Open Range

Think you know westerns; think you’ve seen more Clint Eastwood and John Wayne than anyone else? Well, that’s great, but that’s not gonna matter at all when it comes to this movie. Open Range takes the western and brings it into the 21st century (so to speak).

The story centres around a set of three “free rangers”. In the old west land was just land, and it didn’t really matter who owned, with the invention of barbed wire, this all changed, and free rangers became a thing of the past. This movie concentrates on the confrontation between those trying to divide up the land and the last of the free rangers who are trying to protect their way of life.

When you walk away from this movie, the first thing you’re going to say is, got that was a beautiful movie. The cinematography is spot on, and some of the sweeping landscapes brought my home state right back to me. But it’s not just people moseying along on horses. The gun battle at the end of the movie is nothing like any western gun battle I’ve ever seen. It throws a bit of matrix lobby-ness in with a touch of black-hawk down, so basically it kicks a lot of ass.

The only thing I’d say is, this film sounds very American, which is why it did so poorly at the box office here, but I don’t think anyone, no matter their nationality, would be disappointed by this screening.