SnoopyStyle
Canaan (Armand Assante) is a mysterious gunfighter blinded during the Civil War. He's carrying a baby to a waiting adopted family. He runs into a gang led by Alacran (Robert Davi). He enters a border town with only one road out and cut off by the bandits. They are after a shipment of silver being transported by Sgt. Hastings (Adam Baldwin) and his men. Town leader Caroline (Elisabeth Shue) recruits the blind man to join in the fight for 200 lbs of silver.This should be a fun campy spaghetti western. A blind gunfighter screams cheese. This movie has no style. Armand Assante is a great actor and he does his job here. Elisabeth Shue is not hard enough to be the town leader. She is a damsel in distress and a romantic partner thrown at Assante. This could be great but it is mostly boring.
ma-cortes
A blind gunman roams through Mexico carrying a baby and seeks vengeance against a cruel Mexican outlaw and hoodlums . TV Western filmed in location and deals with a Blindman who arrives in a town ravaged by bandits . The gunfighter enemy is Alacran and his gang who terrorize themselves the villagers . There appears Canaan ( Armand Assante) , a mysterious gunslinger left nearly blind from Civil War combat at the battle of Antietam . At the beginning Canaan rescues a man from bandits , he then passes through a border town where Union Cavalry officers (led by Adam Baldwin) assigned to deliver a load of silver are under attack from brutal outlaws . With some reluctance, Canaan steps in to help the soldiers . Later on , Clay is imprisoned by the bandit Alacran (Robert Davi) and also townsfolk is living in terror of his band . In the middle of these two waring parties is a beautiful woman (Elizabeth Shue) who helps and heals Canaan . The gunfighter enters the town caught between two feuding factions, a nasty U.S. officer and a gang of Mexican bandits attempting to take the shipment , and is caught up in a struggle against them . But here is a problem however, Canaan is blind.The film packs violence , shootouts , high body-count , continuous flashbacks about Civil War , and it's fast moving and quite entertaining . There is plenty of action in the movie , guaranteeing some shoot'em up or stunts every few minutes . It's an exciting western with breathtaking showdown between the starring Armand Assante and his enemies , Robert Davi , Danny Nucci , among others . The movie contains gun-play, action Western , thrills and bloody spectacle . Screenplay with interesting premise about a 'blind gunfighter' though its origin results to be a Japanese series starred by ¨Zaitochi¨, a blind swordsman from the 60s and being recently remade by Takeshi Kitano . This interesting theme about a blind gunslinger is also treated in other films such as ¨The Blindman¨ by Ferdinando Baldi with Tony Anthony and Ringo Starr , ¨An eye for eye¨ by Michael Moore with Robert Lansing and ¨Minessota Clay¨ with Cameron Mitchell , directed by Sergio Corbucci . An interesting casting full of usual Titus Welliver , M.C.Gainey and brief appearance by then unknown Jack Black . Special mention to Robert Davi in his ordinary role as a cruelly baddie , he is terrific, and bears a hysterical and mocking aspect , subsequently he would play similar characters . The movie gets the ordinary Western issues, such as avengers antiheroes , violent facing off , quick scenes and exaggerated baddies . It's an improbable blending of standard Western with pursuits, high body-count and it's fast moving and quite entertaining . Mediocre cinematography by Jack Conroy, but is necessary a perfect remastering , being the copy washed-out .Direction by Richard Spence (New world disorder ,Brookside , Different for girls) is well crafted, here he is more cynical and violent and less inclined toward humor and packs too much action . Spence makes a nice camera work with clever choreography on the showdown , fighting , moving shootouts and bemusing scenes . It's an outlandish , surprising and uneven story but will appeal to Western aficionados . Rating : 5,5 , riotous Western in which there's too much action and violence and excitement enough .
hokeybutt
The movie itself is not that great... it's an unimaginatively-conceived western that is not much more gritty or believable than an episode of "Gunsmoke". The premise is terrific, hearkening back to the plots of old Italian spaghetti westerns... a blind gunfighter carrying a newborn baby comes to a small town overrun by bad men and proceeds to shoot out with every bad guy within range. What makes this movie memorable for me, though, is a GREAT performance by Armand Assante as the blind Canaan. He transcends every other acting job in the movie... no one else seems either authentic or interesting. Assante, however, has done his homework and seems like he wouldn't be out of place at all in an old "Django" movie. Elisabeth Shue is pretty but totally unconvincing as a frontier femme who comes to the aid of Assante and the young baby girl. Every one else is a typical western cartoon... stuffy army officers, nasty bandits with thick accents, etc. (Jack Black appears at one point as an army sentry... which is a little more disconcerting now that he is famous for his more comedic roles.) Fortunately, whenever Assante is on screen he makes the movie work... even some of the ridiculous one-liners. "How do you like your eggs? Scrambled?" (said while clutching a bad guy's genitals).
vegascage3
This movie was really very good. I like westerns as a rule but don't generally like newer ones. I bought this one because I really like Armand Assante. He didn't let me down in this movie. And neither did the movie. It's very different than any other western I've seen yet. They are some gross scenes and some very good action scenes. I liked that alot. I don't like wimpy westerns. Over all a very surprisingly good movie with a great cast including Elisabeth Shue and a small role by Jack Black. If you like westerns this is a good one to get.
