Pale Rider starts on Carbon Canyon high in the mountains where a group of prospectors are panning for gold, however local businessman Coy LaHood (Richard A. Dysart) wants the land to expand his own mining company & is using intimidating tactics to force the prospectors to move on. While in town one of the prospectors Hull Barret (Michael Moriarty) is beaten by some of LaHood's men, then seemingly out of nowhere a mysterious preacher (Clint Eastwood) comes to his rescue. The presence of the preacher brings the feuding prospectors together & they decide to stand up against LaHood & his bullying tactics, however LaHood has had enough & calls in gun for hire Stockburn (John Russell) & his six deputies who kill for the right price...
Produced & directed by Clint Eastwood who also stared in it Pale Rider is an entertaining western that I rather liked. The script by Michael Butler & Dennis Shryack tales itself very seriously with a fair amount of character development, anyone looking for constant gunfights & action would be advised to look elsewhere but if your looking for a solid, well written western with a moral then you could do a lot worse then Pale Rider. It deals with faith & pulling together & those are it's main themes which it gets across in a effective manner. The film has a sedate pace about it, it's not the fastest moving film ever but at the same time I never felt bored with it. The ambiguous nature of Eastwood's character is well handled & his origins are intriguing although we never find out anything about him other than he's a preacher & that at some point he has met Stockburn before, I have to say I liked the mystery surrounding him & it cuts down on sentimental type dialogue. Overall I thought Pale Rider was a decent western that I enjoyed.
Directed Eastwood does a good job, I'm not sure how he can direct & star at the same time but he pulled it off here. The crisp 2:35:1 widescreen photography is very nice as it captures the mountain locations very well as does it the period town. There's a good atmosphere to Pale Rider & the climax where Eastwood kills the six deputies is a well sustained tension filled sequence. There's not much in the way of violence here, a few gunshot wounds & a couple of fights is about it.
With a modest sounding $6,900,000 budget Pale Rider is well made with top production values & period design. The acting is very good from all involved, it was nice to see & recognise Billy Drago as one of the deputies, Richard Kiel better know for playing Jaws in a couple of James Bond films makes an appearance & Chris Penn turns up in an early role for him.
Pale rider is a watchable western with some nice action scenes & a decent story as well, I liked it & it's as simple & straight forward as that.
Produced & directed by Clint Eastwood who also stared in it Pale Rider is an entertaining western that I rather liked. The script by Michael Butler & Dennis Shryack tales itself very seriously with a fair amount of character development, anyone looking for constant gunfights & action would be advised to look elsewhere but if your looking for a solid, well written western with a moral then you could do a lot worse then Pale Rider. It deals with faith & pulling together & those are it's main themes which it gets across in a effective manner. The film has a sedate pace about it, it's not the fastest moving film ever but at the same time I never felt bored with it. The ambiguous nature of Eastwood's character is well handled & his origins are intriguing although we never find out anything about him other than he's a preacher & that at some point he has met Stockburn before, I have to say I liked the mystery surrounding him & it cuts down on sentimental type dialogue. Overall I thought Pale Rider was a decent western that I enjoyed.
Directed Eastwood does a good job, I'm not sure how he can direct & star at the same time but he pulled it off here. The crisp 2:35:1 widescreen photography is very nice as it captures the mountain locations very well as does it the period town. There's a good atmosphere to Pale Rider & the climax where Eastwood kills the six deputies is a well sustained tension filled sequence. There's not much in the way of violence here, a few gunshot wounds & a couple of fights is about it.
With a modest sounding $6,900,000 budget Pale Rider is well made with top production values & period design. The acting is very good from all involved, it was nice to see & recognise Billy Drago as one of the deputies, Richard Kiel better know for playing Jaws in a couple of James Bond films makes an appearance & Chris Penn turns up in an early role for him.
Pale rider is a watchable western with some nice action scenes & a decent story as well, I liked it & it's as simple & straight forward as that.