Review of Tombstone (1993) by Mitchell B — 04 Sep 2014

Tombstone is a fairly entertaining ride and a good Western film, but not my favorite. To be honest I'm not big on Westerns. It's just not a genre I'm very into. However, I'm not going to be biased and judge the film on whether it's actually good or not and whether I had a good time overall. I know this is based off real events and the characters in this were real people but I won't judge on how accurate this film is because I don't know the real story very well. I will say the film definitely good and I got some entertainment but, at the same time, I wouldn't watch this all the time. One because I don't care for Western that much and, while it fun, it was also boring and poorly paced in places. It also fakes you out too many times. There are a few Western I enjoy.

The plot is as follows. A man named Wyatt Earp (Kurt Russell), a former lawman moves into the city of Tombstone with his two brothers, Virgil (Sam Elliot) and Morgan (Bill Paxton) and their wives to settle down and make their fortune. They also run into and old friend named Doc Holliday (Val Kilmer). However, in the Wild West there is little-to-no order. The sheriffs and lawmen are almost nonexistent. The cowboys really run the show so it virtually total anarchy. Wyatt's brother, fed-up with the lawlessness and people living in fear, become lawmen to bring order to an order-less town despite their brother's protest. They soon realize how difficult that is. When one of the brothers is killed and another injured Wyatt rejoins the fray, becomes a U.S. Marshall, and, with his posy, guns down every cowboy they can find.

The film looks good and the fight scenes are quite entertaining. You have an amazing cast. You have Kurt Russell, Bill Paxton, Sam Elliot, Val Kilmer, Powers Boothe, Billy Zane, Michael Biehn, and the list goes on. I think everyone in the cast does a great job acting-wise. I like all the main characters and though they were all memorable and badass especially Wyatt and Doc. I loved Kurt Russell as Wyatt Earp but the one who stole the show for me was Doc Holliday. I'm not too familiar with Val Kilmer. I'm not a big fan of Batman Forever and I haven't seen anything else he's been in other than this film. I though he did an amazing job in this film and Doc is the definition of badass. Powers Boothe and Michael Biehn do good as the villains though they're not given much to do which I'll get to.

There are a few things I didn't care for. This film does seem like a bit of a romanticized version of the Wild West. It looked nice but a little too nice. It looked too fancy for the Old West to me but maybe I'm wrong. I wasn't in the Old West so what do I know? There are conflicting tones in this film. It tries to play itself very series and dark in places yet it goes very over-the-top action movie in others. For example, there is a shoot-out near the end where Wyatt snaps and kills everyone. That scene is so goofy that it took me out a bit. I don't know if that was intended or if it was just the execution. The villains are all comical too despite good performances by the actors.

The pacing is to too draggy as well. While it definitely had its entertaining moments it also had its slow and boring moments especially at the beginning. The film is 2hrs. 10 min. and it feels like it if not longer. There are like three or four seemingly final fights. You have the fight in town against the cowboys. You would think that that would be the big final fight but the film keeps going. Then you have the big shoot-out between Wyatt and Powers Boothe's character's groups but the film keeps going. There are two more seemingly final confrontations after that. It didn't seem like the film knew when to end. However, most of the fights were enjoyable.

The villains are nothing. The actors and their performances make them a bit more worthwhile but ultimately they're forgettable. The villains are built-up throughout the entire picture, but, at the end of the day, they just couldn't compete at all. They aren't, at all, interesting either.

Overall, Tombstone is a good movie. Half of my complaints are really minor grips. My lack of enjoyment in some areas could be due to the fact that I'm not a big fan of this genre of film anyway. If you like Westerns then you should definitely watch this film if you haven't already.