All the Pretty Horses

2000 "Some passions can never be tamed."
5.8| 1h57m| PG-13| en
Details

The year is 1949. A young Texan named John Grady finds himself without a home after his mother sells the ranch where he has spent his entire life. Lured south of the border by the romance of cowboy life and the promise of a fresh start, Cole and his pal embark on an adventure that will test their resilience, define their maturity, and change their lives forever.

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Reviews

CheerupSilver Very Cool!!!
Greenes Please don't spend money on this.
AnhartLinkin This story has more twists and turns than a second-rate soap opera.
Kayden This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama
Kirpianuscus I do not know if it could be considered a good film. maybe, a correct one. because it has many virtues who define a beautiful storytelling, smart trip across delicate themes, the meet with real admirable actors - Miriam Colon is an example, the great performance of Lucas Black. a western who preserves a special air. not always credible, not always coherent, but giving that beauty who determine you see it again. for a specific scene, for a specific actress/actor or , maybe, for the flavor of a state of soul. so, a film full with virtues. this is all !
Robert J. Maxwell It's post-war Texas. Matt Damon and his buddy team up and ride across the Rio Grande to seek their fortunes. They meet, and lose, a sixteen-year-old companion along the way. They find a job at a Mexican horse ranch. The owner takes a shine to Damon, a buckaroo who knows his quarter horses.Then, alas, buscar a la mujer. The owner's daughter, the delicious Penelope Cruz, shows up. She and Damon throw a few winks at one another and the next thing you know they're rolling around in the sack like two coyotes in heat. It's a fast, unexplored, and improbable romance. And, mind you, she is the owner's daughter and not meant for the likes of a handsome young Yanqui who owns nothing but his horse and saddle. Cruz's father and aunt get wind of this. Damon is warned but he cares not.Pow -- Damon and his buddy are in a Mexican prison, charged with something or other. The sixteen-year-old wastrel they met on their way through the majestic mountains is also incarcerated, charged with the murder of two or three people, one of them a police officer. There is no capital punishment in Mexico, so after the corrections officers break the kids ankles they take him out in the desert and shoot him, while Damon and buddy watch helplessly.The two Americans are bailed out by the wise and honorable and candid aunt of Penelope Cruz. Damon, alone, decides to return to the rancho and get it on again with Cruz. But he's brought before the stern aunt who tells him candidly that it's impossible. She gives him money and a horse and tells him to leave. Damon protests that he loves Cruz. "We all are cured of our sentiments," she tells him. "If life doesn't cure us, death will." It's a pretty good exchange. I assume it was lifted intact from McCarthy's novel.The performances are pretty good too. Both Damon and his amigo, Henry Thomas, are convincing as polite but determined Texas youngsters, the kind who "won't change my mind because it's made up, and I'm not the kind of guy who changes his mind once it's made up" -- to quote another Texas youngster who became president. They're well brought up. "Yes, sir." "No, sir." I don't know how Cormac McCarthy, born in Rhode Island and raised in Appalachia, could have pinned down Southwestern character so well.Billy Bob Thornton's direction has it finer touches. He doesn't spell out the obvious for us. When the miscreant kid is taken out to be shot, the execution takes place off screen and we hear only two separate gunshots and we see only the expressions on the faces of Damon and Thomas.At the same time I wish Thornton had been able to avoid three common clichés, despite their pedigrees: choker close ups (Sergio Leone), slow motion (Pekinpah), and freeze frames (Truffaut).It's a long and languid tale of an adventurer barking his shins against reality. It starts slowly but it picks up momentum as it moves along. And each time we think we've reached a climax, there's another one around the corner. The final one is a conversation between a remorseful Damon and a gentle judge, Bruce Dern, and it seems anti-climactic because heretofore Damon hasn't shown the slightest regret at the mayhem he now confesses to and appears to regret.
John Raymond Peterson The storyline sounded like a classic 'western' adventure; it turned out to be just that. Newer, 21st century westerns are expected to showcase the scenery with as much cinematographic style as can be mustered; in this movie, there could have been more resources dedicated to the cinematography, but it is still very beautiful to watch. Matt Damon has made just a few 'western' movies, his first with none other than Robert Duval and Gene Hackman as the co-starring leads (in Geronimo). The only other that comes to mind is 'True Grit (2010)'. Only in '…Pretty Horses' does he have the lead role; that role was a demanding one because he is in almost every scene and he has to ride bucking horses, rodeo style. It hurt just watching him be thrown off the horse (I'll assume some of the rides were done by stunt-men because no guy from Boston could take that kind of abuse). I liked the adventurous story, the beautiful Penélope Cruz and all I can think of to improve the movie would have been to throw in a cameo by Duval or Tommy Lee Jones perhaps.
Spikeopath All the Pretty Horses is directed by Billy Bob Thornton and adapted from Cormac McCarthy's novel of the name name by Ted Tally. It stars Matt Damon, Penélope Cruz, Henry Thomas & Lucas Black. Marty Stuart scores the music and Barry Markowitz photographs it. Plot finds Damon as John Grady Cole, a young cowboy who travels with his best friend, Lacey Rawlings, from Texas across the border into Mexico. It's a journey that sees acquaintances come and go, love blossom and the harshness of the world become all too real to such young eyes.A big financial disaster for Columbia Pictures and Miramax Films who lost nearly $40 million on the film. Serves them right I say, for Thornton's original cut was a long epic piece thought to be around three and a half hours in length. But good old Harvey Weinstein demanded drastic cuts to be made and Thornton had to trim it to just nearly two hours in running time. That's a lot of story gone astray, and boy does it show, no wonder Damon himself bitterly commented that to lose 35% of your movie ultimately leaves you with a completely different film. It's such a shame because although it's now a film chocked with flaws and flow problems, one can see that in its original cut there had to be at worst an involving rites-of-passage story.So what are we left with? Well it's certainly not a donkey. It drips with period atmosphere and comes resplendent with a poetic beauty thanks to Markowitz's photography. Stuart's score too has the tone absolutely right, blending the old feel of the West with evocative arrangements for the more tender moments involving the protagonists: and there are tender moments, notably between Cole (Damon youthful but not really exuding a naivety for the age of the character) & Rawlings (Thomas effective and dominating his scenes). That the crucial relationship between Cole and Alejandra Villarreal (Cruz weak and lacking believability for the romantic strand) is barely formed can be laid at Weinstein's door. So too can the fact that a number of characters file in and out with blink and you miss them parts, sad when it's the likes of Robert Patrick and Sam Sheperd; and tragic in the case of Bruce Dern's judge; the latter of which is a crucial character in the final quarter but gets about three minutes screen time. Madness. Star of the movie is Black, who as young ruffian Blevins, manages to convey a deep sense of vulnerability. It's a critical role, one that affects the main character's lives, and thanks to Black's spirited performance we anxiously await what fate has in store for the lovable rogue.So much good to sample, then, even if it feels like going out for a three course dinner and finding the main course is no longer available. It's hoped that one day we may get a directors cut from Thornton, only then you feel will All the Pretty Horses be revealed as a potential thoroughbred. 6/10