From: kaufman@eecs.nwu.edu (Michael L. Kaufman)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.movies
Subject: Unforgiven (Was Re: Unforgivable)  ***SPOILERS***
Date: 13 Aug 92 14:02:03 GMT
Organization: EECS Department, Northwestern University

wwr@calmasd.prime.com writes:
>	"Unforgiven" is simply 5 steps above films like ALoTO.  It challenges
>you in every aspect ... Nothing about this film takes the easy way out  ...
>	What a great film.
>	And some moron that lacks the ability to see a full spectrum of a film
>comes out of the blue & slays it.

A few comments:

1) It took me a few minutes to figure out what "ALoTO" stood for. Where there
others who didn't guess this right away, or was it just me?

2) WWR, you need to settle down a bit. Just because someone disagreed with you
about a film, is no reason to become insulting. I mean, it's not like he was
defending _Darkman_ or anything. ;-)

Now to the film:

I am big fan of Clint Eastwood, particularly of Clint Eastwood westerns and 
I have to say that this was only fair. I enjoyed it, but I wouldn't call it
great. It had two major flaws as far as I was concerned.

1) The story. Rather then "never taking the easy way out" there was not a 
moment in this film that was a suprise. Taking the major moments of the film
in order, you tell me if you were in slightly suprised by: Muuny deciding to
go after turning the kid down. (skipping ahead a bit) The kid being upset about
begin a killer. Morgan Freeman being caught and killed. Munny going back to
drinking. Munny killing Gene Hackman and all the bad guys. Munny surviving and
going home. I am not saying it was a bad film. It was better then Silverado (a
film I also enjoyed) because the characters were somewhat more complex, but it 
was basicaly the same story.

2) The character of Will Munny. Lets face it, Munny is basicly a one-note
character. THe whole film he keeps saying that his is not a violent guy
anymore, and we don't believe it, and we suspect that he doesn't really
believe it either (that's why he keep saying it, he is trying to convince
himself) and eventually we see that he still is violent. He is a cartoon of 
the old-western type. We don't know his motivations except for the moment 
when he avenges his friend - certainly a stock western theme if there ever 
was one.

Compare this film to _The Outlaw Josey Wales_ (my personal Eastwood favorite)
to get an idea of what I mean. Joesy Wales is a fully rounded character. We
understand his past, and we care about his future. When Unfogiven ended and
we were just told Munny went to California or something, did anyone really
care? Did you walk out of the theature discussing how his life went? I am
guessing not. When Josey Wales ended and Clint rode off, I was intensly
interested. Did he go back to the ranch, or did he ride off alone? Whichever
you thought, it was important. Consider the scene with Ten-Bears in Joesy 
Wales. That was a scene I was not expecting. It certainly was not a typical
"western" scene. Can you pick a scene from Unforgiven that you can make those
claims about?

Unforgiven was ok, but IMHO it was by no means a great film.

Michael

-- 
Michael Kaufman | I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on
 kaufman        | fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in
  @eecs.nwu.edu | the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be
                | lost in time - like tears in rain. Time to die.     Roy Batty