Faithless Hearts: A Review of 'Appaloosa'

Shooting the breeze: Appaloosa plays by its own rules, but, if challenged to, probably couldn't tell you what those were.

What on earth is ‘Appaloosa’? This difficult question concerns the viewer long after the opening moments of the film, which establish Appaloosa to be the name of a small town of 1881 in dire need of some law and order to counter the bathetic violence of local tradesmen Mr Bragg, and it lingers into the closing credits, with their strange whiskey-advert aesthetics of soft American rock over tactile, almost haptic images of Western lore. This film both stars and is directed by the great actor Ed Harris, and it’s everything one would expect the man not to be: quirky, inconsistent, and overly concerned with matters of the heart.

Appaloosa gets the heroes it deserves in the shape of Virgil Cole and Everett Hitch, who immediately begin to shoot any man not conforming to the new laws they have themselves put into affect. However, their arrival is concurrent with that of Ali, a prettily formed widow who catches the eye of the steady-handed and inexpressive Cole. Whilst her presence could never be described as the linchpin of the drama (no matter what the final voiceover tries to convince us) it is from her that the film seems to harvest all its most striking ideas. Though it is Bragg’s arrest by Hitch and Cole and his inevitable escape which forms the backbone of the story, Ali’s responses to the ebbing and flowing of this masculine tide leave the strongest mark.

Ignorant to the blunt social portraiture of James Mangold’s 3.10 To Yuma recent remake, the single-minded methodology of Kevin Costner’s Open Range or even – and most unexpectedly – the moral mire of Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven, Appaloosa begins a strange beast and only becomes more odd as it goes on, edging dangerously close to absurdist parody at times. This ever-present sense of humour is by turns spiky and soft, simple and high-minded, and reminds one at times of Sergio Leone’s cock-eyed view of the American frontier. Almost upended by these laughs, the film is nonetheless able to sneakily express a deeply unsettling image of American humanity and a highly cogent undercutting of Western mythos: corruption is endemic, genderless, and such a part of human character that it lugs around no sombre somnambulism nor visual viciousness, instead being a rarely negotiable and ever-present obstacle to one’s own advancement.

Despite this agenda, the film is certainly not immune to providing some of the expected generic pleasures, albeit with twists: the one gunfight of any substance is thrillingly built-up to in a beautiful Mexican town, a saxophone stretching itself out on the soundtrack in anticipation: although, when the shooting happens, it lasts the blink of an eye (Hitch comments ‘that was fast,’ Cole laconically replies ‘yeah, they could shoot.’) White picket fences and references to European trade make an appearance, but the most affecting expression of the suppression and taming of the frontier occurs on a verbal level, as characters vie with each other to express themselves with as much circumlocution as possible and ensure that laws, no matter how hastily assembled, are written down before they are enacted (even though, as Cole says, legality is just a way of making him feel better about what he would likely do anyway).

What is Appaloosa, then? It is an experience which, for the most part, absolves Renée Zellweger of her cinematic crimes to date, as she delivers an earthy and air-headed yet somehow gracious performance as the widow Ali. It is also a perilously complex re-evaluation of Western cliché which remains, for much of its running time, regrettably uninvolving, despite its strengths. Finally, Appaloosa (the town and the film) is a literate place in which expediency, companionship and consistency are all examined, and seen to be as bafflingly absurd as each other.

Down From The Mountain: A Review of 'Seraphim Falls'

Coming to us courtesy of a director whose experience has been limited so far to television cop shows of varying repute, Seraphim Falls has far more to offer an audience that simply a name that needs to be spoken twice to anyone who asks it. Firstly, it gives Pierce Brosnan another chance to bring his brand of business-like charisma to the screen, something which is always welcome, and delivers some fantastic photography in addition to a surprisingly engaging story.

‘Never turn your back on the past’ is the tagline for the film, which is presumably an attempt at irony on the part of writer-director David Von Ancken, as the film-making seems resolutely against giving any additional information other than the presently-occurring facts: Brosnan, name unknown, is being pursued through the wintry climbs of some mountains in the American south-west in the years following the civil war by a band of calmly calculating gruffians, led by Liam Neeson, name unknown. The one man flees from the rest, getting shot, injured, submersed in ice cold water; all the while the film staves off an explanatory flashback in the same way that Brosnan’s character keeps one step ahead of those after him; when the past seems to catch him, it is but a fleeting glimpse, the chase resumes, and the audience stays in the dark.

I am sure that Ancken was pressured to put some kind of explanatory titles at the start of the film; that he has not caved makes him worthy of real credit. It is a rare pleasure to simply watch events unfold without repeated overtures made to what led everyone here. It lends the film an urgency and excitement that it is able to maintain for much of its lean-feeling two-hour running time. When the details begin to trickle through it feels natural, not forced: Brosnan introducing himself as Gideon, and the dropping of Neeson’s character’s name being Carver. These are not introductions, they are overheard snippets.

In lieu of back-story, we get to watch Brosnan repeatedly mumble and wince in pain as he is put through several tortures, which suggest the makers recently viewed Die Another Day. His character is described as one ‘who doesn’t speak much’, and it is indeed half an hour before he says a word. It is hard to see why Brosnan was cast in the role (the involvement of Mel Gibson’s Production Company Icon and the near-constant infliction of pain suggest the erstwhile lethal weapon was previously drawn to the part), but it works a treat, as does Neeson’s quietly venomous but ultimately human portrayal of a man out to catch another man.

Moving from icy primitivism through familial concern and towards the corporate civilization of the railroad (via Christian missionaries, of course), the various stocks-in-trade of the American Frontier myth are addressed and subtly manipulated. Having thus crafted a state-of-the-nation circa 1868, the film then veers towards the surreal, in the last reel moving unexpectedly into David Lynch territory (although one suspects even he would have had second thoughts about Wes Studie cameoing as a character in charge of a watering hole called Charon.) This is not entirely unwelcome; indeed, it brings a new slant to the story, as does the movement from the top of the mountains, through an autumnal pine landscape, and onto the boiling heat of a featureless salt flat. One might criticise that the visceral energy presented, however mutely, in the first hour begins to ebb away from the piece, but if this slight remove gives off the whiff of intellectualism, surely that is a far sight more interesting than another town-based gun battle, no matter how confidently staged? The film demands a second watch, not because of any plot twists or character revelations, but because it conjures up the sights, smells and atmosphere of its locales in a way that few other films, let alone Westerns, manage so confidently.

In the final reckoning – having mixed a tweaked Outlaw’s Progress tale with various elements of Greek tragedy, biblical emotions, and historical cliché – Seraphim Falls is oddly able to walk into the sunset with head held high.