“Well, everyone knows Custer died at Little Bighorn. What this book presupposes is… maybe he didn’t.” — Eli Cash in The Royal Tenenbaums (2001)
Unlike the “presupposing” about Custer done by Owen Wilson’s character in The Royal Tenenbaums, there is actually considerable evidence that Butch Cassidy didn’t meet his end in the famous shootout that movie fans all remember from the Paul Newman/Robert Redford 1969 film, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. First of all, the shootout is an ultimate example of a “Hollywood Ending” (there was no shootout), and the remains of either outlaw have yet to be identified since their 1908 “demise.”
Blackthorn takes the premise that Cassidy survived and, like the folklore of his survival “presupposes,” lived in Bolivia for a time under the assumed named James Blackthorn. Wishing to see his family again, an elderly Blackthorn (Sam Shepard) sells his horse ranch and hits the trail back for the United States.
Shepard is the best cinema aging gunfighter since Clint Eastwood in Unforgiven — while Jeff Bridges was wonderful as Rooster Cogburn in True Grit, that role has a significant element of comedy to it that takes away from the staid, assured old-age gunfighter that Eastwood portrays in Unforgiven and Shepard delivers on as well in Blackthorn. Shepard was impressive in 2007’s western The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford, and he shines even more here.
Blackthorn has an unlucky chance encounter with Eduardo Apodaca (Eduardo Noriega), who is being pursued for stealing $50,000. Apodaca eventually offers Blackthorn a share of the money if the older outlaw helps him escape his pursuers. Although initially hesitant, the task awakes a sense of adventure in Blackthorn, who remains a crack shot and superb survivalist in his old age. He is reinvigorated, and even at one point breaks out into a trail song not unlike a ditty you would hear in a Roy Rogers film as the aging outlaw becomes reborn. It’s probably no coincidence that Apodaca looks similar to the Sundance Kid, who is played by Padraic Delaney (TV’s The Tudors) in flashback scenes. We get a few more faces out of Cassidy’s past, too, but curiously the film doesn’t tell us much about them.
There’s a lot more layers to the story, which I won’t get into here, but we get a perfectly enjoyable small-cast western, filled with action and great South American scenery, for just over an hour and a half. Yes, that’s a bit short as modern westerns go, which reveals the film’s chief weakness: the film’s story isn’t quite strong enough to support a feature length film. What could have been done in an episode of Deadwood or even a 22 page Jonah Hex comic book (not the garbage movie) is spread out over 90 minutes. Sure, a revisionist western is always going to be full of quiet moments for dramatic purposes, but there are about a half-dozen too many in Blackthorn, which left me wondering if that was just padding. Director Mateo Gil — best known in the United States as the writer of the original Spanish version of Vanilla Sky, Abre Los Ojos — hasn’t directed a theatrical film since 1999, so it’s entirely possible that his pacing is off.
Ultimately Blackthorn — which never got much of a theater release here in the United States, and Magnolia Pictures even offered it on iTunes before its theatrical release — is worth a cheap rental if you can find it (it is available on DVD, including Redbox, on Tuesday, December 20th). As for special features, the DVD comes with deleted scenes (none of which would have made the film any faster paced), the trailer, a “making of” doc, and a few short films by Gil, which don’t add much value to the package (leaving Redbox or VOD your better options). There are so few westerns made these days that it’s great that you can never go wrong with them, but a bit less “quiet time” would’ve made Blackthorn an even stronger film.
(Check out Melissa’s review of Blackthorn here — she got to see it during the Tribeca Film Festival)
Movie Rating: 7/10 (A solid, enjoyable western, though oddly quiet).
DVD Rating: 8/10
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