‘I’ve bin runnin’ all my life.’ How many times have you heard those words in the tense moments before a western’s climactic shoot-out? Of all genres, however, the western thrives on familiar ‘signposts’, and this one is no different. The other given is that the good guy – although here we have a hero and a heroine – must prevail against superior odds. We are in New Mexico, 1871, and if the whistling wind across the dusty landscape is a tad overdone, all the better. Jane (Natalie Portman) and her little girl are doing the chores when Pa returns badly shot-up by the Bishop gang. There is history between them, and the story is from then on told between flashbacks to 1864 and 1867. Narratives unfolding in reverse order are, for mine, overdone these days (John Ford would never have bothered with such tomfoolery), but through the time jumps we learn that Dan Frost (Joel Edgerton), before disappearing during the Civil War, had been the love of Jane’s life. It’s he whom she calls upon to help protect her against Bishop and his mob of outlaws. As Bishop, the dandified, moustachioed murderer, Ewan McGregor is marvellous, speaking in fruity arch terms (again, the comforting cliché) – ‘he developed a fixation on the girl and absconded with her in the dead of night’. It was shot in a sepia hue, with earthy textures and minute attention to detail in costume design. I was totally absorbed by this movie from the minute Jane cocked her rifle on the wooden porch of her handmade cabin (as were all of the Japanese seniors who watched it with me in Kyoto last week). Shameful to admit it, but I haven’t enjoyed seeing a bloke get shot as much as I did when Jane blew out the brains of the creep who was about to rape her. And the brothel scene (nothing like Kitty’s spick and span saloon in Gunsmoke), with Red River Valley tinkling on the piano, is gold. I loved it.
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