Revisionist Westerns - 80s and 90s Quiz

Answer: Heaven's Gate

The Heaven's Gate cult was founded by Marshall Applewhite and Bonnie Nettles. Thirty-nine members of the group committed suicide on March 26, 1997 when the comet was at its brightest, because they believed the comet to be a sign that the Earth was about to be destroyed and they needed to go to the Next Level of existence.

The movie "Heaven's Gate" was set during the Johnson County War in Wyoming, in the 1890s, a historical case where wealthy landowners hired gunmen to kill small landowners who they considered guilty of rustling. The conflict pitted the gunmen against a sheriff's posse sent to stop them and eventually ended with the intervention of the US Cavalry. The movie featured an all-star cast, including Kris Kristofferson, Christopher Walken, Jeff Bridges, John Hurt, Sam Waterston, Geoffrey Lewis, Richard Masur, Terry O'Quinn, Mickey Rourke, and Willem Dafoe. The film was a colossal, critical and commercial failure, ruining the career of an Oscar winning director, Michael Cimino of "The Deer Hunter" fame, and causing the collapse of the United Arists movie studio.

The movie is considered revisionist, not because the history upon which it was based is in dispute, but rather because it brought to light an ugly part of the history of the West. Wealthy landowners became vigilantes by hiring thugs to carry out their own brand of justice and by doing so became outlaws themselves.

Answer: Pale Rider

The movie's title, "Pale Rider", was a reference to Revelation 6:8 and the fact that Death rode a pale horse during the Apocalypse. In both "Pale Rider" and "Shane", a stranger was drawn into a conflict where he defended the weak against the strong, a typical Traditional Western plot. Although many considered "Shane" to be a straight-forward Traditional Western, even it had some shades of gray. Clearly Shane was attracted to the life of the homesteaders and more specifically to Starrett's wife and son. But he did not act on this attraction and instead sacrificed himself for the good of others.

In "Pale Rider", Eastwood took the shades of gray only alluded to in "Shane" and painted them in full detail. Where Shane was a conflicted gunfighter, looking to leave that life behind, Preacher (Eastwood's character) was more of an avenging angel with no qualms about what he was doing. This dichotomy, of a man of God being willing to kill without hesitation, existed flawlessly in Eastwood's portrayal. As was true of Eastwood's earlier Revisionist classic "High Plains Drifter", "Pale Rider" left it uncertain whether Preacher was a ghost or a man. The movie's religious and spiritual overtones made it another true Revisionist Western to add to Eastwood's growing legacy in the genre.

Answer: Nicaragua

The movie "Walker" followed Walker's exploits from his time in Mexico, to his takeover of Nicaragua in 1856, to his eventual death in Honduras. Ed Harris played the title role.

During the 1980s the US supported the Contras in opposing the Sandinista government in Nicaragua, because of its communist leanings. Director Alex Cox read about William Walker in the magazine "Mother Jones" and decided to do a movie about him, to protest American policy in Central America. Ed Harris agreed to star because he also opposed US policy. The movie was given the full support of the Sandinista government and was filmed in Nicaragua. The movie was revisionist not only because of its use of a historical situation to address current events, but also because of its violent sequences. It was supposed to be a morality play about how the US has meddled in Central America for over a century but the film was poorly received. Because of the movie's dismal critical and commercial failure, Cox was shut out of the studio system afterwards.

Answer: Emilio Estevez

In both movies Emilio Estevez played Billy, Kiefer Sutherland played Doc Scurlock, and Lou Diamond Phillips played Jose Chavez y Chavez. In the first movie, Charlie Sheen played Dick Brewer, Dermot Mulroney played "Dirty Steve" Stephens, and Casey Siemaszko played Charlie Bowdre. Those three did not appear in the second movie. The first movie covered the time of the Lincoln County War in 1877-1878 and has been called the most historically accurate movie about Billy the Kid, by Dr. Paul Hutton (source: Wikipedia). The second movie covered Billy's time after the Lincoln County War, prior to his death and took a little more license with the accuracy but still followed the historical record pretty closely.

The movies were revisionist in their portrayal of graphic violence and in making an outlaw a hero arrayed against a corrupt system. Historically, Billy did end up on the wrong side of a corrupt power system that killed his employer, John Tunstall, in cold blood. Although his actions in the Lincoln County War may have been justified, his other actions were dubious at best. He never hesitated to use a gun to solve his problems.

Answer: Sioux

"Dances with Wolves" told the fictional story of a veteran and hero of the Civil War (Kevin Costner as Lt. John Dunbar) who headed out West to his new post on the Plains, an abandoned army outpost. There he was befriended by the local Sioux tribe and soon adopted their ways. When forced to choose between the white world and the Native American, he chose the latter.

The movie had a sympathetic view of the Sioux and made the US Cavalry the villains, making it a true Revisionist Western. The movie was a critical and box office success. It won seven Oscars, including the Best Picture and Best Director Oscars. In 2007 it was selected by the Library of Congress for preservation because of its cultural significance. The Sioux Nation adopted Costner as honorary member because of the movie.

Answer: The Missing

"The Missing" was a 2003 Tommy Lee Jones movie, not a Gene Hackman movie. Hackman appeared in the other three.

In "Geronimo: An American Legend", Hackman played Gen. George Crook, a man portrayed in the movie as having an understanding and respect for his adversary that the later commander of the US Cavalry did not. The movie chronicled the last campaign against Geronimo and his capture. Besides Hackman, Matt Damon, Jason Patric, Robert Duvall, and Wes Studi (as Geronimo) appeared in the movie.

The movie was seen as revisionist not only because it painted a more sympathetic portrait of Geronimo, as would be expected of a Revisionist Western, but also because it downplayed Geronimo's well documented ferocity in executing his war against the white man. Unlike "Ulzana's Raid", the movie steered clear of a visual representation of the atrocities committed by the Apache. It did show, however, that Geronimo did not consider them atrocities but rather acts of war.

In "Unforgiven", Hackman played the Sheriff of Big Whiskey, Little Bill Daggett. Daggett, an ex-gunfighter, controlled his town with an iron grip, which ended up pitting him against Clint Eastwood as Bill Munny, Morgan Freeman as Ned Logan, and Jaimz Woolvett as the Schofield Kid. Hackman won a Best Supporting Actor Oscar and Eastwood won the Best Director Oscar. The movie won the Best Picture Oscar, becoming only the third Western to win Best Picture along with "Cimarron" (1931) and "Dances with Wolves" (1990).

As a Revisionist Western, the movie portrayed a very violent and very amoral world where the gun was the final law. Eastwood's Munny was a tortured soul, because of the life he led as a gunfighter, who was drawn back into that life out of necessity. Hackman's Daggett was a less-than-just enforcer of the law, a man who was his own law.

In "The Quick and The Dead" Hackman portrayed John Herod, the ruthless ruler of the town of Redemption. The movie told the story of a lady gunslinger (Sharon Stone as Ellen aka The Lady) bent on avenging her father's death at the hands of Herod. Also in the cast were Russell Crowe as Cort and Leonardo DiCaprio as The Kid.

The movie offered a revisionist view of the gunslinger, with the lead hero being a woman. There were women outlaws in the Old West but none that looked like or dressed like Stone. The other typical revisionist motifs were present in the film, including the violence and the darker atmosphere.

Answer: Quantrill's Raiders

Quantrill's Raiders were responsible for the Lawrence Massacre. The movie followed the story of four Missouri Irregulars, or Bushwhackers, who became a part of Quantrill's force: Jake (Tobey Maguire), a German immigrant whose immigrant community was pro-Union while he fought for the South, Jack (Skeet Ulrich), a Southerner whose father was murdered by Union Jayhawkers, Daniel Holt (Jeffrey Wright), an African American fighting as a freeman for the South, and Holt's former owner George Clyde (Simon Baker), an aristocratic Southerner.

Like other Revisionist Westerns, the movie did not shy away from a gritty portrayal of violence and its aftermath. It also showed an African American who fought for the South, a move that drew great criticism. But the role of Holt was based on a historical figure, John Noland, an African American who rode with Quantrill. The dramatic climax of the movie was Quantrill's Raid on Lawrence Kansas and the ensuing massacre.

Answer: The Cowboys

The Clanton Gang, aka The Cowboys, operated unopposed in Southern Arizona before the arrival of the Earps. "Tombstone" told the story of the Earps arrival in Tombstone, the gunfight at the OK Corral, and the bloody aftermath that ensued. Casting for the Earp Brothers was as follows: Kurt Russell played Wyatt, Sam Elliott played Virgil, Bill Paxton played Morgan, and Val Kilmer played Doc Holiday. Leading The Cowboys in the movie was Powers Boothe as "Curly Bill" Brocious. In real life Old Man Clanton led the gang.

In many ways "Tombstone" was a Traditional Western, pitting the good guys against the bad guys in typical fashion. But in other ways it was revisionist, most notably in the flaws of some of the good guys and the carnage portrayed. Wyatt's wife was addicted to laudanum and Doc Holiday was clearly trying to drink himself to death. Wyatt cheated on his wife with Josephine, a strong, self-possessed woman not typically seen in Traditional Westerns. The violence of the shoot out and the subsequent vendettas on both sides were shown in graphic detail. Although Wyatt operated under the guise of the law, his pursuit of his brother's killers certainly had mixed motives at best.

Answer: Dead Man

In "Dead Man", Johnny Depp played William Blake, a young man who came west for a job as an accountant. Instead circumstances forced him to become a notorious outlaw and gunman, who was a walking dead man because of a wound he received that had not killed him immediately, but eventually would. The movie followed his violent journey through the Old West.

"Dead Man" was shot in black and white, adding to its dark and surreal atmosphere. Although the movie failed to deliver a clear revisionist view, it did touch on many revisionist motifs. These included a man forced by circumstance and fate into a life he did not choose, the use of the law by the powerful for their own ends, and a bleak, dreary, decaying view of the white man's conquering of the West. It also had spiritual/metaphysical overtones but these also were not clearly developed.

Answer: Gold

"Thousand Pieces of Gold" was based on the novel of the same name by Ruthanne Lum McCunn. The novel was based on the true story of Polly Bemis, a 19th century Chinese immigrant woman who came to the Old West. The movie followed the story of Lalu (Rosalind Chao) as she was sold by her father to a marriage broker, who then sold her to a Chinese businessman, Hong King, in an Idaho mining town. He planned to use her as a prostitute but Lalu refused to be so used. Eventually, King's white partner, named Charlie Bemis (Chris Cooper), won her in a poker game. They lived together but the relationship remained platonic. Over time Lalu, who came to be known as Polly, fell in love with Charlie and the two married.

The movie was revisionist because it portrayed the issues Chinese immigrants faced when coming to the American West. It also showcased a strong female in the person of Polly and how she refused to be misused, standing up for her own dignity. Both topics were little discussed in Traditional Westerns.