![]() Remember when Sharon Stone was big? remember that? seems along time ago doesn't it, also seems odd to think it too with her rather bland boring 80's look. At the end of the day this, like most westerns, won't appeal to the mainstream but fans of Raimi from before his dabbling in comic book adaptations and Kevin Costner baseball movies will eat it up. His camera has all the wild energy of those movies here and I remember this being a complaint from viewers who couldn't get on board with his visual style. Now Raimi is just another Hollywood journeyman but back when this came along he was still known as the man behind the "Evil Dead" series. ![]() As well as these star names there's a rogues gallery of great character actors like Pat Hingle, Mark Boone Junior and Tobin Bell. If you attempted to assemble this cast now you'd be seriously out of pocket. Crowe also stars in one of his first American appearances. Henriksen's part as a showboating gunfighter steals the show and there's a pre-Titanic DiCaprio playing a cocky Billy the Kid archetype. ![]() She may be the weak link here but there are plenty of great performances to make up for her seeming disinterest. Coming off the back of performances in movies like "The Specialist" and "Sliver" she was the laughing stock of Hollywood. Part of it's failure may be the casting of Stone. The movie didn't fare too well at the time, neither critically nor commercially, but, as is want with cult movies, seems to have gained more respect over the years. Stone enters the competition and defeats various unshaven ruffians before meeting Hackman in the grand finale. He's basically playing a more tongue in cheek riff on his "Unforgiven" character and seems to be having a great time in the role. Stone arrives in town looking for revenge on Hackman, the evil patriarch of the town and the man responsible for the death of her father. The small town of Redemption is hosting a tournament for sharpshooters. The plot of "The Quick and the Dead" is borrowed from Anthony Mann's great Jimmy Stewart starring western "Winchester 73". While the left side of Dermot's face maintained a stony expression, his right side was laughing maniacally. At that time he was in the middle of a bout of the obscure medical condition known as "Bell's Palsy", a bizarre ailment which renders one half of it's victim's face numb. My other friend Ruairi, who had been sat the other side of Dermot looked at me in bewilderment and asked "Did you not see him laughing his ass off?" You see, I had completely forgotten something about Dermot. "Are you kidding me?" he replied, "It was hilarious!". When the lights went up and we departed the theater I questioned his enjoyment. ![]() "How can he not be enjoying this?" I wondered. I was giggling like a girl throughout but anytime I looked across at my friend Dermot, seated to my right, his face was expressionless. It was one of those glorious summer nights in between college terms when two of my fellow geeks and I headed into town to catch the movie before a night of drunken revelry. I first saw Raimi's western on it's initial cinema release. ![]()
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