The Long Riders: Walter Hill

For a daguerreotype, Walter Hill's The Long Riders sure is nifty. But as a movie, it's quite lacking. All of the characters move and are blocked like wax statues. What's worse, they don't introduce any of the characters--quite a sin for a film whose raison d'être involves the casting of several groups of real-life brothers to play the members of James-Younger gang. What's the point of such meticulous casting if we can't tell any of the characters apart from each other? (All except for David Carradine--you can always tell it's David Carradine.) I did appreciate how they morphed the story of Jesse James into one of familial vengeance, sort of a Hatfield/McCoy relationship between the James-Younger gang and the murderous Pinkertons who came to arrest/kill them. But much of the drama is drained of its lifeblood by its own solemnity. However, the film comes to vibrant life during action scenes. A knife fight between David Carradine and an Indian in a saloon was one of the most visceral of its kind I've ever seen. And, holy sh!t, the doomed Northfield, Minnesota raid may be one of the best movie shootouts of all time. I mean that 100% honestly. It's probably because it feels like it was guest directed by Sam Peckinpah. And no, that's not an exaggeration. I was going to give this film a 5/10, but that gun fight raised it a point.

6/10