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![]() Samurai cowboys save a poor village in ye old Mexico, riding in to one of the greatest themes of all time. Fifty years on, the all-star cast impresses less than the bravura music — the Marlboro jingle still arouses. The Magnificent Seven famously remakes Kurosawa’s Seven Samurai…
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Elmer Bernstein's Magnificent Theme
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![]() Crisp and charismatic Western, done classically yet with an ironic sensibility. Fans of Ed Harris, Viggo Mortensen and Westerns won’t be disappointed.
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![]() The myths about one of the Wild West’s most mythologized characters get burnished in this enjoyable biopic. Hollywoodized to the point of cliche, Wild Bill isn’t much for historical veracity. That leaves it free to make entertaining hay out of the many shootouts, lovers, standoffs, and saloon…
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Enjoyable if Hollywoodized into cliche
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![]() John Wayne’s final movie serves as a benediction for gunfighters at the dawn of the 20th Century, and for Wayne’s career as a celluloid gunfighter. It does the latter better than the former, making it more of an obligation for fans of the Duke than for Western fans generally. The Shootist b…
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Lauren Bacall: strong & lovely
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![]() A Toy Story knock-off inspired by classic Westerns, Rango is populated with reptiles and rodents instead of toys. Unfortunately its uncuddly creatures aren’t especially relatable, even though they’re in recognizable human dilemmas, a la Pixar’s playthings. Rango’s larger problem is a st…
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![]() In Old California is a simpleminded recreation of Old Sacramento in 1848 and then 1849, made in 1942. A quasi-historical tale, it mostly exists to showcase John Wayne looking quite-the-dandy, from Boston even. The settings are the thing now: pre-49er San Francisco and then up the river to Old…
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John Wayne, the Boston Dandy
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![]() John Wayne starring in an Old West fairytale based on a Louis L’Amour story endows Hondo with loads of old fashioned panache, yet saddles it with too many cliches for enduring greatness. That’s in 2D however. Having seen it years ago in 3D, I recall it as being better but still not great. It…
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The trailer hypes Hondo a bit too much.
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![]() Natalie Portman and Joel Edgerton are very good in this respectable western that focuses more on character study than your typical shoot-em-up fare |
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![]() Denzel Washington is Yul Brynner caliber, but Chris Pratt ain’t no Steve McQueen and the music in The (2016) Magnificent Seven is a very weak imitation of the all-time great theme from the 1960 original. Hence, Antoine Fuqua’s remake is a solidly entertaining Western, but will hardly go down as…
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Denzel talks Magnificent Seven
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![]() A traditional Western presented with richly modern production values, 3:10 to Yuma fails to satisfy due to an ultimately silly story and run-of-the-mill performances. |