Les cousins (dir. Claude Chabrol, 1959) – If only the title had “dangereux” tacked onto the end. The film has some very swirly moments, little celebrations of freedom that align…
On a narrative level, there’s little to say about the Coen brothers’ new version of True Grit that couldn’t be said about the first film. Plenty have talked about the…
Gearing up for the Coen remake, it was necessary to revisit this old classic that my siblings and I had practically memorized during our childhood. As is almost always the…
The War Wagon (dir. Burt Kennedy, 1967) – This is really all formula, all textbook Western – for its era, anyway. John Wayne is a slightly less upstanding character this…
Like any other trilogy, the Dollars trilogy shouldn’t have to be viewed chronologically if it’s worth its salt. So, after A Fistful of Dollars and then The Good, The Bad,…
When in doubt as to where to begin, defer to your local online academic database; in this case, William McClain’s essay, “Western, Go Home! Sergio Leone and the ‘Death of…
It’s no surprise that the AFI’s choice of the greatest western of all time is a John Ford film featuring John Wayne. To those who grew up watching “old-er West”…
For being based on (and according to Akira Kurosawa, the same movie as) Yojimbo, A Fistful of Dollars contrasts with Kurosawa’s film in important ways. It is no The Magnificent…
Though unplanned, this appropriately marks the 100th post on this blog. I dedicate it to The Dude. In my comments on the Coen Brothers’ most recent film, Burn After Reading,…
You can’t really get the Coen brothers’ No Country for Old Men unless you’ve first watched (and gotten) Blood Simple. Now I have to go re-watch the former. It’s far…
