3:10 to Yuma

While buying some Blu-Rays a few days ago, I was standing in an extremely long and slow line. I said to myself, “they really should open up another cash register”. Moments later, the man operating the register I was waiting for called someone up to run another. Why am I telling you this? Well, evidently anything I say will come true. I’ll use this to my advantage. My bank account will have a million dollars in it tomorrow morning and Hollywood will make more westerns. The first wish is an obvious one, but number two may require a little explanation. Of all the genres I could pick, why westerns? In the simplest way I can put it, Westerns are awesome and very few get made. I could count the number of big budget westerns released in the last few years on one hand. Those would be A Million Ways to Die in the West (It only kind of counts), Django Unchained (again, only kind of counts, but for different reasons), True Grit, and 3:10 to Yuma. The last is far and away my favorite out of not only those four, but the entire genre.

Being a fairly grounded movie, so much of the performance is solely on the shoulders of the cast. They do not disappoint. Russell Crowe and Christian Bale star as the outlaw Ben Wade and a rancher, Dan Evans. Their performances are amazing, especially when you compare it to some more classic westerns. I am honestly not a huge fan of most classic American westerns, as the acting is awful. Yes, that includes John Wayne, he is the single most overrated actor of all time. Feel free to yell at me in the comments for that. In classic the Spaghetti Westerns done by Sergio Leone, the acting is wonderful. My issue is with the tone of the movies. While I did enjoy them, I wasn’t exactly a fan of the almost surreal tone in play there. Anyways, back to the topic at hand. Wade comes off as a smart man. Smarter than everyone in his gang and probably any of the other characters in this story. He draws in his free time and is well read. Essentially, he’s a gentleman. Except for that whole being a murderous stagecoach bandit of course. After getting captured, he is to be escorted to Contention where he will catch the titular train to Yuma, where he will stand trial and most certainly hang. Enter stage right Dan Evans. He is a man who hasn’t run into a whole lot of luck in life. Crippled as result of his time in the civil war, he owns a ranch in Arizona, but that isn’t exactly working well. A combination of drought, debts, and the impending arrival of the railroad has left Evans a desperate man. On a cattle drive with his sons, he encounters Wade robbing a stage coach, and the plot gets set in motion.

Mild spoilers here, nothing that really ruins the plot, but some people are a little uppity about that sort of thing, and I don’t want anyone to miss out on this.

I not going to give you a play by play of the plot, you can just watch the movie for that. What is important is that Wade ends up getting captured, and Evans needs to get him to the train, and he will get the money to save his ranch. Well, he has more motivation than just that. Wade offers him ten times the amount that the railroad company was offering him to let him go, but still insists on delivering him to the train. That’s the man Evans is, stubborn and he has something to prove. The dialogue between Wade and Evans in the final act is amazingly well written and delivered, really showing the tense relationship between these two characters. It really is nothing like anything I have seen since. The supporting cast is amazing as well, most notably Ben Foster as Charlie Prince, Wade’s right hand man. The character is an odd man, who seems completely infatuated with Wade and will stop at nothing to keep Wade from hanging. Foster is one of my favorite actors, and is completely underrated. Do yourself a favor and check him out in The Messenger. Peter Fonda plays a grizzled old Pinkerton detective, Byron McEllroy, hired by the railroad to hunt down Wade. He seems to have a history with him, as there is intensity in the dialogue between the two. Logan Lerman plays, Evans’ oldest son, William. He is a son who has almost no respect for his father, but when they encounter Wade, he almost seems to idolize him. As you can imagine, this doesn’t please Evans, as Wade is a self-admitted bad man. William’s relationship with his father is one of my favorite aspects of the film. All of these characters drive the plot forward to a more than satisfying.

This film has one of the best casts to ever grace the silver screen, with these characters being distinct and unique, without being stereotypes. The depth that is brought to play here is nearly unbelievable. From the acting and story, as well as from a technical standpoint (This movie was nominated for two Academy Awards, Best sound Mixing and Best Score), this movie is just amazing.

Observe and Report Impressions

Hey look, I’m talking about a comedy for once. Well, this is technically a comedy, just extremely dark. Set Rogen stars as a mall cop in this movie released around the same time as another movie about a mall cop, Paul Blart: Mall Cop. Unlike Paul Blart: Mall Cop, Observe and Report is actually funny. Evidently that wasn’t enough to make it stand out, as it is one of lowest performing movies in terms of box office receipts for Seth Rogen. That isn’t awesome at all, considering this is one of his best performances that I’ve seen. His character Ronnie has some deep psychological issues that haven’t really been entirely worked out. It also doesn’t help that he still lives with his mom. There really is a lot more to his character, but if I say anything else, it might spoil something for you. Trust me on this.

A consequence of Rogen’s character is that a lot of comedy seems out of place. Like I said, this move is seriously dark, borderline depressing. One of the supporting characters, Dennis (played by Michael Peña), keeps it from being to dark thankfully. Every scene with Dennis is wonderful,  especially one in particular,  where he and and Ronnie assault some skateboarders. Peña is an amazing actor who really should be more well known. It really was a shame he didn’t get more screen time. Ray Liotta and Anna Faris also perform admirably here.
One issue I do have with this movie is that the plot seemed to wrap itself up a little too neatly.
Because it is so dark, this movie is not for everyone, even if the comedy is expertly done. But, if you are a fan of Seth Rogen, this is definitely worth your time.

The Signal Impressions

I’m just going to say this right here: I really don’t know what happened in this movie. The plot seemed completely nonsensical,  and the editing really made no logical sense. It probably would lend itself to another viewing, but it’s late and a rental copy so that probably won’t happen for a while. The acting from the main cast was decent, with Laurence Fishburne doing the greatest job here. That being said, much of the script was awful, and really could have used a rewrite. Overall it came off as pretentious.

What did The Signal do right? Well, quite a bit actually. The special effects were better than a lot of major Hollywood releases with budgets ten times as large as the (relatively) miniscule 4 million dollars used here. The director, William Eubank was trained as a cinematographer, and that shows. Every shot in this movie was done near perfectly. Give Eubank a better, more grounded story and a decent script and I can see him doing something amazing. With The Signal, that greatness is very hard to see.