Ensofter Overrated and overhyped

Hattie I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

Zandra The movie turns out to be a little better than the average. Starting from a romantic formula often seen in the cinema, it ends in the most predictable (and somewhat bland) way.

Roxie The thing I enjoyed most about the film is the fact that it doesn't shy away from being a super-sized-cliche;

Dark Jedi This is another one of those movies that I have vague memories of having seen when I was a kid. I probably did since my father always watched any western that was shown on TV. My vague memories also include not being too thrilled about this movie at the time and this is maybe not so surprising. After all this movie is quite sad and contains several plot elements that I really dislike: our hero is downright stupid, he is betrayed, journalist falsifies reality, lawyer with political ambitions gets hero sentenced, hero dies. All of it certainly not really my cup of tea.Now I could appreciate a movie like that if it was really well done but I do not think it was. The acting is pretty much standard Hollywood fare. That is, nothing to write home about. Sometimes the scenery in these Western movies can be really breathtaking but not really in this movie. The fights and shootouts are generally quite silly and not very well done. The story just plows on in a simple linear fashion towards the inevitable sad ending.What bugs me the most, apart from the crooked journalists and lawyers of course, are the fact that Tom Horn is downright stupid. He walks around in some country boy fog with a silly look on his face for most of the movie. He doesn't understand the fix he is in and he certainly do not cooperate in any way to get out of it. When he finally manages to escape jail, for a very short period of time, he barely walks out of town before he drops the jacket he stole, displaying a white shirt so that he can be spotted as easily as possible, and proceeds to run straight out onto the grassland without a hiding place in sight. That was just so stupid! No, this movie is definitely not my cup of tea.

TOMASBBloodhound Tom Horn is one of the last pictures ever made by Steve McQueen. It is unfortunate that it fails to completely engage the audience or sustain any real drama. McQueen looks frail and doesn't bring much life to the title character. The writing is amateurish, the direction pedestrian, and there isn't a lot of action. There were apparently five different directors used, and that is a shame. The fellow they finally decided on appears to have spent much of his career in television, and you can tell by the way he fades out like they're going to a commercial after some scenes. McQueen's ego is listed as the reason for the project going through so many directors. I'd love to have seen what Eastwood could do with a story like this....Tom Horn is largely based on true events. Horn is a famous Indian scout and interpreter who has built up a very worthy reputation by the early 1900s. The West by then had toned itself down quite a bit, and a man like Horn who shoots first and asks questions later finds himself on the wrong end of the law by the end of the first hour. Horn has been hired by ranchers to stop cattle rustling which has really been a problem in the part of Wyoming depicted in this film. Horn blows away several rustlers, and is soon framed for shooting a fifteen year old boy in cold blood by local politicians who want his brand of justice outlawed. Horn is facing the death penalty with what appears to be flimsy evidence against him. We quickly learn however, that Horn has no intention of lowering himself to the point of defending his name in the ludicrous show trial devised by power-hungry local officials. When asked to refute the evidence in court, Horn simply looks off to the mountains on the horizon and answers the questions in maddeningly vague terms. The long trip to the gallows in the last half hour of this film is as frustrating for the viewer as the dopey romantic subplot told to us in flashbacks.Horn's motivations for seemingly laying down and allowing this miscarriage of justice to happen are not all that compelling. If he is willing to risk his life in an escape attempt (which he does try), then why won't he try harder to clear his name in court??? What is his fascination with the handful of tiny Indian charms he holds in his hands all the way up to the gallows? What is his motivation for killing so many men who steal the cattle of others? Is he just a mean old SOB like some claim? Hard to say on all accounts.The film is worth about five stars. Most of them for the cinematography which is very, very good! The Hound.

ma-cortes Interesting but boring Western about the last days of a real-life Wyoming gunslinger named Tom Horn with Steve McQueen in the title role. The movie has its moments here and there but results to be a little bit tiring and slow-moving . It's a melancholy chronicle and near bittersweet dealing with the last exploits of Horn who is shown as hired hand to eliminate some rustlers . Good support cast who provides the best moments as Richard Farnsworth as old-timer who hires Horn , Slim Pickens and Billy Green Bush , both of them as Sheriffs , furthermore a beautiful Linda Evans and brief performance by the eternal secondary Elisha Cook Jr . Marvelously filmed by the classic cameraman John A Alonzo and good musical score by Ernest Gold . The motion picture produced by McQueen and Fred Weintraub is professionally -though with no originality- directed by William Wiard.The picture is based on true events , the deeds are the following : Although his official title was always "Range Detective", he actually functioned as a killer for hire. In 1900 he was implicated in the murder of two known rustlers and robbery suspects in northwest Colorado. During his involvement in the Wilcox Train Robbery investigation, Horn obtained information from Bill Speck that revealed which of the robbers had killed Sheriff Josiah Hazen, who had been shot and killed during the pursuit of the robbers. He passed this information on to Charlie Siringo, who was working the case by that time for the Pinkerton's. He left that line of work briefly to serve a stint in the Army during the Spanish American War. Before he could steam from Tampa for Cuba, he contracted malaria. When his health recovered he returned to Wyoming. Shortly after his return, in 1901, Horn began working for wealthy cattle baron John C. Coble .Willie Nickell murder, Horn's arrest and trial. On July 18, 1901, Horn was once again working near Iron Mountain when Willie Nickell, the 14-year-old son of a sheepherding rancher, was murdered. Horn was arrested for the murder after a questionable confession to Joe Lefors, an office deputy in the US Marshal's office, in 1902. Horn was convicted and hanged in Cheyenne in 1903 .During Horn's trial, the prosecution introduced a vague confession by Horn to Lefors, taken while he was intoxicated. Only certain parts of Horn's statement were introduced, distorting the significance of the statement. Additionally, testimony by at least two witnesses, including lawman Lefors, was presented by the prosecution, as well as circumstantial evidence that only placed him in the general vicinity of the crime scene.Glendolene M. Kimmell, a school teacher who knew the Miller family, testified on the Millers behalf during the Inquest.It is still debated whether Horn committed the murder. Some historians believe he did not, while others believe that he did, but that he did not realize he was shooting a boy. Whatever the case, the consensus is that regardless of whether he committed that particular murder, he had certainly committed many others. Chip Carlson, who extensively researched the Wyoming v. Tom Horn prosecution, concluded that although Horn could have committed the murder of Willie Nickell, he probably did not. According to Carlson's book Tom Horn: Blood on the Moon, there was no actual evidence that Horn had committed the murder, he was last seen in the area the day before the murder, his alleged confession was valueless as evidence, and no efforts were made to investigate involvement by other possible suspects. In essence, Horn's reputation and history made him an easy target for the prosecution. Execution Tom Horn has the distinction of being one of the few people in the "Wild West" to have been hanged by an automated process. A Cheyenne architect named James P. Julian designed the contraption in 1892, earning the name "The Julian Gallows", which made the condemned man hang himself. The trap door was connected to a lever which pulled the plug out of a barrel of water. This would cause a lever with a counterweight to rise, pulling on the support beam under the gallows. When enough pressure was applied, this would cause the beam to break free, opening the trap and hanging the condemned man. Tom Horn was buried in the Columbia Cemetery in Boulder, Colorado.

revdrcac This film, while not a classic, is an important and entertaining view of the dying days of the American West. Tom Horn, as portrayed by McQueen, is a legend past his prime.... misunderstood and out of place in the new century. In a number of ways, the film is similar in this respect to the films Unforgiven as well as the Grey Fox (which also featured Richard Farnsworth).My only real disappointment in the film was the short amount of screen time for Linda Evans. She was dynamic in the few scenes in which she appeared and had excellent chemistry with McQueen.This film was superior to the earlier Nevada Smith and is a must-see for fans of the genre .