Chaplin
Better off silent
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The Quick and the Dead (1995)
Directed by: Sam Raimi
Cast:
Sharon Stone - Ellen
Gene Hackman - Herod
Russell Crowe - Cort
Leonardo DiCaprio - Kid
Tobin Bell - Dog Kelly
Roberts Blossom - Doc Wallace
Critic's Review:
Sam Raimi's hyper-stylized contemporary Western is a delightful diversion. While the cult director has taken hits for his style-over-substance format, this film boasts a taut storyline and a number of interestingly sketched characters, brought to life by the likes of Sharon Stone, Gene Hackman, Leonardo DiCaprio, Russell Crowe, and cult favorites Keith David and Lance Henriksen. Though his absurdist tendencies have been frowned upon in purist cinematic circles, here this proclivity makes Raimi a singular director. Tackling the Western genre in an offbeat manner may have offended the Hollywood hard-line, but it proves a sure-fire formula for creating entertainment value, with Raimi's comical treatment of blood-and-gut gore reflecting a modern American desensitization towards violence. Overall, this is a superbly crafted picture with some very excusable flaws and will surely satisfy fans of Raimi's over-the-top technique; though no Evil Dead, the director's cryptic, quirky tone persists in making this an infectiously fun film to watch. ~ Mike DiBella, Rovi
My review:
Since we've been talking a bit about this and a lot of people surprisingly didn't like the film, I thought it'd be a good starting off point for the return of Movie-A-Day.
I particularly like the movie, not really for Sharon Stone's performance, which isn't much--she rarely does anything other than brood and look angry. But there's no denying she looks good on-screen. What Raimi does here is take a lot of Western cliches and gives his own special touch to them--the silent hero bent on revenge, the "Mayor" of an old western town who rules with an iron fist (Hackman did this to great effect in Unforgiven a few years earlier), the young gunslinger who thinks he's better than anyone, and of course, the tired gunfighter who has turned to religion to make up for his bad ways.
It's actually a uniformally good cast--Hackman always lends a bit of respectability in anything he does, and you could see Crowe's star power here, well before Gladiator 5 years later. And don't forget some of the other familiar faces that show up: Keith David, Lance Henriksen, Tobin Bell, and yes, Gary Sinise in a very small role. Many Western fans will recognize Woody Strode in his final film appearance.
But the star of the show really is Sam Raimi, who puts in a lot of his trademarks: Over-accentuated violence, POVs of inanimate objects--namely bullets, and slow motion close-ups, such as when Gene Hackman is introduced for the first time.
In 1995, Westerns weren't exactly a big draw at the box office. Sure, Unforgiven and before that Dances With Wolves got some attention, but this film doesn't quite feel like a Western, but it is definitely entertaining and well-made.
Trivia:
A sex scene between Ellen (Sharon Stone) and Cort ('Russell Crowe (I)') was shot, but Stone and director Sam Raimi decided that it wasn't a necessary part of the story. The scene was not included in the American release of the film, but international versions do include it.
Sharon Stone hand-picked 'Russell Crowe (I)' to be in this film. The studio was initially unsure about this choice because Crowe was a complete unknown to the American audience.
Sharon Stone was so insistent that Leonardo DiCaprio appear in the film that she paid his salary personally.
Bruce Campbell had a cameo appearance during a wedding scene, but the scene was cut. Campbell says Sam Raimi created that scene for the specific reason of giving Pat Hingle something more substantial to do and was never intended to be in the movie in the first place. Campbell was also visiting the set on his day off when Raimi drafted him to play a skid-row character in several background shots. Although all of Campbell's appearances ended up on the cutting room floor, he is still listed high up in the credits.
All of the actors on the set in the gunfight scenes were instructed in the art of the quick draw by a stunt coordinator. Due to his limited screen time, Gene Hackman had the most opportunity to prepare his quick draw and as a result was the fastest actor on the set.
For obvious reasons, this is the only Sam Raimi film to date (2002) where his trademark beige 1973 Oldsmobile Delta 88 doesn't appear in its original form. However, according to Bruce Campbell, the car makes an appearance in the form of a wagon's chassis. He claims the car was disassembled and the chassis was used for the wagon.
According to the "Evil Dead Companion", Sharon Stone was given a lengthy list of directors that had been approved to direct this film, so that she could choose the directors she thought would work. She sent back a list with a single name... Sam Raimi. When asked why she chose Raimi, she said it was because she liked Army of Darkness (1992), among Raimi's other works.
Scars is a tribute to Curly Howard of The Three Stooges.
There is a scene where Gene Hackman lightly slaps Sharon Stone. It wasn't scripted and Stone's reaction is real.
John Sayles did on-set rewrites of the film's script during principal photography.
The Kid (Leonardo DiCaprio) has a real name: Fee Herod.
Russell Crowe's first American feature.
All the props set pieces for the Quick and the Dead came from Abbas Acre of Antiques in Tempe Arizona, It is now a train depot.
Sharon Stone's gun for this film was made by a master gunsmith John Phillips. Mr Phillips was a fast draw legend.
The title "The Quick and the Dead" comes from the King James translation of the Bible, I Peter 4:5, which admonishes the believer from behaving like pagans, "who shall give account to him [Christ] that is ready to judge the quick and the dead." The phrase became better known in English as part of the Apostle's Creed, a Christian doctrine which appears to date back (at least in partial form) to the second century. The Creed, as translated in the Book of Common Prayer for the Church of England, states that Christ "...ascended into heaven, and sitteth on the right hand of God the Father Almighty; from thence he shall come to judge the quick and the dead." In both cases, the word "quick" is a more archaic use meaning "living" (in modern parlance, the "quick of the fingernails" is a rare instance of the older meaning); however, the movie title clearly plays off the double-meaning, in that there are two kinds of gunslingers: quick (meaning both fast and alive) and dead.
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