Corporate Line: Following the day-to-day encounters of four cattle herders who roam the countryside without owning a particular piece of land, or “freegrazers” (Costner, Duvall, Luna, Benrubi), living in the final years of the Wild West, this film tells the story of how they eventually team up to rid a burgeoning remote town, Harmonville, from the machinations of a ruthlessly evil rancher, Baxter (Gambon), who forms a sort of “outlaw state” where he makes the laws and rules, and enforces them using scare tactics and brute force.
The Good: Robert Duvall is a good cowboy. Kevin Costner is somewhere in between. When he plays it cool you have to like him but when he goes over the top it gets too far for anyone’s taste. The visuals are wonderful. I’d like to find out where they shot this film so I could set up a tent and just stay there for a week and inhale its beauty.
One question for guys: Is there anything better than a shoot-em-up western?
The Bad: The storyline is nothing new and has been replayed many times from the thirties right on up to Clint Eastwood’s spaghetti Westerns. Revenge sells especially in Westerns. It’s not that I disliked Costner rather; I disliked what the screenwriter did to his character. It was felt important for us to find out more about him than we would even care. When Clint Eastwood rode into town as the Man With No Name we didn’t care about his past we only cared about what he was going to do in the present.
One little complaint, the film runs too long. There is an entire scene at the end after the inevitable clash. They could have easily ended it there within a few minutes instead of a half-hour. Short does mean sweet. Long is just long.
DVD Features: Kevin Costner kicks off disc one with a commentary track. There are some elements of interest, like when he points out mistakes in the film, and some that aren’t so interesting, like his theoretic view of the film. Can you say dry?
Disc two finds Costner giving us more commentary on the behind the scenes footage. There are some interesting pieces; like his tribute to Michael Jeter and when Costner discusses the shows money problems and an appendix that was going bad. Yet again it gets monotonous and starts to sound like a Costner tribute to himself.
Frankly: The Movie: I’d pay to see Costner as a cowboy. I would prefer that he say less and shoot more and that Duvall shoot less and talk more. They are good together. Give us some more.
The DVD: You paid for the movie right? You get some extras and if you like Kevin Costner, a lot, than you might be able to sit through an hour or so of him chatting it up.
+ Charlie Craine
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