The Long Riders
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Movie Reviews of The Long Riders
Movie Review: Classic Western
Summary: 5 Stars
This is a solid action packed western. Also try: "Lawman","The Wild Bunch", and "Chato's Land".
Movie Review: one of the best!
Summary: 5 Stars
This a very stylish western with a great cast, plenty of action, colorful characters, and a wonderful soundtrack.Movie Review: The Long Riders
Summary: 5 Stars
Great movie, lots of action in the Old West steeing. Impressive cast and great action.Movie Review: A Gorgeous and Satisfying Movie
Summary: 4 Stars
I frankly fail to understand criticizing this movie based on its lack of historical realism. No one that I know of has ever held up "The Long Riders" as an example of a gritty western that shows history "as it really was." It's quite clearly a romanticized view of the James Gang, and unapologetically so. The cinematography is gorgeous and the Coles and Youngers, with the exception of the stylishly raffish David Carradine as Cole Younger, are handsome, clean, and stylishly dressed throughout. With that said, the movie is far more historically correct than most Westerns of the classic period. But sure, if you're a student of the period, you'll spot some rearrangements in the interest of the plot -- Frank has to be a sympathetic character for example, so Clell rather than Frank kills a bank teller in one scene.
What this movie does bring to light accurately is the rural setting in which the James/Younger clan did their business -- in fact it's hard to see why people think of it as a "Western," since it takes place almost entirely in the Midwest and since most of it was shot on location in Missouri. Must be the horses and the guns.
Beyond the uniformly strong performances, including a great small role by Dennis Quaid, I think the real strength of the Long Riders is its pacing -- if there's a scene too short or too long, I haven't spotted it. This is not just (or even primarily) a movie about robbing banks and trains. It's a movie about character and fate, and each scene gives new insights into the characters and their dilemmas. But sure, if all you want is action, go watch one of the Rambo movies. There are some great action scenes in this movie, but they are part of a whole, not the focus of the movie.
Many of the best scenes are quiet little bits of character exposition, like Pinkerton man James Whitmore Jr.'s wearily sarcastic interviews with the NYC newspaperman. The reviewer here who calls the approach "minimalist" is definitely on to something -- this is a film that shows you rather than telling you, and for such a big-deal Hollywood movie (the famous brothers, etc.), it's quite subtle -- a movie made up of connected vignettes. You've got to pay attention, but it rewards attention.
Is James Keach "wooden faced?" Absolutely. He looks eerily like Buster Keaton in this film, acting almost exclusively with his eyes. I guess that either works for you or it doesn't.
I do think the movie suffers on a small screen, and unless you have a killer home theater, you miss some of the impact of the excellent musical score (Ry Cooder's first significant film gig) and soundtrack. Overall, though, this film really hits the mark.
Movie Review: Hill almost elevates cinema violence into an art form...
Summary: 4 Stars
As Sam Peckinpah's 'The Getaway,' Walter Hill's 'The Long Riders' almost elevates cinema violence into an art form...
Visually, 'The Long Riders' contains much that is stunning, even mesmerizing: the green Missouri scenic landscapes; the train robbery sequence; the stagecoach heist; the crossing of a wild river; but there is no question that it is the scene of the gang's disastrous foray into Northfield, Minnesota - that highlight this film... These specific episodes give 'The Long Riders' its rhythm, power, spectacle, and excitement...
With his slow motion 'terror shootout,' Hill seems to impress his viewers by showing them an inventive montage of high-level gory violence... But Hill's most wonderful sequences are those that were the most reserved: the wonderful moment when Frank is cutting the hardest wood with a forest ax and his brother Jesse, walking with his fiancée, attempting to settle down and raise a family...
Hill may have a reputation for being a tough guy, but his best screen moments (in "Hard Times", "The Warriors", "Streets of Fire") are the ones in which he allows his romantic tendencies to slip through, when he gives his characters the dignity that means so much to them... Hill tries to debunk the American myth that Western gunfighters were "heroes," and to show these embittered guys for the 'rough men that they really were.'
Hill's real intention is to present us with a gang of four families of brothers, and get us to accept them on their own terms, in their own brutal world... The men of 'The Long Riders' are at their most dastardly at the beginning of the film when Ed Miller (Dennis Quaid) indiscriminately shoots an innocent clerk, but for the rest of the film - one by one - Hill reveals their better, more 'human' sides... We further get to appreciate them as we compare them to the awful men around them; next to the Pinkertons killing a simple-minded 15 year old boy, they come out best, the 'good guys.'
To Hill, good and bad aren't on opposite sides of the coin; they share the edge...