In Bajo Rio, they pay to see a man kill a bull. Today, they'll pay to see a man kill another man.
Will Tenneray and Abe Cross are two aging, famous gunfighters, both in need of money. Tenneray comes up with the idea to stage a duel to the death in a bullfight arena, with the ticket proceeds going to the winner.
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Whoever wins loses. A Gunfight is directed by Lamont Johnson and written by Harold Jack Bloom. It stars Kirk Douglas, Johnny Cash, Jane Alexander, Karen Black and Raf Vallone. Music is by Laurence Rosenthal and cinematography by David Walsh. Will Tenneray (Douglas) and Abe Cross (Cash) are two ageing gunfighters who after meeting each other in town hit it of straight away and actually like and respect each other. However, with both men in need of money and the whole town intrigued as to who would win in a gunfight between them, Tenneray hits upon the idea of the two of them having the gunfight and selling tickets to the event, with the winner receiving the ticket proceeds… It was the first mainstream American film to be financed by American Indians—the Jicarilla Apaches—but this in now way was a propaganda move since the narrative has nothing to do with Native Americans. It's a most unusual Western in a lot of ways, off beat and deliberately played for fun at times, yet it pulses with dark thematics involving the human condition. Stripped bare is the fickle value of celebrity status, deftly cloaked with the ignorant blood-lust of a paying public. Director Johnson keeps the pacing smooth as we get to know both men and watch their relationship unfold. All the while we are getting a grasp on the townsfolk in general, while the two ladies of the men's world are impacting greatly due to the sensitive screenplay. All roads lead to the ironic venue of a bullfighting arena across the border, where a full house of paying patrons come to see one of the men die. Whoever that is doesn't really matter, the caustic insertion of a dream sequence at film's end leaves us in no doubt that the winner really hasn't won at all. With great performances from Douglas and Alexander, and good ones from Cash and Black, film also holds up well on the acting front. But the real stars here are Johnson and Bloom, for they have produced a clever picture that doesn't over reach itself by trying to be cerebral. It deserves to be better known and appraised. 7.5/10
Hmmm, I’m not sure this is really anyone’s finest hour nor does it really pay much of an homage to it’s genre as we see two ageing shootists struggling to make ends meet. “Cross” (Johnny Cash) fancied his chances pan-handling but all he got was backache; “Tenneray” (Kirk Douglas) satisfies his days trading on his reputation whilst poncing drinks from the gullible and the easy impressed. With two such famous gunpokes in town, the locals are expecting a bit of fireworks, but what they actually get are a couple who come up with a somewhat less murderous and more theatrical solution to their cash flow problems. They are going to have a shoot-out, ok, but it’s not at any coral - it’ll be in an arena and they’ll be selling tickets! As the big day approaches, the pair start to find that not only are they helping each other to stay one step ahead of some visiting opportunist gunmen, but they are actually becoming quite fond of each other. Believe it or not, they now don’t really want to drop the other when the time comes - but what to do now they’ve sold out? There is a sense of mischief throughout, but for me that misses more often than it hits and Cash is about as wooden as the Gibson he uses to accompany his theme song. There were loads of much better “buddy” westerns, not least the “War Wagon” (1967) that Douglas did with John Wayne and that shows this up as a rather drab, low-budget, comedic affair that I struggled to stay engaged with. There are a few familiar faces in support to bulk it out a bit and a few of the scenes show the glint in both of their eyes, but nowhere near often or consistently enough to make this worth recommending.
**_Two aging gunmen meet in a Southwest town_** The quick-draw contest was mostly an invention of dime novelists and moviemakers. Sure, you can cite the Wild Bill Hickok and David Tutt gunfight over a pocket watch in the town square of Springfield Missouri in 1865, a few months after the Civil War ended. Good luck finding any other documented examples. In the Old West, if you wanted to shoot someone, you just did it. For instance, when Wild Bill was eventually killed, Jack McCall merely came up from behind at the poker table and shot him in the head. Even when fair quick-draw duels rarely happened, it consisted of each individual just standing still and shooting at the other until one (or both) fell. Such fights were more about the willingness to actually kill someone and accuracy over how fast the person could draw. In any case, I liked how this Western takes the situation seriously: What if two famous quick-draw gunmen did meet in a town as they faced their grey-haired years? Since money was hard to come by for such people with limited and nigh-obsolete skills, a winner-takes-all duel would be a tempting option. The worse that would happen is that one of them suffers a (hopefully) quick death. Kirk Douglas was 53 years-old during shooting while the Man in Black was fifteen years younger, but both are depicted to be roughly the same age. The flick’s worth watching just for them, but there are some other highlights, like Keith Carradine’s sequence as a young gunfighter wanting to make a name for himself, not to mention some easy cash. The closing duel is very well done and shows how fast such a contest would be if the quicker person had deadly aim. On the female front, Jane Alexander shines at the age of 30 with her unique beauty. Meanwhile Karen Black is pretty stunning as a saloon girl at the same age (speaking as one who’s not much of a fan, but she’s a’right). There’s a feeling that you get to know these people, their situations, and the town in general. I had low expectations, but was pleasantly surprised. It runs 1h 29m and was shot in June 1970 at a movie ranch in Santa Fe with the bullring sequence done in Madrid. GRADE: B
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