Review of Unforgiven (1992) by Sean L — 19 Apr 2012

Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman play two retired wild west bounty hunters, back in their saddles to chase one last bounty after decades of silence. Agonizingly slow, its two leads take their sweet time collecting their belongings, mounting their horses and trotting at a leisurely pace across state lines, sharing less than a few sentences along the way.

We gather that Eastwood was a shady character in his day, reformed by the love of a deceased wife, but he seems more like a caged animal than a redeemed spirit and we're never given much reason to pull for him despite the presumed change of heart.

Though his beloved bride's spirit lives on in the couple's two young children, he barely acknowledges their presence before leaving them on their own for a month to randomly hunt a new bounty.

Freeman tries to drag some character development out of him on the trail, but Eastwood holds onto it with an icy grip and piercing eyes, and there we sit for the rest of the picture. Gene Hackman is noteworthy for his portrayal of a smarmy, cocky town sheriff with a chip on his shoulder, but on every other count this is a western that misses with each squeeze of the trigger.

Despite a few beautiful panoramas, the world feels stiflingly tight and compressed. Outside of Hackman, there's no fire and passion in the cast, even when Eastwood turns the page and transgresses to his wilder young persona.

Finally, the atmosphere, crucial to all films of the genre, feels too clean and polished where it should be gritty and dirty. Much as I would have loved to see Clint don that familiar parka and revisit the days of his Sergio Leon sunrise, it's just not happening here.