It seems that in the post-HBO Deadwood era producers and directors feel like they have to fill a Western film with profanity and gratuitous nudity to give it realistic grit. This film rejects that mentality. Now admittedly the production value and authenticity is not exactly stellar--in one of the first scenes Shooter Green is using a Henry Big Boy rifle, not introduced until 2003, but it passes for an Old West rifle--but it's not bad. The storyline was fairly easy to follow even though it switched back and forth from the Old West to the 1920's. The acting was fine. It has, as other reviewers have said, a typical Hallmark type production, but sometimes those films can knock it out of the park (the original Love Comes Softly movie, e.g.) This one might not rise to that level, but it was a fun movie that kept my attention and was not overly lengthy. It could have benefited by better costume design, as all the clothes were new, clean, and pressed at all times, which is not realistic for the Old West or even a farm in the 1920's. The shootout scenes also looked fairly fake, as the actors/stuntmen are seen holding guns as if they are as light as plastic toys, and there is no discernible recoil when shots are fired, which means they probably weren't real guns firing blanks but nonfiring props, and the shots were edited in digitally and a gunshot audio effect added.
Review of The Legend of 5 Mile Cave
