One night in a small town, local ranch hands are visiting the local whorehouse. One of the ranch hands becomes enraged with the girl he is with and brutally attacks her, leaving her scarred. When the Sheriff, Little Bill, arrives, he sets the penalties for the ranch hand. The Madam, Strawberry Alice, finds his verdict horribly insufficient. They start to pool their money to hire a gunslinger to kill the man.
Elsewhere, we meet Will Munny. He is a pig farmer with two kids. When a young man calling himself the Scofield comes to try and recruit him for help with killing the ranch hand, Munny explains he does not live that way anymore. His late wife cured him of drinking and his evil ways. But the lure of much needed reward money cause him to rethink his refusal. Bringing along (much to the Kid’s annoyance) his friend Ned, they start to make their way to the town. Meanwhile, Little Bill has discovered the prostitutes’ plan. He makes it clear that nobody will be allowed to kill the ranch hand.
Gene Hackman’s Little Bill is both charming and scary. A former outlaw, he brutalizes an old cohort named English Bob. Bob is followed by a writer who puts his exploits into tabloid books. He starts to be won over by Little Bill, who humiliates English Bob by revealing the truth behind the stories English Bob told the writer.
When the film came out, many people expressed discomfort watching Eastwood struggle to get on a horse or fire a gun. But this is a strength of the film. Unforgiven is an exploration of the effects of violence. As things spiral out of control, Bill finds it harder to fight the darker nature he has put aside all these years.
The Scofield Kid is exuberant and excited, claiming to have killed several men. Munny, of course, sees right through him and has little patience for the Kid’s bravado. Eastwood is not interested in presenting violence as a heroic act. When Munny proves himself to be every bit the frightening killer the Scofield kids expects him to have been, it is tragic. As much as you the viewer may desire to see Little Bill pay a price, it comes at a great cost to Munny.
Personally, I consider Unforgiven to be one of the all time great westerns.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one…a mysterious drifter comes to town with a purpose only known to her.
Superman III bombed heavily. Eventually, the rights were sold to Canon Films. Reeve had sworn off ever playing Superman again. But four years later he was back. In part, he was promised that he could be involved with the story. And the story we got was Superman getting rid of all our nuclear weapons. He puts them in a net and hurls them into the son. Gene Hackman is back as Lex Luthor…he gets busted out of prison by his dope of a nephew Lenny (Jon Cryer, looking like he stepped on the set of Hiding Out). His plan is to take advantage of Superman’s plan by using Superman’s DNA (from a strand of Superman’s hair) and get it in with the missiles. He succeeds and creates the weirdest enemy for Superman the screen has seen.
Assemble almost 30 years later, the Donner cut restores the original footage Donner shot and also uses some of the Lester material to fill in the blanks. It was not assembled by Donner, but it had his blessing.
Superman the Movie and Superman II were filmed back to back, but director Richard Lester came in when there was friction between the Salkinds and Donner. He threw out a lot of what Donner filmed and started over. Remember Zod and his Cronies? They are still floating through space in the Phantom Zone. When Superman thwarts a terrorist plot by launching a bomb into space, they are set free and make their way to earth.
Richard Donner’s Superman is often presented as a more upbeat and hopeful film than more recent Superhero efforts. And, in a lot of ways, it is a brighter view overall. Donner opens the film with life on Krypton. His version of Krypton has influenced countless versions of Superman. It became a ruling vision. And I get it…it is a society and world at it’s end. But the severely antiseptic frozen tundra look is actually unpleasant and does not really speak of an advanced society. Jor-El is introduced presiding over the trial of General Zod and his army. Well, him, Ursa and Non. Not really an army. What stands out was that in the middle of this trial, Zod tries to convince Jor-El to join him. And then they are zapped by a giant reflective record sleeve. Then, they never appear in the rest of the film.
Tripping Through Gateways 