This movie sucked. The best way I can describe this movie is "depression porn," which is to say that there isn't much of a narrative throughout the film, rather just a simple, unexplained setup to a bad situation, followed by a series of terrible events mostly caused by the stupidity of the characters themselves. Not all the events are caused by the characters though, sometimes these events happen for literally no reason, other than that the filmmaker wanted you to feel even worse than you already do. It's manipulative.
At some point in this movie a family is introduced. We learn that the man, his wife, and his child are travelling to California, passing through the town in the movie. They're happy and excited. The man decides to go to the saloon that's run by the antagonist character. The man is shot. We don't know by who, we don't know why, we only know that a happy guy was killed and now we should feel sad.
In another part of the movie, a single mother of a teenage (?) daughter goes straight to the saloon to offer herself as a prostitute to the very man who killed her husband. This happens about a month after her husband died. She claims her reasoning is that she and her daughter will starve otherwise. Why doesn't she find another job like the rest of the women in the town? Why is prostitution her default choice of occupation? Because it's gross and makes you feel sick, that's why. The saloon owner antagonist character says he'll only accept her offer if her daughter is included. We find out soon enough that the mother accepts this... The mother prostitutes her young daughter who is dragged off by some unnamed creepy old man. This is where I stopped watching - roughly half way through the movie.
I should also mention that this movie takes place in a town that has banned alcohol. The people are church goers, so where are all these degenerates that we see in the saloon coming from? Or are we really supposed to believe that with the introduction of a single saloon, the entire town turns to murderous idiots? One scene has the saloon owner shoot an 18 year old kid because he entered into a game of poker without enough money to pay his debts. Yet another event in the movie where the character was introduced and promptly killed off so that we feel bad. "Look at all the depressing stuff we're showing you!"
While all of this is going on, the protagonist, played by the seemingly emotionless Emile Hirsch, decides not to put his plan to travel to California in motion, despite having his wife and children under almost constant threat by the saloon owner and his cartoonishly evil friends. Honestly, how stupid are these people? The priest in the movie is also poorly acted. He attempts to give a dramatic and intense performance but it comes off as unoriginal, clichéd, and comical.
Despite having only watched about half of this movie, I cannot possibly recommend it. It's just a dumb movie disguised as a serious, dramatic film.
At some point in this movie a family is introduced. We learn that the man, his wife, and his child are travelling to California, passing through the town in the movie. They're happy and excited. The man decides to go to the saloon that's run by the antagonist character. The man is shot. We don't know by who, we don't know why, we only know that a happy guy was killed and now we should feel sad.
In another part of the movie, a single mother of a teenage (?) daughter goes straight to the saloon to offer herself as a prostitute to the very man who killed her husband. This happens about a month after her husband died. She claims her reasoning is that she and her daughter will starve otherwise. Why doesn't she find another job like the rest of the women in the town? Why is prostitution her default choice of occupation? Because it's gross and makes you feel sick, that's why. The saloon owner antagonist character says he'll only accept her offer if her daughter is included. We find out soon enough that the mother accepts this... The mother prostitutes her young daughter who is dragged off by some unnamed creepy old man. This is where I stopped watching - roughly half way through the movie.
I should also mention that this movie takes place in a town that has banned alcohol. The people are church goers, so where are all these degenerates that we see in the saloon coming from? Or are we really supposed to believe that with the introduction of a single saloon, the entire town turns to murderous idiots? One scene has the saloon owner shoot an 18 year old kid because he entered into a game of poker without enough money to pay his debts. Yet another event in the movie where the character was introduced and promptly killed off so that we feel bad. "Look at all the depressing stuff we're showing you!"
While all of this is going on, the protagonist, played by the seemingly emotionless Emile Hirsch, decides not to put his plan to travel to California in motion, despite having his wife and children under almost constant threat by the saloon owner and his cartoonishly evil friends. Honestly, how stupid are these people? The priest in the movie is also poorly acted. He attempts to give a dramatic and intense performance but it comes off as unoriginal, clichéd, and comical.
Despite having only watched about half of this movie, I cannot possibly recommend it. It's just a dumb movie disguised as a serious, dramatic film.