The Last Western You Watched?

The Blueberry film was much closer to 2001 than to the comic. Strange film, it did not work.

No. I was very dissapointed, I like Vincent Cassel and I like the Blueberry comic books (and I do not dislike Madsen), but something went completely wrong. Maybe it works after smoking some pot, I havenā€™t tried yet

I tried but fell asleep before the really psychedelic stuff began. :slight_smile:

O, I agree on Blueberry. It looked more inspired by Moebius than Giraud, you know what I mean.

Thatā€™s what I was thinking too.

Itā€™s a fun film. Though it draws inevitable comparisons with Seven Samurai (Iā€™ve even seen a Japanese dub of The Magnificent Seven), itā€™s almost its own film, and thatā€™s partially due to Leeā€™s subplot, and Calvera being such a fun character.
I like comparing the similarities and differences between the samurai and the gunmen. Chris seems like a younger, sprightlier version of Kambei, only heā€™s distant and nonchalant, a bit of a cool loner, while Kambei is cynical yet sentimental. Vin, like Shichiroji, is the sidekick who tags along and doesnā€™t really say or do much, although Shichiroji seems more open and friendly.
I like how Chico is a mix between the idealistic Katsushiro and the headstrong Kikuchiyo, so he comes off as this cocky, affable wannabe kid gunfighter. At first I thought he was kind of weird but then I saw the characters he was based on and liked him more, once I found who he was supposed to be emulating. He also manages to get the happy ending that neither Katsushiro no Kikuchiyo achieved in their stories.
Harryā€™s entrance is a slight variation on Gorobeiā€™s, but other than that heā€™s a very different character. Heā€™s practically an original creation. I donā€™t like the character that much, but Brad Dexter is fine in the role.
Bernardo and Heihachi are polar opposites in personality. Bernardo is a somewhat cold and distant wisecracker, while Heihachi is upbeat and cheerful, even if he sometimes picks on people or says the wrong thing. I like Bernardoā€™s relationship with the kids, as annoying as the little brats are, and I like his speech about how he doesnā€™t have the courage to live responsibly as a family man.
Britt and Kyuzo are the most similar to each other.
As for Leeā€¦ heā€™s interesting. Like I said before, I like his subplot, and how it deconstructs the gunfighter mythology. Like Harry, heā€™s the original addition to the script.

Finally got to see The Homesman, and I quite enjoyed it. Gruesome and weird in its own right, but really a nice effort.

I watched El Puro again tonight. As brilliant as always.

Diablo.

Young man goes after the men who kidnaps his wife. We are on familar ground, but around half way into the film you notice somthing is not right. The film does change and becomes a more interesting one for me. Scott Eastwood mimics his dad at times in the expression front, and wow when he does he looks like Eastwood senior from his 60ā€™s westerns. Nice cameo from Danny Glover and enjoyed this more in the entertainment stakes than a more recent high profile western released at the cinemas.

I saw the film, itā€™s not great but itā€™s not terribly bad either. Young (Scott) Eastwood is not bad in this weird western and in some scenes he looks a lot like his famous dad, but he is clearly outclassed in the acting department by the likes of Walton Goggins( who IMO steals the film as a mysterious crazy killer) and Danny Glover. Decent action in this and the cinematography was great.

Yes good way to put things.

Well, i have to say i liked Blueberry as a whole, although it has nothing to do with comics. I bet, readers of Carlos Castaneda would appreciate this film more. And no, i didnā€™t smoke anything while watching it, and neither before or after. It is really embarrassing to see, how is everyone, who liked this kind of movie, accused of ā€œsmokingā€ something. Yes, he liked a movie with psychedelic elements in it, so he must be a smoker. Jeez.

You donā€™t have to be stoned to like a psychedelic movie. But you have to be stoned to like a bad psychedelic movie :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

So last night I saw The Wonderful Country, which I thought was meh at best. Today I saw Comanche Station, which I think is an excellent movie.

The only scene I really like in The Wonderful Country was the fight with the Apaches. As for Comanche Station, I was put off by the fact that the Comanches in the film looked more like Pawnees or Osages. Other than that, itā€™s not a bad little film.

Iā€™m just rewatching The Wonderful Country, which is a wonderful film, one of the best western of the 50s. Great atmosphere, great color photography and believable characters and situations.

Iā€™ll have to watch it again. Sometimes I like films more when I re-visit them after a long time. I felt that way about Santee.

Agreed! And it serves well to illustrate the difference between an American and an Italian Mexico western: In the end Mitchum goes back north, leaving his troubles (that is his gun and a woman) behind south of Rio Grande.

Actually he goes to the woman, and the woman scenes are ā€¦ well, far from bad, but still a bit strange compared to how all the other scenes are developed.

TWC is quite unusual in many respects, and often looks like 5 -10 years ahead of itā€™s time. The atmosphere is very Spag-like, but it shows at the same moment how different US westerns tell their tale, and how differnt the tales are.

The novel seems to be interesting too.