Western

Lynne Ramsey reported to be working on new title with Natalie Portman

The two will pair up on western Jane Got a Gun

25 May 2012

Glasgow born director Lynne Ramsay's next project has just been announced: a Western that will star Natalie Portman. Jane Got A Gun will focus on a young woman whose outlaw of a husband is brutally attacked by his own gang. When the band of men head to…

The Good The Bad The Weird

5 Feb 2009

WESTERN/ACTION Gifted South Korean filmmaker Kim Ji-woon takes on Sergio Leone’s greatest western and (unbelievably) emerges victorious. It’s the 1930s in the desert wilderness of Japanese colonised Chinese Manchuria and three treasure hunters are in…

The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford

29 Nov 2007

WESTERN (15) 159min Arch confederate and violent outlaw Jesse James was and is a gift for dramatists. With numerous appearances in literature, film, theatre and music, American folklore’s Robin Hood seems as unstill in his grave now as he was when…

Andrew Dominik - Contrary cowboy

29 Nov 2007

It’s taken New Zealand-born, Australia-bred filmmaker Andrew Dominik (pictured) seven years to make the follow-up to his much-praised debut, Chopper. Like that film, The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is a wildly unconventional…

Soldier Blue

30 Oct 2008

Originally released in 1970 at the tail end of a period of huge social, political and psychological change and based on the massacre of Cheyenne Indians at Sand Creek in 1864, Soldier Blue is as relevant today as it ever was. Predominantly a love story…

Meek's Cutoff a keenly observed addition to the 'mythic Western' genre

Director Kelly Reichardt crafts a tense fable with no clear morality

24 Mar 2011

(tbc) 104min Kelly Reichardt (Old Joy, Wendy and Lucy) is one of the most interesting American filmmakers working today and her latest feature film delivers on all fronts. Meek’s Cutoff belongs to the slender sub strata of the Western genre…

Coen brothers' True Grit reunites a great text with its original meaning

A stirring poem to corrupt, bygone society of the Old West

2 Feb 2011

(15) 110min Henry Hathaway’s 1969 adaptation of Charles Portis’ novel was a rousing Hollywood crowd-pleaser, with the role of Marshal Rooster Cogburn allowing the unfashionable John Wayne an unexpected comeback. In the hands of the Coen Brothers, the…

The Valdez Horses

Bronson stars in solid western from director of The Magnificent Seven

12 Aug 2010

(15) 93min (Optimum) Though not generally thought of as being a spaghetti western, this US/Italian/Spanish co-production from 1976 fits the bill. Directed by Hollywood veteran John Sturges (The Magnificent Seven, Gunfight at the OK Corral), produced…

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

31 Jul 2008

WESTERN (15) 180min The third part of Sergio Leone’s spaghetti western ‘Dollars trilogy’ receives a new print re-release ahead of its predecessors A Fistful of Dollars and For a Few Dollars More (their digital re-release comes in September). As stupid…

3.10 to Yuma

6 Sep 2007

Pitting Russell Crowe and Christian Bale head-to-head guarantees a bout of intense, tortured manliness and this glowering, gripping remake of Delmer Daves’s 1957 Western (adapted from an Elmore Leonard short story) practically fires rounds of solid…

Seraphim Falls

(15) 111min

23 Aug 2007

In this age of filmmaking retrograde, substantial lengths of celluloid are devoted to the lazy re-hashing of successful formulae and gratuitous remakes. Unfortunately this is not confined to action films or romcoms, as Seraphim Falls, a western, follows…

DVD - Silent Tongue

2 Jul 2007

WESTERN Although filmed on the expansive plains of the Old West, Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Sam Shepard’s 1994 western is a very stagy affair, switching between handfuls of dusty, dialogue-heavy scenes and boasting some scenery-chewing…