Gunslingers

I am a big fan of gritty westerns which is what this looked like in the trailers, but it is deinitely not. Within 10 minutes I realized the acting was pretty bad. There were moments of believabilty in the characters but mostly seemed like none of them were rehearsed professionals. I really blame the directing that made the whole story predictable and plodding. The effects were on par with 1970's films; bright red blood, punching sounds. By far the worst I've ever seen of Nicholas Cage. His characterization was ridiculous. So, I gave it 2 stars only because I didn't have pay to see it in a theater.

Thomas Keller is on the run after killing a Rockefeller and has become a most wanted man. He comes across a town filled with wanted men, living a new life of redemption. He is welcomed into the town and treated as their own by the town's leaders. A woman named Val arrives looking for him and it doesn't take long for a battalion to show up for Thomas and claim the bounty. The townspeople stand by their words and a war breaks out between the two party. Does Thomas surrender or the town win the war for survival, forms rest of the story.

For a Western, the film's narrative is too dull and doesn't let the characters have a decent arc. It's just that the main lead arrives at this town and they accept him. There is no space given to establish these supporting characters and the action begins sooner. The action sequences too don't stand out with non-stop gunfight and with no connections felt to these characters, it simply feels dragged. The choice to have that particular accent by Nicolas Cage was definitely questionable and he doesn't get to shine much in his supporting role. Overall, Gunslingers was dead on arrival.

I like westerns. I could say I watched them all. There were a load of bad ones over the years. Shalako and Soleil Rouge could be compared because those are somewhat weird too but have decent (great) actors. So those westerns got above 5 stars. This one however is a disgrace to all westerns and I am so sorry for all those actors who put their career in jeopardy appearing in this and hope they all were well compensated. Cage will be ok, I fear for Stallone though. This guy made already other westerns and you would think he would learn from mistakes.

I actually fail to understand why anyone could rate this 5 or more stars. 3 stars feels high already. It is really difficult to continue watching. The whole story could be told in 5 sentences.

Story: Poor. While I think the idea of the town "Redemption" and how it is run could have been exploited to make a much better story around it, but the general red line in this movie had no real surprises and everything happened exactly as expected.

Music: Music in westerns is important. It does not have to be Ennio Morricone, but it has to match the setting. It did not.

Landscape: This western is not much dusty, which is ok. It is pretty green. Nice landscape. Too much shots against the sun. Those pictures are good but this should be an action movie and not nature documentary. Disturbes the pace of the movie.

Costumes: Too clean. Feels like a TV show and not like a movie.

Acting: I actually think they really tried and those actors were all good, but either there was no directing at all or they just always took the first take. Cage character is a joke and seems he didn't care much. Dorff did good but at some point he seemed bored as well sometimes. Others probably did not get any feedback on how/what they are doing.

Dialogues: Half of them were not necessary (not even language set in 1907) but then the movie would have taken 25 minutes if some unnecessary action scenes would be dropped too.

Shooting: All action scenes were poor. The cuts were ok but angles didn't work out and if someone got shot it was either in the heart or it was a full miss. The pistols were nice and you could recognize some of them, some of the rifles even had an accurate sound. They could also count to six in this movie, so it was not all total nonsense. While the movie takes place in 1903-1907 they however talk about a cartridge invented in 1935.

Humour: None. There were no funny dialogues or funny szenes at all. Unless you could laugh about the movie in general.

Not worth to watch twice and not recommended. Watch a western of the 50ies or 60ies you haven't seen yet and you'll be entertained more.

Saw Gunslingers. In a world where horrible modern day movies like Novocaine and Death of a Unicorn exist, Gunslingers is a much needed friend, an old school Western/Action shoot em up with sibling rivalry plot lines and a hilarious and awesome NICOLAS CAGE performance. You may ask why the negative mainstream reviews? That's because they don't respect B action films. They'll only sell you the latest Timothee Chamalet drek. If you can appreciate the efforts of a small film giving it their all, you'll enjoy this film. Sure, it's not perfect but you can appreciate it, flaws and all. Kudos to Lionsgate for delivering these films to the community of action lovers.

When I saw the cast ensemble for the movie, I have to admit that I was initially somewhat intrigued and impressed. I mean, with the likes of Stephen Dorff, Heather Graham, Nicolas Cage, Tzi Ma, Eric Mabius and Costas Mandylor on the cast list, then you would assume that you would be in for something enjoyable.

But I have to say that writer and director Brian Skiba definitely proved me wrong with "Gunslingers". The storyline in the movie was flaccid, and there just wasn't a whole lot of entertainment value in the movie. I have to say that I sort of zoned out about half way through, and the movie just because something that played mostly in the background.

Even with a cast ensemble that included some good talents and names, the movie failed. Sure, the acting performances were, for the most parts, actually fair, then the movie just proved to be less than mediocre. And not even the sheer amount of gunfights did much to make up for the shortcomings.

Maybe diehard Western fans will be getting a much bigger kick out of watching "Gunslingers" than I did as a casual viewer.

The CGI animated rain was just cringeworthy to look at. But at least it provided a moment of good laughing.

This is not a movie that I will return to watch a second time.

My rating of writer and director Brian Skiba's 2025 movie "Gunslingers" lands on a generous three out of ten stars.