Tombstone

Tombstone – 1993, George P. Cosmatos (or was it Kurt Russell?)

The 90’s didn’t deliver many westerns (the glory days of the western were long over by the 80’s) but the massive success of Dances With Wolves in 1990 prompted a bit of a resurgence. Unforgiven (1992) wasn’t as successful but it was even better (and less exhaustive to watch – anybody else remember when ITV showed Dances With Wolves over two separate nights?) Hot on it’s spurred heels was Tombstone.

I’d only seen Tombstone once years ago, and because it was released at about the same time as those other famous modern westerns, my memory of Tombstone was rose tinted. Tombstone is also remembered favourably because of Val Kilmer stealing every scene as the tuberculosis ridden Doc Holiday.

Watching it again was a bit of a disappointment. It’s all a bit cheesy, almost camp in parts. I guess I’ve just been spoilt by Unforgiven, which to cut the western down the bone. Tombstone falls awkwardly between the realism of Unforgiven and the ‘good old fashioned entertainment’ style of classic westerns. This may be due to the troubled production.

According to Wikipedia Kurt Russell really directed Tombstone, George P Cosmatos was only hired at the behest of the Studio. Kurt agreed because Sylvester Stallone had told him that George would let Kurt effectively do the actual directing himself (does this mean that it was Sly who really directed First Blood Part 2?) Some parts of Tombstone are good, but then towards the end when things heat up, it starts to fall to pieces. The worst part is the bit where Kurt Russell shouts ‘Noooooo’ in slow motion

The ensemble cast is vast (85 speaking characters), there are loads of great actors involved, but there are just too many characters. As well as the four good guys, there are three main bad guys; Powers Boothe camps it up as gang leader Curly Bill, Michael Biehn plays the ‘really nasty one’ but his character is the most underwritten in the film, and Stephen Lang as the ‘mean and stupid’ bad guy. The motivation the good guys have for hunting them all down is clear, but by the time they are all killed, it feels like one bad guy too many.

Almost all the other big Westerns of the 1990’s bombed and lost lots of money, including Sam Raimi’s The Quick and The Dead, which deserved to be a success more than Tombstone did. Looks like there’s no justice in the west after all.