Unforgiven Reviews

I'll have that thirty-two, Bob

Unforgiven is a good movie. Clint Eastwood did a tremendous job in acting and directing this film which had a great supporting cast as well.

The story, just like real life, tells the story a man who has been out of the game for a few years and is making one last triumphant return to his old stompin' grounds. This film is unlike many other westerns in the fact that it doesn't glorify violence. Rather, it shows its dark side and the after effects that it has on people and their emotions. When Morgan Freeman cannot bear to shoot a man and when the Schofield Kid claims that he will never shoot another after he had killed his first.

A brilliant performance from Hackman, and the pace and movement of the film were perfect for a western. Worth a watch but probably wouldn’t buy it.

[Highly rated reviewer]

Grand opera, Western-style: maybe not as great as it would like to be

Certainly this film underlines the coarse brutality of an age which is sometimes misrepresented as being Golden in American history. But at times it tries a little too hard: a black sidekick (who of course dies) with a Native American wife ... purlease.

In the end it just doesn't avoid a great many trite and sentimental clich?s: if that's what you want out of a Western (and it is, after all, what most people do) then this will be a rewarding choice; rather less so for those who expect it to seriously stand out from the average.

A reminder of how great a star Clint Eastwood is

Cliche Eastwood pulls off a dazzling reminder of his talent, in which he both directs memorably and acts in his usual Mona-Lisa-ish way. The film takes you through a moral obstacle course, by asking you to side with a reformed criminal who returns to crime on a two-wrongs-will-correct-the-prob lem mission against Gene Hackman, the corrupt mayor. While Hackman is masterful, Clint Eastwood remains the master. In my view the best western I have ever seen. And four Oscars suggest I'm not alone in my views

Best Western

Already a classic, and winner of Best Picture and Best Director Oscars, this return to the saddle of Clint Eastwood produced one of the most thoughtful and reflective Westerns ever made.

Surprisingly low on action and gun fights, the film is nonetheless gripping as its drama unfolds. Clint manages to satires his own gun-man action image, and undermine the mythic heroic status of the gunfighter and cowboy in US folklore and legend. Here, the gunfighter is shown, on reflection, to be a drunk, sordid dealer in death, with no moral values or purpose.

Tremendous support from Gene Hackman as a complex flip-side to Clint's own character. And the movie self-consciously comments on the way in which history has turned these petty, nasty people into legendary heroes, by incorporating a novelist, who captures the unseemly fighting and bullying, and translates it into tales of the heroic West.

One of the best Westerns ever made, and a great companion to Clint's other masterpiece, "Outlaw Josey Wales"

Very dark boring film

I only managed to watch the first ten minutes and then stoped, a very dark and boring film shame as it seems to have had some big stars in it.

Absolute Classic

It took me around 10 years to see this film even though I purchased on VHS when it was first released.....And remember watching only around five minutes and switching off thinking that I couldn't sit through it...Boy I was wrong...

It one of the most intelligent, well acted and just flipping great brillant film! If you have a short attention span leave well alone. If you want to watch a classic rent Unforgiven!

[Highly rated reviewer]

Unbelievably boring.

This must be the most overrated, boring, dreary western I've ever seen, and I've seen many westerns down my many years. I just don't know where the professional critics are coming from with their unbelievably over the top words of praise for it. Eastwood's performance was as wooden as the posts he ties his horses to. The storyline has no credibility whatsoever. What man, even a notorious gunslinger, would leave his children alone in the wilderness in order to go off and act as a knight in shining armour to avenge the disfiguring of a saloon girl (a prostitute)? It was absolute tripe. Even Morgan Freeman and the equally brilliant Gene Hackman couldn't rescue this claptrap.

If anybody wants to watch a western that really does tick all the boxes and which is directed with pace, style, and above all with a sense of credibility then look no further than High Noon. But the DVD for this flick should really only be found in the one pound basket in those cheap backstreet shops amongst most other turkey's that Hollywood churns out for the home video market. In my humble opinion, it's that bad.

Clint strikes back

Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven, a story of an outlaw gone straight who is asked by a nephew of a man he killed to hunt down the cowboys who slashed the 'teets and cunny' of a prosituite, is quite simple one of the greatest westerns ever made. And its westerns like this that seperate them from the cliche westerns from the 40's and 50's that involve cowboys and indians. If you were never a fan of westerns like i was, there has been no better time to start.

Eastwood's performance as the retired killer, william Munny is marvellous. A man so haunted by what he has done in the past, he has to return to his old ways for a bounty to support him and his two kids.

Along for the ride is Munny's long time friend, Ned logan, played by Morgan Freeman quite possibly the best black actor in Hollywood, who tries his best to assure Munny that he 'isn't like that anymore.'

And there is Gene Hackman, the sly brutal sheriff of Big Whiskey who takes pride in lashing out brutality to the criminals he comes across and also Richard Harris, in a subplot as an english gunfighter hired by the prostitues to hunt the cowboys and who ends up right in the face of Gene Hackman.

Unforgiven maybe too slow for some but its charactorisation makes up for it and the whole thing bangs together at the end when Munny decides to become what he used to be once more.

This is a story of forgiveness and gunplay, but then its always 'a-hell of a thing killing a man...'

I cannot forgive

This was probably one of the strangest clint eastwood films i have seen, the repetitive narrative was quite annoying. David webb Peoples the scriptwriter must have been on something and i will not forgive him for what he has done, he must bring me 4 ponies. Thankyou

Unforgiven

The worst film ive ever seen. It was slow and boring, not even worth watchin the end.