Yul Brynner is a powerful and dynamic actor. He had donned the cowboy hat before in the 'Magnificent Seven' but quite arguably Jules was his greatest role ever.
In the film Brynner plays a mysterious gun fighter hired to kill a rebel who's property was sold in the war. The man demands answers but is shot. Forced to leave he refuses and returns to his farm where a gun is drawn upon him and he has to defend himself. In killing the man he has a bounty placed upon his head and a gunman is hired. But this movie is more than just a simple Western. It is much, much, much more.
In the town the Mexicans are treated as inferiors. The rebel is the only man that treats them decently. And they beg Jules not to kill him. Jules refuses yet Jules has a dark secret of his own that is similar to the Mexicans. Jules is a Creole from Louisana and is half French and African. His father was a slave owner and his mother was a slave. Because of this he was treated as inferior. When his mother argued with his father she was sold away because she was property. So naturally Yules is a cold and very dark because of the hardship and injustices of his past. And in Brynner, the Mexicans, and the Rebel there are three groups that are being discriminated against. The town claims to be against slavery but yet it stands by every injustice outside of it. And we see the conflict that surmonts between Jules, the Rebel, and the Town. So the film shapes into a morality play of sorts like 'High Noon' where the protagonist must choose between right and wrong. Brynner's role is very much like Eastwood's 'Man with No Name'. He is sort of an anti-hero or perhaps a divided one who has to make deep, difficult desicions. Does he do his job or does he do what is right? The film has romance, intensity, and passion and it all plays out well. The film is really a fine example of how great the past generation was in filmmaking. This film makes the viewer think, feel, and rationalize. The characters are very human and that is what I appreciate. Brynner's role is very realistic and intersting as he is more than just a hired cowpoke: he is a deep, complex, and intense. This film is truly a work of art and should be a part of any Western fans collection.
Yul Brynner is Magnificent
If you liked Yul Brynner in "The Magnificent Seven" you will love him in this movie. Brynner is cool as they come. This is a great western and should be on DVD.
The Civil Rights movement goes West
This movie made me a Yul Brynner fan. I'd watched him many times in other movies, but I'd never seen a movie just because Yul Brynner was in it. Now I feel it is time to review this fine gentleman's career. I've been a movie fan for over forty years and appreciate a good Western, yet somehow this film had escaped me. Its release date (1964) places it in a volatile period within and beyond the movie industry. For Westerns, John Wayne rules, but A Fistfull of Dollars is just around the corner. Invitation is therefore free of the Italian influence, but Yul takes the no-name, silent gunman to the extreme in the first part of the film. He is mystic, mesmerizing, mysterious, and muy macho in this role! As his character slowly reveals himself, he loses his invulnerability and where it leads, no other Hollywood leading man could have pulled this off. Bravo, Yul! And brave,too. 1964 was a year of many troubled civil rights freedom marches and sit-ins. How this film played at the time and how many fans might react would certainly make this a risky venture. The story involves interracial love, bigotry, and even a one-man riot and looting scene. All in all, Yul Brynner carries this movie. Masterfully using just a look rather than unnecessary dialog, he brings depth and rich characterization to his role. And with that, powerful empathy to an overall theme of justice, respect, and equality. On a minor note, in an area often inaccurate in Westerns, this movie matches the guns to the era. The setting is 1865, and the pistols and rifles look authentic for the time. I also was curious about what might be in those two little bags of luggage Brynner carries with him as apparently his only possessions. They remain with him to the end and effectively add to his mysterious persona.
I don't know the real history of the gunfight at the OK Corral. I saw the recent movie TOMBSTONE with Kurt Russel and Val Kilmer and found it thoroughly enjoyable but I never considered it to be "historical". It was just hysterical.
HOUR OF THE GUN is another, older version of the story. It too is excellent and more believable as a historical drama but I have no conception that it is historical other than the recognition that Wyatt Earp, Doc Holliday, and Ike Clanton were real people; Tombstone, Arizona, Colorado, Mexico and the OK Corral are real places; and a gunfight really did take place at the corral. That doesn't matter to me because this too is a fine film and thoroughly entertaining. It has none of the comic element that TOMBSTONE had but it is a high quality western... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): James Garner - Jason Robards Director(s): John Sturges DVD Release Date: Released the 17 May 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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After being coerced by a roving gang of Kiowas to trade his season's worth of hard-earned furs for a runaway slave, Joe Bass (Burt Lancaster) vows to take back what's his. Before he can get them, though, the Kiowas are slaughtered by a gang of `scalphunters' led by Jim Howie (Telly Salavas), who nips Joe Bass's furs in the bargain. With Joseph Winfield Lee (Ossie Davis) in tow, Joe Bass trails the fur and scalp-laden Jim Howie and vows yet again to reclaim his property.
THE SCALPHUNTERS (1968) is a comedy-western that somehow manages to makes palatable some terrible things - specifically, slavery and the harvest and sale of human scalps. It doesn't condone them, of course, but it doesn't dwell on their horrors, either. Lancaster is energetic and perfectly cast as the... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Burt Lancaster - Shelley Winters Director(s): Sydney Pollack DVD Release Date: Released the 17 May 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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"Warlock" is a great classic western with an amazing cast. I am sad to see Dolores Michaels not get billing on the DVD, as she did on the original moive posters. While she retired early from acting, she not only was beautiful, but a very solid actress. More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Richard Widmark - Henry Fonda Director(s): Edward Dmytryk DVD Release Date: Released the 24 May 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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During his Twentieth Century Fox contract years, Gregory Peck looked to veteran director Henry King as something of a father figure and gave two of his best performances--in Twelve O'Clock High (1949) and The Gunfighter (1950)--for him. The Bravados (1958) isn't in that league, but it's a surprisingly tough film from the flabby CinemaScope years when the studio, director, and star all seemed to be floundering.
Peck plays Jim Douglass, a dark, haunted man who rides into a Southwest border town on the eve of a hanging. The bad men set for the drop (Stephen Boyd, Albert Salmi, Lee Van Cleef, Henry Silva) are the same ones he's been pursuing for the rape and murder of his wife. Douglass isn't happy about leaving it to the law to carry out his vengeance--and so there's... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Gregory Peck - Joan Collins Director(s): Henry King DVD Release Date: Released the 24 May 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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This restoration of Sam Peckinpah's 1965 western Major Dundee is nothing short of magnificent, a noble attempt at restoring a famously wrecked masterpiece. When Peckinpah went over budget and over schedule during the Mexico shoot, unshot scenes were canceled and the footage rudely cut by the studio. The director disowned the results. In 2005, surviving footage was patched back in, and a new musical soundtrack commissioned to replace the score Peckinpah hated. This raises some legitimate questions about interpreting a director's intentions, and about messing with film history, but Major Dundee--The Extended Version is such a rousing, mysterious experience, one feels grateful.
Major Dundee (Charlton Heston) is a vainglorious officer busted to the decidedly inglorious job... More Info about this DVD Actor(s): Charlton Heston - Richard Harris Director(s): Sam Peckinpah DVD Release Date: Released the 20 September 2005 Usually ships in 24 hours
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