The Quick and the Dead (1995) Movie Review

The Quick and the Dead is a 1995 action western movie directed by Sam Raimi and written by Simon Moore (with contributions by Joss Whedon). It stars Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe and a young Leonardo DiCaprio. Originally written by Moore in 1992 as a tribute to earlier spaghetti westerns but with a female protagonist, Sharon Stone decided Sam Raimi should be the director after watching his work on Army of Darkness (1992) and the film got a slightly more campy tone in a similar vein to Raimi's other films in the Evil Dead series. While production company Sony wanted a less serious tone and hired John Sayles to do rewrites, Moore came back and pretty much stuck closer to his original vision regardless. The film became a notable box-office bomb when it was released but it has since been reevaluated as a good post-modernist western and a homage to the films of Sergio Leone.

A mysterious female gunslinger named Ellen "The Lady" McKenzie arrives to an old west town named Redemption to seek revenge on John Herod, a dangerous and criminal leader who runs the place. She enters a fast-draw shooting tournament Herod has set in order to win the prize. Ellen meets an ex-gang member turned priest and a young gunslinger as she blasts her opponents in this ruthless town.

Turns out Raimi's eclectic and kinetic style of constant movement and weird angles perfectly fits the artificial and unique cinematic conception of the western by the likes of Sergio Leone and other spaghetti western directors. This film delivers awesome action by creating several highly fragmented segments of events, actions and reactions and joining them together through editing in order to achieve a certain effect or convey some meaning. The dutch angles and zooms are done in such a way that very few other westerns, especially American ones, can even come close to, it's totally unfamiliar in that aspect.

The story and characters are portrayed in a very two dimensional cartoonish manner, following tropes and archetypes but slowly charging them with some gravitas or charm due to the performances. Stone's character is a perfect example as she is, on paper, a very basic character: the mysterious, silent loner who arrives at a violent town and disturbs the social order (this element is more radical here because she is a woman) but by the end it is revealed that she is looking for revenge as the characters personal relationships are exposed and explored. However, Stone is such a good performer that her stoicism works and is believable, which gives her character more of a presence and layers.

A fancy split diopter shot.

It's not a well rounded film, it's sometimes too clunky in its storytelling and pacing, slowing down at points or focusing on the least interesting parts of its storyline, but it has some top notch production design and art direction as well as cinematography and camera work (something expected from Raimi), elements that certainly help at giving the film not only very distinctive look but also to become slightly lyrical and beautiful at moments, details like the way they shoot the rain falling down or the large skies decorated with clouds are always a joy to gaze at. 

Very recommended for western movie fans since it will not only give you some expected action but it gives the conventions an interesting twist, creating the needed element of variation and originality that good movies from a genre need.

Scalps (1987) Indian Vengeance - Review

Female led Spaghetti Western movies aren't really common but they aren't non-existent either, one example is this very late entry into the genre by directors Claudio Fragasso and Bruno Mattei, a duo responsible for a good amount of absurd but fun Italian horror and action genre cinema like Hell of the Living Dead (1980), SS Girls (1977), Strike Commando (1987) and the infamous Troll 2 (1990) (by Claudio alone).

Scalps follows in the footsteps of Soldier Blue (1970) or The Animals (1970): a survival/revenge plot featuring strong female characters in the savage west. It was released in 1987 and starred Spanish actress Mapi Galán in her first leading role. Scalps was also shot back-to-back with another Bruno/Claudio western titled White Apache.

A group of Confederate soldiers, led by the evil Coronel Connors, become renegades after refusing to surrender and attack a local Comanche tribe, looking to buy or simply possess the young daughter of the chief. The girl, Yarin (Mapi Galán), is captured and constantly abused by the men after her tribe is exterminated. She eventually manages to escape and encounters a lonely cowboy named Matt, who hates Indians and revenge but aids the wounded native woman. After realizing that Matt used to work for Coronel Connors, Yarin asks for his help in her search for vengeance.

The biggest virtue of the film is its very potent cinematic narrative skills, like when Yarin escapes and the way the soldiers are able to find her is by following the drops of blood she leaves on the ground, a very memorable and inventive image. There's great shots of full of sorrow and with an ecstatic thirst for vengeance by the protagonist that convey her need for revenge. I also liked how for the first half of the picture Yarin has an injured eye that visually conveys her suffering and both physical and emotional scars. The male lead, Matt, is a gray character but one that tries to get better, he's a far more stereotypical character than all of the other ones and he lacks real personality and charisma. 

Yarin is a very intriguing heroine because she is feral and somewhat primitive, her conception of the world is only her tribe and the desert, the performance by Mapi Galán is very effective in presenting that. She isn't trying to prove anything, she is just trying to survive and has zero consideration for the outside world and our recognizable morals, which explains her nonchalant savage attitude when killing men. 

The villains are very typical bigots and brutal sadists, Southerners who can't admit that the fight is lost, that they shouldn't be fighting for their nefarious cause. In contrast, Matt gave up on them and even in his hatred of natives he doesn't want more violence, this bigoted aspect is challenged and redeemed by the fact that he ends up respecting the natives and doing things their way.

While the thrills aren't missing, Scalps never manages to reach the high levels of action-packed delirium other movies by Mattei did, so it's a bit more tamed and limited, but it is more sober and approachable for most audiences because of it. 

The film isn't perfect, the pacing it's occasionally brought down by filler, some moments are downright unrealistic (if not silly) and the relationship between Matt and Yari isn't very convincing nor is it properly developed (Soldier Blue, for example, has the upper hand in that regard) but it's far from a bad picture, the visual storytelling is strong even if the actual character relations are weak, elemental at best and arbitrary at worst. 

I can recommend it to people looking for a bloody and somewhat female-driven spaghetti western, but this last element is really diluted and goes for gore and cheap exploitation rather than anything else. I mean, it is amusing because of it.