N'Al on 18/5/2010 at 14:39
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is one of only two movies where the voiceover really annoyed me, Barry Lyndon being the other. Cinematography and score were outstanding, though.
As for RDR, I'm unfortunately not going to get it just yet. Got exams coming up, so must resist.
EvaUnit02 on 18/5/2010 at 14:48
Quote Posted by Matthew
Many many great films in that list Eva, I agree with most of them. I really like Rio Bravo as well.
My opinion of Rio Bravo was really coloured because I went in with very high expectations. You see I'm a big fan of Assault on Precinct 13 by John Carpenter.
Precinct 13 is hardly a remake of Rio Bravo at all, it's only very similar to Rio's 3rd act. If anything I liked Howard Hawk's El Dorado far better, for the delightful performances by Robert Mitchum and a young James Caan.
When I went into Rio Bravo I was expecting sometime along the lines of A Fistful of Dollars vs. Yojimbo.
The similarities between Precinct 13 and Rio Bravo are comparable to Ringo Lam's City on Fire and Tarantino's Reservoir Dogs - they only share like a skeleton portion, say the lower torso, other than that they're very different films.
Honestly the closest film to Precinct 13 that I've seen is Carpenter's own abysmal Ghosts of Mars.
EDIT:-
Actually Matthew, could you please list the ones that you disagree with?
Thirith on 18/5/2010 at 14:56
Quote Posted by N'Al
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is one of only two movies where the voiceover really annoyed me,
Barry Lyndon being the other. Cinematography and score were outstanding, though.
Haven't seen
Barry Lyndon, but the voiceover is one of the reasons why I really liked
The Assassination.... Might also be because the guy doing the voiceover sounded so much like Ricky Jay. :D
Edit: A couple of years ago I directed a play, and for one scene we were looking for a scene of a lonesome cowboy riding into the sunset. We didn't find a single one - the closest we found was the ending of
Shane. Are there any westerns that end on what I'd thought was pretty much an archetypal image?
gunsmoke on 18/5/2010 at 15:12
Yeah, I can't remember off the top of my head. Sometimes they do the sunset thing somewhere other than the ending. Did you check any of the Spaghetti Westerns?
EvaUnit02 on 18/5/2010 at 15:18
Sorry Thirith, I'm drawing a blank. To be fair I've only made an effort to see the works by particular filmmakers or highly talked about films. It just so happens that most of those are either A. genre revisionist films that carved their own identity, often made by men with specific visions or B. films that set trends and again that didn't necessarily conform specifically to genre conventions.
High Noon for example might be one of the bonafide classics of the genre, but it had its own identity. It's essentially about one man who alone stands up and clings to both his personal values and that of his profession in the face of insurmountable amounts of pessimism around him. You could argue that it was way ahead of its time, pre-dating the Revisionist films of the 60's-70's.
Matthew on 18/5/2010 at 15:27
The Searchers ends that way, doesn't it? Edit: well, he walks off rather than rides off but you know what I mean. High Plains Drifter is another.
Edit edit: Eva, it's more that I haven't seen a few of those films than that I disagree with them (still haven't watched Open Range despite it being on my DVD shelf for about a year and a half, for example).
I saw Rio Bravo before Assault on Precinct 13, so I don't have that problem :p In fact, as I recall Rio Bravo was intended as an answer to High Noon, with Wayne and Hawks being very critical of the actions of the characters in the latter.
Thirith on 18/5/2010 at 16:12
Quote Posted by Matthew
The Searchers ends that way, doesn't it? Edit: well, he walks off rather than rides off but you know what I mean. High Plains Drifter is another.
The horse was more important for this specific scene than the sunset, which is why we ended up going with
Shane. Made for a great, off-beat counterpoint to Richard of Gloucester's "A horse, a horse, my kingdom for a horse." :p
The closest we came to finding something back then was the final scene of
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, but that was four riders, if I remember correctly, which didn't work as neatly.
gunsmoke on 19/5/2010 at 01:18
Quote Posted by Matthew
High Plains Drifter is another.
That is the Spaghetti Western I was thinking of. Thanks!
T-Smith on 19/5/2010 at 06:42
So I picked this up and yeah, it's pretty damn good. Problem is now I'm playing two massive open-world games - Red Dead and Just Cause 2.
Matthew on 19/5/2010 at 13:09
Woo, on it's way and for less than £30!
