The Quick and the Dead
Sure, it's been reviewed over and over. Seeing as how this was my first time viewing the film, I noticed right off the bat that it was a Sam Raimi film. The technical work involved in this film is nothing short of amazing. The quick cuts and use of focal lengths is more a marvel than the story and the characters. I found the characters to be pretty flat compared to other characters in westerns.
I know there's only a certain amount of depth you can make a character who is essentially made to die in a gunfight. There's not much you can really do about it. The acting was top notch for what the subject matter was. I loved the megalomaniac that Gene Hackman played and Sharon Stone was, by far, the best emotionally in this movie than in other movies I've seen her in.
I can not praise this movie enough for the breathtaking scenery and amazing camera tricks and focal lengths used. Even if the script was a complete piece of shit (which it wasn't). I would definitely recommend setting aside a few hours to watch this film.
I actually could go into the plot a little and explain that there are a few in-congruencies which I found mildly annoying and completely unexplained. The main character Ellen (Stone) was completely nameless until someone spoke her name. How this other person knew her name was never explained. As far as figuring out where the hell she came from after however many years of being away... good luck, I never understood it and didn't really want to waste my time trying to figure it out. The other thing that tripped me out was that Ellen almost seemed surprised at the beginning when Herod (Hackman) walks into the bar. Which begs the question "What is her motivation for even being here and why is any of this even happening?"
There are moments like that throughout the movie that really make this movie just about good clean western gunfighting fun. If you try to make any sense of the plot, it is a moot point because it just simply is not there. Despite the holes in the plot, I would still give this film six out of seven nuts and bolts simply because of the brilliant cinematography.
I know there's only a certain amount of depth you can make a character who is essentially made to die in a gunfight. There's not much you can really do about it. The acting was top notch for what the subject matter was. I loved the megalomaniac that Gene Hackman played and Sharon Stone was, by far, the best emotionally in this movie than in other movies I've seen her in.
I can not praise this movie enough for the breathtaking scenery and amazing camera tricks and focal lengths used. Even if the script was a complete piece of shit (which it wasn't). I would definitely recommend setting aside a few hours to watch this film.
I actually could go into the plot a little and explain that there are a few in-congruencies which I found mildly annoying and completely unexplained. The main character Ellen (Stone) was completely nameless until someone spoke her name. How this other person knew her name was never explained. As far as figuring out where the hell she came from after however many years of being away... good luck, I never understood it and didn't really want to waste my time trying to figure it out. The other thing that tripped me out was that Ellen almost seemed surprised at the beginning when Herod (Hackman) walks into the bar. Which begs the question "What is her motivation for even being here and why is any of this even happening?"
There are moments like that throughout the movie that really make this movie just about good clean western gunfighting fun. If you try to make any sense of the plot, it is a moot point because it just simply is not there. Despite the holes in the plot, I would still give this film six out of seven nuts and bolts simply because of the brilliant cinematography.