High Plains Drifter Reviews

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A western ghost story

This is an interesting and slightly surreal film as has been pointed out in another review, but it is still a favorite for me, and anyone else I guess that appreciates the ultimate revenge by a murdered good man!

It took some thinking about the first time I saw it, but once I had worked out our hero is already dead and back as a ghost, everything clicked into place.

A vision in red

This film can often be confusing yet surreal I liked this offbeat western for just this quirkiness one to watch

One of the best

This has got to be one of the best cowboy / spaghetti western films of all time. It's kind of a brain out film that takes a little thinking about. Eastwood is superb and the story is wonderful, the man with no name turns Lago into hell and all hell breaks loose. A great romp - see it, you won't be disappointed even if you don't like spaghetti - westerns see it!

Mystic Lake

Clint's first directorial stab at a western proves remarkably self-assured, clearly influenced by his "No Name" character from the Leone trilogy, and also by "Yojimbo", the original Japanese influence on Leone.

The atmosphere is ghostly and threatening, and the people are viciously self-serving. The opening sequence is a masterpiece of suspense, with wonderful use of sound to heighten the moment.

As a western, it departs a long way from the conventional soap opera drama of classical Hollywood. It is both unusual in its supernatural story, and riveting in its abandonment of traditional morality. As such, this movie is a child of the Leone revolution in westerns, and a fore-father of Eastwood's own later essays in the genre.

And lots of action too!

Brilliant!

Good old Clint, very good acting.

Truly Spooky

One of Eastwoods best and personally, I rank it a lot higher than 'Pale Rider'. It's nastier than 'The Unforgiven' in as much as the revenge taken is colder and Eastwood puts forward a particularly chilling character with style - as usual. Definitely a film to watch during a dark and stormy night.

[Highly rated reviewer]

high plains drifter

great film good action typical clint eastwood

Not one of Clint's best movies but still a good western. He plays his typical role as gun fighter who helps out a small costal town to get rid of three bad guys who have been terrorising them. But is he real? Is he a ghost from the past? The ending leaves the viewer to decide.

The archetypal Eastwood Western

I have a soft spot for Eastwood Westerns. I'll admit it. I'm into films, and I'll happily sit through films that make my friends get up and go to the pub. The more challenging the better...

But there's something about a man with no name (why does Eastwood never have a name in these?!) turning up in a desert town, being all dark and brooding, sleeping with half the female population of the town and shooting all the men. Must be something primaeval.

Anyway, for me, this film is great. Eastwood directed it, as well as taking the lead role, so a critic might say it shows all his indulgences. Like the fact that the women throw themselves at him. But it has all the key pieces, including a backstory that drives the plot forwards as it is slowly revealed. It's one of the darker spaghetti Westerns I've seen (with suggestions of rape and so on), but still very enjoyable. Maybe I'm just a pleb...

Mysterious western

Brooding, violent by 1972 standards, a classic.