Probably the worst Western I've seen in my life, and I'm retired. Has writer Josiah Nelson ever even seen a Western? The Three Stooges would've made better outlaws. The entire show-down shoot-out was utter nonsense to the point of cringeworthy. Everyone was shooting when they weren't supposed to, and not shooting when they should've been. And for being in any sort of army/war ranks, these bozos had zero tactical skills. As if four Wanted Gangsters couldn't surround and take over a house with only a woman and child guarding it - within minutes, let alone days. And I'm not sure what was worse, casting an annoying constantly crying baby, or Nick Searcy as the Captain with his constant lame biblical quotes. The writing was the biggest joke, a bad joke, that dragged on and on for almost 2 hours, of which felt over 3 hours long with the ridiculously long dragged out scenes and snail-pacing. It was convoluted, bland, lacked continuity, riddled with plot and technical issues, and had zero logic to it; why would Gina Carano's character all of a sudden pull out only a double-barreled shotgun on four heavily armed men, with a baby and her son in the home? They were almost done eating... let them leave, then barricade yourself without them knowing you're onto them and gain the upper hand - instead of risking a gunfight from the get-go when you're outnumbered and have a baby and young boy within arms reach. Complete nonsense. A fifth-grader could've written a more convincing screenplay.
The directing by experienced filmmaker Michael Polish wasn't any better. Even with a sloppy script, he could've easily filmed scenes much better. The film starts off on a sunny summer day, then shifts to a cold snowy season, next day it's all of a sudden summer, then a storm's approaching that never arrives... make up your mind and set a singular tone for the scenes. Then there's when Dad takes off in a slow carriage (for whatever reason), but only has a horse when he's in town, of which, towards the end, we hear that horse approaching, Cowboy Cerrone's character gets off his horse, everyone can clearly see him, yet is able to do a WWE jump off the ropes onto one of the guys so easy like it was such a stealth sneak attack? That was amateur hour directing. Was this film even edited? At least 30-40 mins needed to end up on the cutting room floor. And did someone forget a movie needs to have some sort of score?
As for casting and performances, only Nick Searcy as the Captain held his own. Polish failed miserably in directing his cast, especially Gina Carano, who was unconvincing and the worst of all the cast. She was monotonic with zero facial expressions for the most part, and it seemed like this was her first acting role. At least UFC's Cowboy Cerrone's character was passable.
I get that this is a low budget indie film, and I can usually look past rookie mistakes, but this entire production felt like it was intentionally made as a film-school study on what Not to Do. Yes, it was that bad. The only redeeming qualities were the fairly decent cinematography, and the gruesome special effects and prosthetics. It's a very generous 3/10 from me.
The directing by experienced filmmaker Michael Polish wasn't any better. Even with a sloppy script, he could've easily filmed scenes much better. The film starts off on a sunny summer day, then shifts to a cold snowy season, next day it's all of a sudden summer, then a storm's approaching that never arrives... make up your mind and set a singular tone for the scenes. Then there's when Dad takes off in a slow carriage (for whatever reason), but only has a horse when he's in town, of which, towards the end, we hear that horse approaching, Cowboy Cerrone's character gets off his horse, everyone can clearly see him, yet is able to do a WWE jump off the ropes onto one of the guys so easy like it was such a stealth sneak attack? That was amateur hour directing. Was this film even edited? At least 30-40 mins needed to end up on the cutting room floor. And did someone forget a movie needs to have some sort of score?
As for casting and performances, only Nick Searcy as the Captain held his own. Polish failed miserably in directing his cast, especially Gina Carano, who was unconvincing and the worst of all the cast. She was monotonic with zero facial expressions for the most part, and it seemed like this was her first acting role. At least UFC's Cowboy Cerrone's character was passable.
I get that this is a low budget indie film, and I can usually look past rookie mistakes, but this entire production felt like it was intentionally made as a film-school study on what Not to Do. Yes, it was that bad. The only redeeming qualities were the fairly decent cinematography, and the gruesome special effects and prosthetics. It's a very generous 3/10 from me.