Screening Log: 3:10 to Yuma

One line review: it ain’t Unforgiven but it’s good. Rent it.
Lineage: In an experiment, the scientific spirits of Unforgiven and High Noon clone the original 3:10 to Yuma.
Russell Crowe just annoys me for some reason. He’s really a great actor, but it take me 1/3 or more of the film to really get past the fact that it’s ol-fat-face in the role. The night-stabbing is what flips me.
And Christian Bale– I will probably never get past the image of him swaddled in bloody visqueen in _American Psycho_, but he does a good job with a character that just isn’t quite as sympathetic as he is intended to be… see last point.
Charlie Prince has crazy man-love for Ben Wade… if I wasn’t sure at the halfway point, I was sure by the end.
Pretty much every single part in this film from large to small is done really well. Peter Fonda and Alan Tudyk get gold stars.
I don’t think Ben Wqade or Dan Evans actually know why they end up doing what they do. But I enjoyed the consistency (and there is a logic to even the apparent reversals of character) right down to Ben Wade whistling for his horse at the very end.
I’ve never seen the original, but I’m adding it to my NetFlix queue ASAP. Not because this movie is that great, but because my curiosity is piqued about how the characterization of the main characters is handled– there’s something very “modern Western” about the Ben Wade, Dan Evans, Charlie Prince trio.