subgns

I really enjoyed this film. It is a good example of dialogue over action within a story. The main character does not have any dialogue, but the film is carried so well by the supporting cast that we begin to learn about the main character as much as the supporting cast. Sayles did a great job on this film for a respectable low budget film (some might even say a B film). A good film to watch...

It is also a good film for most any screenwriter to study. Screenplays are essentially dialogue and action. That is to say that a reading (or spec) screenplay is set up that way. Dialogue is the vehicle that drives the story, and this film demonstrates that point very well. The idea that the main character has no dialogue is complemented by the dialogue of the supporting cast in intelligent ways.

This was a very good film. It is very direct and straight forward with its editing and continuity as well as its haunting sense of realism. The period styling is very gritty and yet also very colorful (many Westerns filmmakers seem to think that there was nothing but washed out colors in the late 1800s). The two main characters are The Morphinist and The Journeyman--two brothers separated at an early age. They meet once again at the climax, which is a well choreographed shoot-out in a graveyard. The drug addicted cowboy, The Morphinist, has some very cool lines such as: "People always remember evil long after they've forgotten good." The character of Walter P. Higgs III is very interesting and (for me) very funny. Walter is sad when Frank the Thief dies (betrayed by the Morphainist), and he is redeemed by the end of the film. I found myself rooting for Walter all throughout the film. The path of death that the Morphinist leaves in his drug induced wake makes him seem unredeemable, but when he weakly grasps the crucifix that the Journeyman places in his near dead hands at the end of the film we know that he too has suffered and needs compassion. But, only his brother could save him, or redeem him. This is among the best Westerns of the past ten years, and certainly ranks up there with Wild Bill, Tombstone, and Unforgiven.