Hollywood Deep

We all had high hopes for the remake of th western film, “3:10 To Yuma”. The consensus from my crack staff of movie reviewers, was that “Yuma” fell short. Although it did pretty well at the box office, the Russell Crowe film disappointed a lot western fans. Before it was released based on the tailer and reviews, we all had high hopes for “Yuma” to be reminiscent of some Clint Eastwood or even John Wayne classic westerns. That was not the case in the opinion of some serious moviegoers that I’ve talked to.

Well western fans, you have another chance. “The Assassination of Jesse James”, starring Brad Pitt, looks like it could pay off. The reviews are all good and the trailer looks very good. Movies about Jesse James have been made over and over again for decades. Western film legends Audy Murphy and Tyrone Powers are two of many who have played the notorious outlaw in the movies. Brad Pitt’s portrayal in this film is a little bit of a different take on the character. Jesse has always been played heroically, a southern Robin Hood whose robberies targeted those capitalist carpetbaggers, the banks and the railroad. The legend was that he robbed from the rich and gave to the poor.

Director Andrew Dominik’s film of Ron Hansen’s novel, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford,” begins late in Jesse James’ career. With 25 robberies and 19 murders under his belt, Jesse has a high price on his head, and he seems to sense the glory days are behind him. He’s not about to hand over any money to the poor either, nor is there any hint that he ever did.

“It’s all lies, you know,” Jesse gently chides his greatest fan, Bob Ford played by Casey Affleck. Ford had grown up reading the dime-store novels that had made a hero out of the outlaw when he was in his twenties. So this is Jesse James after all his adventures were done, about his time spent with Robert Ford, the last 2 years of his life. He was like an old rock star at this point, everyone knew who he was, and he walked around like a celebrity. An interesting take on an interesting time of the most famous American outlaw of all time. The film runs a little long, 160 minutes, but it seems worth it for a western film fan, certainly for a Jesse James fan, and of course for a Brad Pitt fan.
…DEEP!

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