. They aren’t the infallible gunslingers with a colt low at the waist who are so brilliantly parodied in Lemonade Joe, but true cowboys for whom manly honor and honesty are above all else. Duvall and Costner play their roles superbly, and thanks to their performance the viewer easily becomes familiar with their fates and will cheer for them all the more during the final, quite successful shootout. However, I think that the editing scissors could have helped at times, for the sake of more plot build-up, and I also had the impression of a set-up ending at the end. Overall, three and a half *. For the first time in a long time, Kevin Costner at least gave a bit of a flashback to his old days when he charmed the movie world with Dances With Wolves.
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There is nothing more captivating than a classically constructed story of men who, despite their rudeness, fight for direct ideals of courage and honor. I end up never wanting to leave such an environment, and neither does Kevin Costner. Although I can't point out a single scene that was purposeless or unnecessary, the running time is unbearably drawn out. The added passage after the decisive shootout speaks for itself. All the interiors of the spit-filled saloons, and especially the exteriors of dusty towns and endless plains, are right up my alley, but just watch any part of Dances with Wolves and you too will see that Kevin was in a completely different league.
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I always knew that Kevin Costner is good, and here he serves a smart film with characters that have proper depth and where the phrase “instant romance” cannot be used. The way the screenwriter develops the characters is surprising, without pathos or unnecessarily extended scenes. And the final approximately 15-minute shootout is really well-crafted.
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An honest western that illustrates in perhaps a somewhat linear (yet basically almost flawless) way that evil must be confronted and fought to the end, even in the face of what seems a losing battle. Overall, this is a story told very slowly and with a wonderful build all the way through, graced in the end by one of the most impressive shootouts I've ever seen. It's very "Costnerian", but I don't mean that pejoratively in the slightest. [80%]
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