Review of Wyatt Earp (1994) by Philip A — 03 Oct 2010

Wyatt Earp is a film that was largely dismissed by in 1994 in favor of the much more popular Tombstone. Often anti-Tombstone fans have preferred this version stating it's historical accuracy and details. Well, if you have a 3 hour movie you SHOULD have details in there. The problem I have is that the length and details didn't largely enhance the story for me. I will say that perhaps the title character was handed better, but as a whole I thought it felt pointless because of Tombstone. The film had a mid 90's TV western vibe to it and cinematic wise it was nearly a tension-less film and I think that's a large part of the reason people didn't take too it.

Moreover, once Wyatt Earp once developed into the character that people love, he becomes cold hearted and that's where Kevin Costner fails. It's a tricky thing trying to make us relate to a character that becomes this cold hearted when were supposed to buy into his motivation for getting revenge when Morgan is gunned down. Wyatt has grown so careless of everyone around him that it felt like Wyatt only kept his family around because he needed them. Therefore, the actions of Wyatt after Morgan was killed carried no merit with me.

Otherwise, the film is filled with actors we have all seen before playing such characters as Bat Masterson, Dave Raughabaugh, Doc Holliday and so on. Quaid gives a better than average effort, but really Micheal Madsen, Pullman and Linden Ashby were mis-cast in my opinion. Gene Hackman's role was sadly pretty much short which was a shame.

Overall, I still prefer Tombstone by a large margin. While his Earp doesn't get much character development, Kurt (like pretty much the rest of the cast) is more entertaining and his Earp just had more impact on me. Costner's bland acting destroyed the Wyatt Earp character in the second half of the film. Too bad.