Unforgiven-1992

Directors: Clint Eastwood

Writer : David Webb Peoples
Runing Time: 131 mins

Rating: R

Genre : western/action/adventure

Cast: Clint eastwood, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman, Richard Harris

                    Unforgiven is about as far from Sergio Leones A Fistful of Dollars as Clint Eastwood could get. No pin-point accuracy with 19th century technology, no desire to play fair and face the enemy on even terms. If you can shoot him in the back...then do it. Eastwood said he wanted to bury the western with this film and he did it!
    Eastwood puts in an astonishing performance as the retired killer Muny, saved from his life of thievery and lawless gunslinging by his late wife. Now, desperately trying to support his children with no income, he is tempted back to his killing ways by the bounty offered by the women of a brothel, one of whom's number has been savagely beaten and disfigured by a drunken ranch-hand.
   The film follows Eastwood as he wrestles with his desire to honour his dead wifes wife's memory and his need to feed his children by returning to the killer that, he fears, is his true nature. Meanwhile word of the bounty has spread and the events spiral out of control as the sheriff (Gene Hackman) deals with the guns for hire that ride into town.
   While all the supporting cast are excellent Gene Hackman's Oscar winning performance even manages to eclipse Eastwoods as the brutal Sheriff. He beats one of the bounty hunters, English Bob (Richard Harris) almost to death and then explains to a journalist, in one of the film's stand out scenes, how men like he and Muny are so successful at killing. The mood moves from light banter to life threatening seriousness...and back again, with just one move of his head.
  This is truely one of the greatest Westerns ever made in my opinion, and some of Eastwoods best work. Unforgiven is really a true statement of man's brutality and what he "or" she is capable of. Religion,marriage,children, doesn't change ones true identity. After all, when the "society" comes on you hard, the steps you are willing to take in real life, are sometimes desperate.  Although the fact it's a western is really secondary. In truth it's a tale of the nature of evil and the nature of man. Eastwood uses the gap between the western myth and reality as an arena to play out his story and does so with impecable style.

8/10 Stars