‘BONE TOMAHAWK’ REVIEW & INTERVIEWS, PLUS JOHN SAYLES TO SCRIPT ‘DJANGO LIVES!’, ‘JUSTIFIED’ AUCTION, AND MORE!

BONE TOMAHAWK – A Movie Review

When a pair of literal cut-throats, played by David Arquette and Sid Haig, have to scramble up a mountainside to escape pursuers, they stumble into the hidden aerie of a lost, savage, cannibal  tribe.   One of the two escapes, and days later wanders into the quiet town of Bright Hope, population 268.  Unfortunately, he’s been followed, and he and the people with him -- a deputy and a woman nursing the wounded cutthroat -- are spirited away to the aerie.  A small group of men quickly assemble to attempt a rescue.  They are the Sheriff (Kurt Russell), his back-up deputy (Richard Jenkins), the kidnapped woman’s husband (Patrick Wilson), and the woman’s wealthy former suitor (Matthew Fox). 

This is the start of a sharply written, elegantly played western adventure.  While the most exciting parts of the adventure commence when they reach the aerie, there is great fun, and character development, during the cross-desert trek.  Much of the pleasure is getting to know the men, none of whom seem entirely up to the undertaking.  The Sheriff is a capable law man, but his predilection for shooting people in the leg makes one doubt his judgment.  The back-up deputy is too old for the job, and seems somewhere between eccentric and simple.  The husband is the sort of sexist that has a hard time admitting the value of his fine wife until she’s gone – and he is traveling with one leg in a splint!  The former suitor is such a pompous prig that you can’t wait for him to be deflated. 

And yet, impressively, all these fallible men rise to the occasion.  They live by a code of honor and duty, and their imperfections make their dedication all the more admirable.  When Sheriff Hunt, preparing to leave, addresses some townspeople, telling them to stay vigilant, he indicates the missing woman’s husband.  “I’m riding out with Mr. O’Dwyer because there isn’t a choice for either of us.”  He doesn’t ask the crippled man ahead of time because there is no need: of course he is going.

There’s plenty of action, beautiful landscapes, and fine performances.  Kurt Russell is an older and more cautious lawman than his Wyatt Earp, but he is just as solid.  Richard Jenkins’ sidekick combines all the strengths of Chester and Festus and Gabby Hayes without imitating any of them.  Though the role was brief, I particularly liked Sid Haig, who seemed to be channeling Slim Pickens. 

While all of the film is entertaining, and much of it amusing, it gets increasing grim, and there are cringe-worthy moments of savage brutality.  I saw the film at its Hollywood Egyptian premiere, and at a particularly ugly moment, the man next to me muttered to himself, “Wait: it gets worse.”  And indeed it did.  It’s a very enjoyable film, but not recommended for the sensitive, and very definitely not for kids.   BONE TOMAHAWK opens this Friday, October 23rd.

INTERVIEW WITH ‘BONE TOMAHAWK’ WRITER/DIRECTOR S. CRAIG ZAHLER

Writer/director Craig Zahler, in the soon-to-be bloody 

barn, in his Once Upon A Time In The West shirt

BONE TOMAHAWK’s writer/director S. Craig Zahler is a first-time director, and only one of his 

many optioned screenplays, ASYLUM BLACKOUT (2011), has been filmed.  So it’s kind of remarkable that he gathered such an impressive cast – Kurt Russell, Richard Jenkins, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox, David Arquette, et al.  Producer Dallas Sonnier says, “It all comes down to the script.  It’s just so good that is what has attracted everybody; so it’s a leap of faith on the part of these actors.” 

Both a crime and a western author, A CONGREGATION OF JACKALS, his first western novel, was nominated for a WWA Spur Award and a Peacekeeper by the Western Fictioneers.  But what really established him in Hollywood was the still-unfilmed western screenplay THE BRIGANDS OF RATTLEBORGE, which made the 2004 Black List.  (In typically obtuse Hollywood fashion, ‘Black List’ no longer refers to writers who are unemployable because of their politics.  It now refers to the best unsold screenplays of the year.)

One night almost exactly a year ago I was visiting a century-old farm just outside of L.A., watching Craig direct Kurt Russell and others in and around a stable.  Between set-ups, we talked.   

HENRY:  You’re a novelist, a screenwriter; a director; I know you’re not shooting this one, but you’re a cinematographer.

CRAIG:  The way it worked for me was I went to NYU film school and I studied cinematography, animation, and directing, and took the acting courses.  I got out of school, and I had a bunch of day jobs, working as a catering chef, and I worked as a cinematographer, pushing heavy metal bands, and writing and directing these weird little one-act theatre pieces.  There was a point when I was working as a cinematographer where I realized that I could make somebody’s forty-thousand dollar indie feature look like a two or three million dollar piece.  But if the writing wasn’t there, and the performances weren’t there, it was worthless.  Good cinematography in a movie that didn’t have content, performance, wasn’t even the frosting on the cake; it was the color of the frosting on the cake.  And that was how I got out of shooting.  I think that was when BREAKING THE WAVES (1996), the Lars Von Trier, came out.  I saw that, and I thought it looked terrible.  But it was such an excellent movie, and the content was there, the performances and the writing.  And that was when I started focusing more and more on writing.  It was also a weird transitional period.  Because I was shooting film exclusively, and the digital thing was starting to happen.  But at the time the digital stuff didn’t look great, and I didn’t want to shoot that stuff. 

HENRY:  At that point, were you focusing on screenplays or novels?

CRAIG:  It’s interesting.  The thing with a movie is, you need a lot of people to believe of you in terms of the financial aspect.  You need to convince a lot of people.  I think one of the reasons I focused on the (novel) writing is because by nature I’m not especially collaborative, and that was something where I could just control every word.  At this point I’m fortunate that my fourth book just came out couple weeks ago, and these are pretty much exactly as I wrote it down.  A couple of words were changed, once I removed a chapter just to bring the word-count down, but the control there is great, and you don’t need to compromise because you’re losing daylight or your running out of money or your horse has flatulence.  It’s great in that there’s no limit when I’m writing fiction, other than how much time I want to put into it.  How much I want to refine the prose.  If directing movies wasn’t expensive I probably would have directed ten by now. Books are just time: my last book is just fifteen hundred hours of my time, and I completed it and it was published.  And the one before it was just twelve-hundred hours, so I just know what it is.

HENRY:  I’ve never heard a writer talk about how long he takes to write a book.  What is the new one?

CRAIG:  It’s called MEAN BUSINESS ON NORTH GANSON STREET, and it’s a crime piece.  There are a few genres I really enjoy writing and reading and watching more than others: westerns clearly, crime, science fiction.  They’re all very different for me, satisfy different things.  At this point Leo DeCaprio is attached to it, and I’ve got a really nice deal, and maybe it will get made and maybe it won’t.  I’ve sold twenty-two different pieces of fiction in Hollywood, and seen one made.  So the odds aren’t great.  But that’s a crime piece, and that’s something where I get to enjoy more intricate plotting than in the westerns, and really focus a lot on the dialogue.  It’s St Martin’s Press. 

HENRY:  That’s a terrific publisher.

CRAIG:  They’re pushing it big, and it’s my first time on a larger publisher, so we’ll see how it does. 

HENRY:  BONE TOMAHAWK – was this ever going to be a novel, or was it always a movie?

CRAIG:  The genesis of this is, one of the producers of this movie is Dallas Sonnier, and he’s my manager and really good friend.  He read a book that I wrote called WRAITHS OF THE BROKEN LAND, which is a western with a very strong horror component.  It’s a particularly savage western.  I certainly had some people read the first paragraph and put it down and say, ‘This is not a Western,’ or ‘I don’t want to read it.’  I’m not trying to shock people with the violence, but I’m trying to come up with something that’s interesting and memorable, and in so doing, I shock a lot of people, but that’s not really the goal.  I just want to come up with violent scenes that you haven’t seen.  It’s not just people being shot in the head and falling over.  Dallas read it and said, “This would be amazing to do as a movie.”  The scale of it is really huge, and could not be done with a small budget.  There are massive battle sequences, gigantic horse-slaughtering sequences.  It’s pretty ugly.  It’s character driven, as all of my stuff is.  (I told Dallas) there was no way I can write a low-budget version of it, because I would just be cutting out way, way, way too much.  But I said I could do another western that has a strong horror component, that is focused around an ensemble, that’s dealing with a rescue.  So that’s how BONE TOMAHAWK came to be. 

HENRY:  The genre of horror-western lately – I’m thinking of things like JONAH HEX (2010) and COWBOYS & ALIENS (2011) – they weren’t that good, and they didn’t do that well.

CRAIG:  I think you’re probably correct.  I didn’t see either of those.  The bottom line is people will classify this, and WRAITHS OF THE BROKEN LAND, as horror westerns.  For me they’re both westerns.  But the darkness and the violence gets darker, and the violence gets more intense than you’re expecting it to, so that’s what pushes it into the horror component.  So for me, because the first western I wrote, which set up my career as a screenwriter, was a piece called THE BRIGANDS OF RATTLEBORGE, that was the same thing, some people read and said, ‘this is a horror western.’  To me it was a western that just got nastier.  But it has that vibe, and the crime stuff I write has the same thing.  People find it scary, and I’m trying to make it intense, I’m trying to make it atmospheric, and I’m putting in all the details, if it’s working for you as the reader, it’s a vivid kind of reading experience, where you are uncomfortable; where the violence does go farther than you’re expecting, where every character is imperiled, and anyone might die, and a lot of them do. 

HENRY:  What western filmmakers influenced you?  What western movies do you like particularly? 

CRAIG:  For me, the real life-changing moment in terms of me knowing this was something I wanted to do, that I wanted to write, was when I was thirteen, and I saw THE WILD BUNCH for the first time.  And that was it – that was a movie I probably saw fifteen times as a kid, and I’ve seen on the big screen after moving to New York in revival houses multiple times.  I knew about the Leone stuff prior to THE WILD BUNCH, and I adore the Leone stuff.  So that’s what really made me a fan, and informed some of the western aesthetic that I like.  A lot of people think it’s just a crime piece with cowboy hats.  But to me it’s a distinctly different thing that I want to see in a western.  My favorite western filmmakers are Sam Peckinpah, Sergio Leone and Anthony Mann.  I like John Ford, although I don’t think the comedy in John Ford works especially well.   I adore John Wayne.  Actually my favorite John Wayne movie isn’t a John Ford, but RED RIVER (1948) .  And I’m a huge fan of THE SHOOTIST (1976).   Anthony Mann, like MAN OF THE WEST (1958), MAN FROM LARAMIE (1955), and all of his pictures working with Jimmy Stewart are terrific.  Budd Boetticher – THE TALL T (1957).  Randolph Scott’s probably my favorite western actor.  I just adore that guy in RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY (1962).  Anthony Mann, Sergio Leone and Sam Peckinpah would be the top three, and then a bunch of other guys.

HENRY: How about people who have done westerns in the last few years.  Anyone impress you?

CRAIG:  THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES BY THE COWARD ROBERT FORD (2007).  That’s the one; the mood there is terrific.  I’m going to sort of ruin the ending – so if you haven’t seen it, don’t read this part of the interview.  I think it’s fantastic how they kill off the protagonist, and then there’s thirty more minutes of movie, where you’re following another guy who becomes the de facto protagonist.  That’s a really ballsy move, and the movie gets even more interesting there.  It’s a gorgeous-looking movie – (cinematographer Roger) Deakins is as good as it gets.  And Andrew Dominick is one of the few best directors working now.  THE JACK BULL (1999) isn’t as recent, the John Cusak, L.Q. Jones western that was made for HBO.  It was extremely emotional: the whole ending section of that piece is really hard to watch, and fully realized. One other one I liked was BROKEN TRAIL (2006) – Robert Duvall is the platinum standard of acting, the finest actor ever to exist.There haven’t been a ton; not a lot to choose from. I didn’t enjoy THE PROPOSITION.  I just felt it was kind of heartless, and it was violent, and the textures were excellent, but I think you need more than that.  The movie I’m working on definitely has its scenes of violence; we’re about to shoot one of them, but proportionally, this is probably going to be well over two hours, and the violence is quick and sharp, and fast.  But it’s not what the movie is about, and the major part of the running time, you’re not dealing with violence.  I think that’s what the modern western should be.  What people want to see is basically an action movie, and that’s not what I think a western should be.  You can have those moments, but none of my favorite westerns are action movies.   

HENRY:  As a first-timer, did you have to fight to be the director on this?  Did people say, ‘we’ll do this, but with a more experienced director?’

CRAIG:  No.  I’ve had westerns floating around Hollywood, including the one that set up my career, for a while.  They haven’t been made, but with BONE TOMAHAWK, I wrote it to be small, and I wrote it to direct.  It’s the fifth western I’ve written.  I have a couple of westerns novels, three scripts, a television pilot that almost got made.  This one I wrote, contained, and I was really fortunate with the cast that it attracted.

HENRY:  How did you get Kurt Russell?

CRAIG:  I had a handful of actors we were going to for different parts.  And Kurt was a great choice for Sheriff Hunt.  What had happened was the character of Arthur O’Dwyer went to Peter Sarsgaard.  When he read it and enjoyed it, and signed on, his agent, who also represents Kurt Russell, was then comfortable showing it to Kurt.  Kurt read it.  He wanted to know about my background in terms of filmmaking, because if I’m a just novelist going on-set, I might not know my stuff, but this is actually my background.  And he came on board and has been unwavering in his support.  Alongside Dallas, he’s one of the reasons that we’re all here – he’s been terrific.  His enthusiasm is incredible. No one’s getting paid well on this movie; we’ve got a lot of people getting the worst paychecks they’ve ever gotten.  It really didn’t seem to matter with him or the rest of the cast.  They just wanted to be involved, and I feel very fortunate.  (Note: the role of O’Dwyer was eventually played by Patrick Wilson, not Peter Sarsgaard)

HENRY:  You have Oscar-nominee Richard Jenkins in your cast.

CRAIG:  There’s no better actor working than that guy – period.  He’s phenomenal.  I was really happy that we had time to do rehearsal prior to shooting, which obviously saves you time, and you’re not figuring out things for the first time on the day.   The amount of embellishments that he came up with, the little moments – he’s just an unbelievable talent.

HENRY:  You’re about two weeks into the shoot?

CRAIG:  Two weeks; today is the middle week.  Because the second half of the shoot is a little heavier with effects and stunts, the first half of the shoot we will have shot well over half of the movie.  We’re moving at a different clip than most movies.  We had a Friday where we (shot) ten and a half pages, which is a ton.  And the only way you’re getting that is having  a fast, hard-working crew, and incredible actors who can come in, run it through a few times, really chisel everything in, hit their spots and get to their moments.  And they’ve been doing it again and again.  It’s difficult for everybody.  This is what we have.  I would love to have twice as much time.  I would love to have even three extra days.  But it took us this long to get to this spot, and it was time to make it. 

HENRY:  How long did it take to get to this spot?

CRAIG:  I wrote it at the end of 2011, and there were a ton of different versions of this movie that almost happened.  I wrote this movie to be made really really cheaply with unknown people for maybe a couple hundred thousand dollars, a total guerrilla filmmaker thing, which is really my background.  Then when bigger names came onboard, and it became something else, there was a period we had it scouted, we were looking at New Mexico.  Then I went out to Utah and found a bunch of locations.  That version fell through.  There was a brief period when we were looking at Romania, which is where I believe they shot HATFIELDS & MCCOYS (2012).

HENRY:  And COLD MOUNTAIN (2003) and DEAD IN TOMBSTONE (2013).  They shoot a lot of westerns there, oddly enough.

CRAIG:  They have a western town there that’s ready-to-go, but it seems really absurd.  We’d planned to do it in Los Angeles, in outlying areas, and we found what we needed.  I had pretty specific things in mind.  Putting in the time has really paid off.  Freddy Waff, who is the production designer, has been killing it, and killing himself to make this look great.  Our editor is Fred Raskin, who cut DJANGO UNCHAINED.  He’s one of my closest friends, a college roommate of mine.  (note: in the finished film, Raskin shares credit with Greg D’Auria) He’s saying our footage, the cinematography by Benji Bakshi, looks incredible.

HENRY:  What equipment are you shooting on?

CRAIG:   It’s Red digital; we’re shooting widescreen.  The speed that we need to move at, it needs to be digital.  I like film, and when I was a d.p. that was all I did.  But the kind of coverage we need to run necessitated digital, but I’m hoping in the end it won’t look that way.

HENRY:  Who are your favorite westerns books?

CRAIG:  I’m a big Max Brand fan.  Sometimes his plotting is clunky, but his prose can be terrific, and especially BEYOND THE OUTPOST, that is just a terrific novel and really really thoughtful and interesting, what it says about the human psyche.

HENRY:  Is he the one who also created Dr. Kildare?

CRAIG:  He is.  His real name is Frederick Faust, which is a pretty badass name.  I think he wrote something like three hundred western novels when he was writing for the pulps.  I read a lot of pulps.  Walt Coburn is another; he was an actual cowboy writer.  The verisimilitude of his work is great.  THE OX-BOX INCIDENT is great.

HENRY:  Anything else I should know, but didn’t ask?

CRAIG:  I wasn’t really a fan of DEADWOOD.  I know everyone adores it as the great western of recent years.  To me the thing that it lacked, one of the most important things about a western is a sense of adventure.  The idea of a man going out into the wilds, and bringing whatever morals and civility he has in him into the wild, and imposing it on his group, or who he encounters.  DEADWOOD could just as easily been England and Dickens; (there was) nothing to do with that sort of experience.  There are good moments, but it missed what I most wanted in a western.  The first four episodes, when Wild Bill was alive, that there was a heart to the show, and then that heart went away, and it became ‘let’s see how grimy and filthy we can be.’  They’re stuck in that town, and there’s no adventure.  I think THE TALL T is a great western, and it’s kind of a chamber piece, but you still get that these guys are going out in the open terrain and imposing their morals upon each other.  The only city that’s there is the one inside of them, and that’s something I look for in every western.  That, to me, is what westerns are, like THE WILD BUNCH: are you going to let Angel get killed?  RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY – are they going to take a stand here?

A TALK WITH THE ‘BONE TOMAHAWK’ PRODUCERS

Producers Dallas Sonnier & Jack Heller

That same night I had a chance to speak with three of the producers on BONE TOMAHAWK, Dallas Sonnier, Jack Heller and Peter Sherayko

HENRY: I’m speaking to Dallas Sonnier, Jack Heller –

JACK: And Peter ‘Wild West’ Sherayko.

PETER:  Did they say anything good about me?

HENRY:  Not yet, but we just started.

DALLAS:  Let’s start with Pete, because it’s impossible to make this movie without him.  Because he knows everything about the westerns.  He’s got the horses, the props, all the guns, the contacts.  I met him as a coincidence.  I was scouting Paramount Ranch, where we shot the town sequences, and he was shooting a movie there.  I introduced myself to one of his wranglers, and he said, “You’ve got to meet Peter.”  So he brings me over to set.  Peter’s sitting there with a cigar in his mouth, of course.   He’s like, “Oh, you’re making a western?  Oh, you’ve got Kurt Russell?  Okay, I’m in!” 

HENRY:  Well, you two did work together before, I recall.

PETER:  Yes, Kurt and I worked on TOMBSTONE together; had a lot of fun there.  And we’re having a lot of fun now.  And as a matter of fact, when I wanted to shoot on our big ranch, where you’ve been to, and I asked Dallas to come on out there, Kurt said, “If Peter’s in, we’re happy.” 

DALLAS:  That’s right.

PETER:  I was thrilled with that.  It’s a great script.  It’s a lot of substance.  And when you don’t have a hundred-million dollars to do it, and you have a small cast, and Craig really cast some really good group of people in it.  Such a tight, tight group of people.  When I first read it, I thought, oh my, it’s like THE PROFESSIONALS (1966), which is a wonderful movie.  And this is going to be a wonderful movie, too, and I was able to add my little magic to it, and Dallas made me a producer. 

l to r, Peter Sherayko, Kurt Russell, Craig Zahler,

wrangler Kevin McNiven on horse

HENRY:  How did you gentlemen get involved with this project?  What was its genesis?

DALLAS:  Jack and I run a company called Caliber Media, and we’re Craig’s managers.  He’s written all these screenplays, and sold them to the big studios, and it was time for him to direct.  We had him conceive this script on a budget we thought we could achieve.  So for two years we humped it around town, and found a bunch of investors – some came and some went – and we made it this way, and that’s the story.

HENRY:  What changed in the two years of putting it together?

DALLAS:  Here’s the good news: we haven’t sacrificed.  That’s been a big commitment to Craig, to the movie, not to sacrifice.  The script we are shooting is the first draft of the script, with every single page, every single word in the movie.  We’re pretty proud of that.  The sacrifices have just been the creature comforts.

JACK:  There’s no producers’ trailer, and no big parties and limousines.  We’re all in it together, which I think it the best way to make a movie, and how Dallas and I usually do make movies.  We’re in the west together.

HENRY:  Is this your first western?

JACK:  It is.  Not our last.  Dallas is from Texas, and I think he was born with cowboy boots on.  I was lucky enough to grow up in New York City where, all the cable channels, every western you could possibly imagine was on.  We always had an eye to make a western, we both went to USC, where we took the same classes.  Every time we come on the set every morning, I’m pretty freakin’ giddy that we’re here. 

HENRY:  It’s interesting, talking to a director and two producers in a row who have all been to film 

school. 

JACK:  I hate to say it, but I haven’t seen many westerns in the theatre that were contemporary westerns.  I was too young to see UNFORGIVEN (1992) and TOMBSTONE in the theatre. 

HENRY: It stuns me to think that was twenty years ago.

DALLAS: I think I was thirteen when TOMBSTONE came out. 

JACK:  TOMBSTONE was the first DVD I ever bought.  My whole film love – and Dallas and I have talked about this a hundred times – when we were growing up, and  DVDs became huge, you would get director commentaries.  As they would reissue the older pictures, they would always get film historians, so even before I got to film school, I could quote commentaries on the DVDs, and Dallas was the same way.  Actually Patrick Wilson was telling us over dinner that he was the same way too.  He got into the behind-the-scenes stuff, too.  That was a great thing for our generation.  Having that really gave us a love for the classic westerns, and a lot of other movies.

HENRY:  Now BONE TOMAHAWK has been referred to as a horror western, which to me suggests supernatural or sci-fi elements, like JONAH HEX or COWBOYS & ALIENS.

JACK:  No, this is not supernatural. 

DALLAS:  No.  Yes, there are horror elements to the film, it’s very scary, but it’s a western.

JACK:  This is a western.  If you think THE SEARCHERS (1956) is a horror movie because they do 

horrible things, then that’s a horror movie.  This is a movie that pushes the limits for character stakes.

DALLAS:  It’s a genre-bending film.  I think it will satisfy the western fans and the horror fans.

  

JOHN SAYLES TO SCRIPT ‘DAJNGO LIVES!’

"Write well, my friend!"

I’ve been writing for a few years now about Franco Nero returning to his most famous role in DJANGO LIVES!  More than a year ago Nero had signed on to for the third time play Django, this time as an older man, living in Hollywood, working as a technical advisor on silent westerns.  But various co-stars, writers, directors, and production companies were announced, then disappeared.  Now comes word from The Hollywood Reporter that John Sayles, twice Oscar-nominated for his scripts for LONE STAR (1996) and PASSION FISH (1992), will be scripting.  Franco told the Hollywood Reporter, “John Sayles is a master of literature.  His LONE STAR is one of the greatest modern Westerns ever shot. He knows how to be exquisitely cultivated and people-oriented at the same time, exactly like another master I’ve worked with, Mr. Orson Welles. And that says a lot.”  The film is to being produced by Fast Draw Films. 

‘JUSTIFIED’ AUCTION OFFERS 300 SCREEN-USED LOTS!

Want to own Sam Elliot’s (Avery Markham’s) blood-soaked dinner jacket?  How about Boyd’s or Ava’s or Dickey’s prison jumpsuits?  Dozens of costume items, props from the U. S. Marshal’s office, signed scripts and more are going on the auction block!  Items signed by Timothy Olyphant will benefit his charity, Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation.  Bidding opened today, and will end on Thursday, October 22nd . You can see everything that’s up for bids, and register to bid HERE. 

‘MAGNIFICENT 7’ CONVENTION THIS WEEKEND AT L.A. CONVENTION CENTER!

Hope to see you this weekend at this event, Friday, October 23^rd through Sunday, October 25^th, celebrating the TV series.  For details and tickets, visit the official site HERE.

TARANTINO’S ‘HATEFUL 8’ TO HAVE TWO VERSIONS

If you decide to wait until after the Christmas  70mm Super Panavision limited engagement, to see HATEFUL 8 at your local multiplex, you’ll see substantially the same movie, but not exactly.  What you won’t get it the overture, the intermission, and six minutes of footage.  Tarantino told The Variety, “The 70 is the 70. You’ve paid the money. You’ve bought your ticket. So you’re there. I’ve got you. But I actually changed the cutting slightly for a couple of the multiplex scenes because it’s not that.”

‘THE REVENANT’ WAS NEVER GONNA BE CHEAP, BUT HOLY COW!

DeCaprio westerns budget swells from $95 million to $135 million or $165 million!  Read about why HERE. 

SPOOKY GENE AUTRY DOUBLE BILL NOON SAT. OCT. 24

To get you in a Halloween frame of mind, The Autry will be screening a pair of Gene’s 1949 Columbia films with spooky overtones, RIM OF THE CANYON and RIDERS IN THE SKY.  His performance of GHOST RIDERS IN THE SKY, from the latter film, is one of my all-time favorites of Gene’s musical numbers.

THAT’S A WRAP!

Have a great couple of weeks – the next Round-up will be Sunday, November 1^st, all things bein’ equal!  Have a happy Halloween!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Contents Copyright October 2015 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved

‘REDEMPTION OF HENRY MYERS’, ‘NAMES YOU NEVER REMEMBER’ REVIEWED, PLUS SAM ELLIOT TO ‘JUSTIFIED’, ‘DAN’L BOONE’ ANNIVERSARY, TIM MCCOY MARATHON!

REDEMPTION OF HENRY MYERS – A Movie Review

THE REDEMPTION OF HENRY MYERS is an unexpectedly powerful and effective Western, with uniformly strong performances by a largely unfamiliar but very talented cast.  Its co-writer and director Clayton Miller – he wrote with Charlie Shanian and Chris VanderKaay – has only directed one feature before, but he draws absolutely natural and effecting performances from the early-teenaged Jaden Roberts and Ezra Proch who, while not the leads, drive a great deal of the story.

Drew Waters, who had a small but showy role as Champagne Charlie Austin in LEGEND OF HELL’S GATE, plays Henry Myers who, with accomplices Clay (Beau Smith) and Mac (Rio Alexander), pull a bank job that turns needlessly bloody.  They separate, and Henry is trying to hide the loot in a church, when he’s startled by the minister (Michael McCabe), and accidently shoots and kills him. 

A year later, his accomplices track him down, looking for the loot and all but kill him before he escapes.  A family finds his nearly lifeless form, and the young girl, Laura (Jaden Roberts), overrides her brother Will’s (Ezra Poch) and their mother Marilyn’s (Erin Bethea) doubts, and insist they take him in and nurse him back to health.  And while Henry heals, now living with the first real family he’s ever known, he is being hunted by his ex-accomplices for the loot, and by Sheriff Tom (Luce Rains), for the robbery, and the murder of the minister. 

Erin Bethea & Drew Waters

This is an elegant production, and a savvy one.  The filmmakers have mounted the size of movie that they can effectively afford to produce: not too many characters, not too many locations.  Filmed at Bonanza Creek Ranch in Santa Fe, New Mexico, the breathtaking cinematography is by Reynaldo Villalobos, who also shot HOUSE OF THE RIGHTEOUS, which premiered on INSP in August (read my review HERE http://www.henryswesternroundup.blogspot.com/2014/08/insp-premieres-house-of-righteous.html )  Special credit also goes to production designer Sean Cunningham and his crew for unself-conscious realism, and the make-up crew headed by Mandy Danielle Benton for giving us some of the truly dirtiest, scummy-bearded villains I’ve ever seen outside of a Sergio Corbucci Spaghetti Western.

This is a faith-based production, and while that used to be a warning to expect poor production values, amateur acting and sappy plots, faith-based filmmaking has improved tremendously over the last several years, I believe because Tyler Perry showed the way, his films bursting from church screenings to mainstream theatres by virtue of the fact that they were hysterical and accessible comedies.   Though not a big box-office name, Erin Bethea is a superstar in the faith-based film world, having starred opposite Kirk Cameron in the ground-breaking FIREPROOF, and several others.  Among the supporting players, Rio Alexander has been seen in INTO THE WEST, 3:10 TO YUMA, LONGMIRE and the modern Western THE LAST STAND.  Luce Rains has had the most sagebrush experience, having been seen, often with a star, in DESPERADO: AVALANCHE AT DEVIL’S RIDGE, INTO THE BADLANDS, THE YOUNG RIDERS, LIGHTNING JACK, WYATT EARP, WILD BILL, NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, 3:10 TO YUMA, APPALOOSA, SHOOT FIRST AND PRAY YOU LIVE, DOC WEST, DEAD MAN’S BURDEN, and last year’s SWEETWATER! 

Jaden Roberts & Drew Waters

If I have any criticism of the recent crop of faith-based Westerns, it is that too many have ‘redemption’ in the title: there was 2011’s excellent REDEMPTION: FOR ROBBING THE DEAD, the current THE REDEMPTION OF HENRY MYERS, and last month I acted in BOONVILLE REDEMPTION.  It gets confusing!

REDEMPTION OF HENRY MYERS has appeared on the Hallmark Movie Channel, and is also available on DVD.

NAMES YOU NEVER REMEMBER – WITH FACES YOU NEVER FORGET by Justin Humphreys – A Book Review

It’s been said that since the passing of the cinema’s Golden Age, roughly from the coming of sound to the 1950s, character actors are a dying breed – even a dead breed.  Author, interviewer and raconteur Justin Humphreys has given the lie to that claim, with his fascinating, informative, and wonderfully entertaining collection of interviews, NAMES YOU NEVER REMEMBER – WITH FACES YOU NEVER FORGET.  Published by Bear Manor Media, it should take its rightful place on your bookshelf, beside Leonard Maltin’s REEL STARS and Jordan Young’s REEL CARACTERS, tomes which interviewed and profiled the great character actors from previous decades. 

Mark Lawrence on THE RIFLEMAN

The final interview of the book, with the wonderfully villainous and delightfully gutter-mouthed Marc Lawrence, is the only conversation that goes back to the early 1930s.  The rest are with actors whose careers began post-war, and I was particularly surprised and pleased to learn quite a bit about two men I’d seen, but never known their names – Don Pedro Colley, whose imposing height and menacing presence made him a natural for sci-fi films and Blaxsploitation; and Buck Kartalian, whose diminutive stature on a body-builder’s frame has given him a long career in action, horror and sci-fi.  Both men have unforgettable roles in PLANET OF THE APES films – Buck as the cigar-puffing ape who abuses Heston, and Don, in BENEATH THE PLANET OF THE APES, as one of the ‘A’ bomb-worshipping mutants – and James Franciscus’ torturer.   

Royal Dano on THE RIFLEMAN

This is clearly a labor of love done over a long string of years – many of the books’ ten subjects are gone; one, Royal Dano, to whom it is dedicated, for two decades.  Western fans will be particularly interested in the interviews with Dano, R.G. Armstrong, Bo Hopkins, and L.Q. Jones – all Western specialists on the big and small screen, all frequent collaborators with Sam Peckipah, and L.Q. even wrote the forward. 

These are not Red-Carpet chats but detailed career discussions – R.G. Armstrong’s at 34 pages is only a little longer than average.  And in it you’ll learn about his desire to be a poet rather than an actor, how his time spent as a hobo would inform his performances as a lawman dealing with hoboes, how Peckinpah used Armstrong’s serious religiosity to create his hypocritical and fanatical religious roles in films like RIDE THE HIGH COUNTRY. 

Dick Bakalyan takes the kill-shot in CHINATOWN

Dick Bakalyan, the pre-eminent juvenile delinquent of the 1950s, later Jack Nicholson’s nemesis, Detective Loach, in CHINATOWN, really grew up as a tough-guy – hence the famously flattened beak – and is endlessly cheerful discussing his strings of Sinatra films and Disney films.  But as with many of the interview subjects, his projections for the future of the industry are bleak for directors as well as actors.

Many of the subjects’ best stories are not about themselves, but about their co-workers.  Don Pedro Colley’s adventures working with Jack Palance in the deep south, and Palance’s sticking his neck out for the black members of the cast, are all the more impressive for being so unexpected.  High points of both Royal Dano’s and Mark Lawrence’s interviews are their memories of ‘Cookie,’ the great Elisha Cook Jr., the movies’ perennial victim and, to my surprise, a drunkard of epic proportions.  Another surprise is to find how funny in real life Royal Dano, almost always a tragic figure on-screen, really was.  His insights into working with directors Nicholas Ray on JOHNNY GUITAR and Alfred Hitchcock on THE TROUBLE WITH HARRY are revealing as well. 

Roger Corman made Jonathan Haze a genre star, casting him as the lead in the original LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS, and he starred in easily a dozen more for the low-budget mogul.  But I was surprised to learn that, rather than sinking into obscurity afterwards, he moved behind the camera, often partnered with Oscar-winning cinematographer Haskell Wexler, and has had a series of successes.

Bo Hopkins in THE WILD BUNCH

Bo Hopkins had just as tough a beginning as Dick Bakalyan, a frequent runaway, in and out of homes, then reform schools, then given the choice of jail for a robbery, or joining the Army.  He fought in Korea, came back with acting scholarships that led to do plays from Kentucky to South Carolina to New York to Hollywood.  He made a smash in his first film role, playing Crazy Lee in THE WILD BUNCH, but he actually earned his S.A.G. card on THE ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW.

L.Q. Jones in THE WILD BUNCH

Speaking of THE WILD BUNCH, L.Q. Jones, half of my absolute favorite bounty-hunting team (with Strother Martin), reveals that he took his name from the character he played in his first movie, BATTLE CRY.  His story of how, as a non-actor, he got the part, and his dealings with director Raoul Walsh on BATTLE CRY and THE NAKED AND THE DEAD are too delicious to give away.  He also credits his buddy Fess Parker with getting him in the door and having his back (Morgan Woodward would tell me the same about Fess).  A man with many more facets to his personality than his screen villainy would suggest, L.Q. would also write and produce the wonderfully creepy THE BROTHERHOOD OF SATAN, and write, produce and direct the sci-fi classic A BOY AND HIS DOG, from Harlan Ellison’s novella. 

Buck Kartalian’s story of how we went, with no intervening steps, from being a professional wrestler, to acting onstage opposite Olivia De Havilland and Jack Hawkins in ROMEO AND JULIET is alone worth the price of admission. 

German-born, Canadian-raised Paul Koslo became a familiar, menacing face starting with OMEGA MAN, and has done a wide range of horror, action, sci-fi films, and Westerns like JOE KIDD, ROOSTER COGBURN and HEAVEN’S GATE.  His stories about Charles Bronson are as astonishing as they are disappointing – Mr. Deathwish comes off as an absolute bastard.  And yet, Bronson would hire Koslo for two more films!  Of equal interest is Koslo’s convincing analysis of the demise of the character actor: the tremendous rise of star salaries has reduced everyone else, regardless of their fame, experience and talent, to scale – take it or leave it.

It’s clear in the tone that some of the subjects were more eager to talk than others – Marc Lawrence continually interjects comments like, “I think you’ve got enough there to write fifteen articles.  What else do you want?”  But author Humphreys charmed and persuaded and cajoled the anecdotes out of them.  Along with the faces, there are a hundred stories you will never forget.  NAMES YOU NEVER REMEMBER – WITH FACES YOU NEVER FORGET, will give you hours of pleasure, ten unique perspectives on the film industry, and will send you searching for dozens of movies – ones that you’ve never seen before, and others you know well, but will appreciate on a whole new level.  I recommend it highly.    

SAM ELLIOT JOINS CAST OF ‘JUSTIFIED’!

Sam Elliot, the actor with the best ‘western’ voice to come along since Bill Conrad voiced Matt Dillon on radio’s GUNSMOKE, will be joining the cast of JUSTIFIED as a continuing character for its sixth, and final, season.  His character is Markham, an ex-gangster who has turned over a new leaf – the cannabis kind – and made a fortune growing legal weed in Colorado.  Also joining the cast is Garret Dillahunt, who played Ed Miller in THE ASSASSINATION OF JESSE JAMES, Wendell in NO COUNTRY FOR OLD MEN, and Sheriff Baskin in WINTER’S BONE.  His character, Walker (not a Texas Ranger), is a special ops-turned-security maven for a not-so-clean businessman.  JUSTIFIED returns to FX in January.

‘DANIEL BOONE’ JOINS INSP LINE-UP ON 50^TH ANNIVERSARY!

Fess Parker 

This coming Sunday, September 28^th, INSP will bring back DANIEL BOONE, within four days of its NBC premiere in 1964. In the title role, Fess Parker had become a superstar on early television as Davy Crockett on a series of WALT DISNEY’S WONDERFUL WORLD OF COLOR episodes, and for insurance, NBC decided to have him wear the same wardrobe playing Boone, coonskin cap and all.  (As a result, virtually no member of my generation can separate the exploits of Boone and Crockett.) 

Fess Parker and Ed Ames 

For six seasons and 165 episodes, the series told the sometimes true, sometimes fanciful tales of the pioneer frontiersman who lived from 1734 to 1820, fought in the Revolutionary War, was captured by Shawnee warriors who planned to kill him and ended up adopting him, and who blazed his famous Wilderness Trail through the Cumberland Gap in the Appalachian Mountains.  Most of the stories take place in the town of Boonesborough, Kentucky. 

Starring along with Fess Parker was Patricia Blair as his wife Rebecca, Veronica Cartwright as their daughter Jemima, and Darby Hinton as their son Israel.  (For the record, Boone and Rebecca actually had ten children, and this past Friday at the Silver Spur Awards, host Darby Hinton explained that there were going to be two sons in the series.  But the producers were so pleased with his work in the pilot that they wrote the other son out.)

Over the years, Dan’l had several friends and sidekicks that drifted in and out, refreshing the series, including Ed Ames, of the singing Ames Brothers, as Mingo, Boone’s Oxford-educated half-Cherokee friend; crusty old Dal McKennon – incredibly, the voice of Archie Andrews in cartoons – as Cincinnatus; Albert Salmi as Yadkin; pro-football player Rosey Grier as Gabe Cooper; and country singer and sausage purveyor Jimmy Dean as Josh Clements.      

Patricia Blair, Darby Hinton, Fess Parker, Veronica Cartwright

Daniel Boone’s life, and hence the series, covered a period in American history that was not often shown, and the battles with the British military, and stories about slavery in a pre-abolitionist society, are pleasantly unfamiliar.  It started in black & white, and I prefer these tougher and darker tales than the later ones.  (I feel the same way about the first noir-ish episodes of SUPERMAN for that matter.) But there is plenty to recommend in the entire run of the series. 

As Doug Butts, SVP of Programming at INSP says, “DANIEL BOONE is not only entertaining. It embodies the timeless values and positive entertainment audiences have come to expect from INSP.  We couldn't be more thrilled to bring DANIEL BOONE to our lineup during the 50^th anniversary of the series, and we believe it will be a great opportunity for a whole new generation of viewers to enjoy this family drama.”

INSP will begin with a star-studded 6-hour marathon on Sunday, September 28th, opening with the two-parter from the second season, THE HIGH CUMBERLAND, about the blazing of the Cumberland Trail.  It’s directed by Western specialist (he directed John Wayne eleven times) George Sherman, and written by D.D. Beauchamp, who started out with Abbott & Costello before becoming a Western pro.  The series will run Monday through Thursday at 10:00 a.m., ET.  If you don’t know if you get INSP, follow the link: <http://www.insp.com/insp-channel-finder>.

GET-TV TIM MCCOY MARATHON NEXT SATURDAY!

On Saturday, September 27^th, Get-TV will present an eight-film marathon featuring some of the very best of Col. Tim McCoy’s Columbia Westerns!  These were the absolute zenith of his career in talkies, and to have such a block of them is unprecedented!  It starts off with a bang at 9:00 a.m. PDT with 1932’s END OF THE TRAIL, featuring both an involving a story and, remarkable for its time, the Colonel speaking, as I recall, direct to camera, delivering a stunning indictment of the Federal Government’s failure to honor the terms of virtually any of the treaties it made with the Indian tribes.  It’s followed by THE PRESCOTT KID, SHOTGUN PASS, THE FIGHTING FOOL, TEXAS CYCLONE, TWO-FISTED LAW, DARING DANGER, and FIGHTING FOR JUSTICE, all from 1930-1933.  And they’re followed at 7:30 by three westerns I don’t know, RELENTLESS        (1948) starring Robert Young, THE PHANTOM STAGECOACH (1957) starring William Bishop and directed by Ray Nazarro, REPRISAL (1956) starring Guy Madison, and one we all know, THE OUTLAW (1943ish) starring Jack Beutel, Jane Russell, Walter Huston, Thomas Mitchell, and directed by the two Howards, Hughes and Hawks.  And here’s a link to find out if you can get GetTV: http://get.tv/get-the-channel

‘SPIRIT OF THE COWBOY’ FESTIVAL!

This great picture from the ‘Spirit of The Cowboy’, held in McKinney, Texas on September 14^th, was sent to me by CHEYENNE WARRIOR author Michael Druxman.  What a great gathering!

Upper row: Dan Haggerty, Michael Druxman, Clu Guhlager, James Stacey    
Middle row: Marshal Teague, Robert Fuller, Darby Hinton, Ken Farmer,  Bo Hopkins
In front: Alex Cord

THAT’S A WRAP!

Coming to the Round-up ASAP are an article on BOONEVILLE REDEMPTION, THE CINECON SALUTE TO CLAYTON MOORE, THE SILVER SPUR AWARDS, and tons of other good stuff! 

Have a great week!

Happy Trails,

Henry

All Original Content Copyright September 2014 by Henry C. Parke – All Rights Reserved