muons If I didn't see the director's name, I'd think this is another Sergio Leone movie, but after having starred in quite a few of them, no wonder C. Eastwood's first directing project is heavily influenced by his master's style. I write this review after seeing this movie maybe the fourth or fifth time. Not that I like it a lot but I stumble upon it on tv channels and not having anything better to do I sit and ask myself what the heck this is about every time. The movie opens with a stranger riding into a sleepy western town. After the usual scuffle with the local troublemakers, he kills three of them with indemnity and rapes a woman who harasses him on the street for no apparent reason. Then, the story drags on in a similar irrational fashion.One thing is clear that the movie is all about hate and vengeance. There's not a single likable character including the would-be protagonist. Indeed there's no real character at all but all caricatures of evil. The plot is ludicrously unrealistic. Almost everything goes against the logic and nothing makes sense. The raped women hug the aggressor with lust after a few seconds (apparently, Eastwood thinks he has an irresistible charm even as a raper); the whole town shakes in terror against three men, etc. The whole project looks more like Eastwood tried to parody the previous spaghetti westerns but without humor. Indeed, there are some attempts for humor, like the midget's appointment as a sheriff, the three villains being fed with their horses in prison, etc. but they are all bland. To top it all, the pace is crawling and the whole story is plain boring.Perhaps, the worst comes at the end, when the anti-hero explains why he acted so obnoxiously throughout the story. Apparently, he thinks his reasoning is enough to vindicate his rape and murders; and expects a belated blessing for his actions. What a puerile finale...

sawman-24193 The first time I saw High Plains Drifter was probably in the late 1970s. Clint Eastwood stars in and directs the film. Most westerns are either about cattle drives or cowboys and Indians. High Plains Drifter is different: this is a God's-Judgment-on-the-wicked western.Clint Eastwood plays a stranger who rides into the town of Lago--and he has a really bad attitude. This stranger is also very good with a side arm. During the course of the film, the stranger ends up killing some bad guys and burning the town of Lago to the ground. There are a couple of flashbacks of one Marshall Jim Duncan being whipped to death. At the end of the film, the audience can see that the stranger was the Second Coming of Marshall Duncan:The stranger rides out of the town of Lago past the cemetery. This little guy named Mordecai is writing something on a grave marker. The stranger looks at Mordecai and Mordecai looks up and says, "I'm almost done here."Then Mordecai asks the stranger, "I never did know your name."And the stranger replies, "Yes, you do."As the stranger rides off, the camera shows the grave marker: "Marshall Jim Duncan."I have a short story entitled "High Plains Drifter" (Ethos, March & May 1995); I have a book entitled High Plains Drifter: A Hitchhiking Journey Across America (PublishAmerica, December 2008); I have a blog called "High Plains Drifter." So is this some sort of gunslinger fixation or is there method to my madness? The clue is in one Scripture: "In the mouth of two or three witnesses let every word be established."There is a lot of sin (unrepented sin) in the United States and in the world. When people continue to live in sin, eventually God's Judgment falls. The more people try to hide their sin, the greater God's Judgment. The people of Lago tried to hide the murder of Marshall Duncan, but their sin was found out. You can't hide from God.There is a scene in High Plains Drifter where this lady tells the stranger, "Ever since Marshall Duncan's death, the people in this town are afraid of strangers." _____"When the Stranger says: 'What is the meaning of this city? Do you huddle close together because you love each other?' What will you answer? 'We all dwell together To make money from each other'? or 'This is a community'?"Oh my soul, be prepared for the coming of the Stranger. Be prepared for him who knows how to ask questions."There is one who remembers the way to your door: Life you may evade, but Death you shall not. You shall not deny the Stranger."--T.S. Eliot Choruses from "The Rock"_____There is another scene in High Plains Drifter where the people of Lago (the town of Lago reminds me of Algona, Iowa) are meeting at the church. One of the guys is speaking in the front of the church. The camera then pans to the right and shows a bulletin board with this Scripture:Isaiah 53: 3-4: "Surely he hath borne our griefs, and carried our sorrows: yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God, and afflicted. But he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed." Marshall Jim Duncan was whipped to death; Jesus Christ was at least nine-tenths whipped to death. The stranger riding into Lago (the first scene of the film) is a symbol of the Second Coming of Jesus Christ: not as the Lamb of God, but as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah.Isaiah 63: 1-6: "Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah? this that is glorious in his apparel, travelling in the greatness of his strength? I that speak in righteousness, mighty to save. Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel, and thy garments like him that treadeth in the winefat? I have trodden the winepress alone; and of the people there was none with me: for I will tread them in mine anger, and trample them in my fury; and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment. For the day of vengeance is in mine heart, and the year of my redeemed is come. And I looked, and there was none to help; and I wondered that there was none to uphold: therefore mine own arm brought salvation unto me; and my fury, it upheld me. And I will tread down the people in mine anger, and make them drunk in my fury, and I will bring down their strength to the earth."

sol- Fearful of three recently released outlaws who murdered their previous sheriff, the citizens of a small Old West town hire a mysterious gunslinger to protect them, but the stranger knows more than he lets on this offbeat western with a 'Twilight Zone' style twist. While the twist at first feels like an afterthought, it begins to make more and more sense when one reconsiders prior events, and while the gunslinger initially seems merely heartless and cruel with the way he humiliates the townsfolk when given carte blanche and unlimited store credit for his services, all of this comes across as logical in the end. Plot turns aside, the film offers an interesting outlook on the risks of giving someone absolute power, and it is curiously debatable whether the townsfolk would be better off at the mercy of the outlaws than the very unpredictable stranger who enjoys raping their women, drinking all their booze and wrecking property where possible. Clint Eastwood plays the part well with a quiet charisma, but even as an antihero, he is a bit too dislikeable (making light of a violent rape; destroying buildings) for one to root for him - and given how despicable all of the townsfolk are shown to be, 'High Plains Drifter' is a film without a single likable character in sight. That said, there is perhaps something deliberate to this as the film noticeably plays against stereotypes of chivalry in the Old West. Indeed, while some have cited 'High Plains Drifter' as a supernatural western, it presents characters more flawed and down-to-earth than in most traditional westerns out there.

damienbiggs I'd give this movie some marks for being one of the most unique westerns I've ever seen. Clint Eastwood acts well in the movie and the action scenes are done well in my opinion.The main issue is that the main hero character rapes one woman and borderline forces another women to have sex with him. These scenes in and of itself wouldn't stop me watching a movie. It's quite different though when a movie sets up the rapist as the hero of the movie!You'll read a bunch of reviews about how this rapist goes to this town to dispense justice to cowardly townspeople who covered up a murder in relation to their mine. I'm sorry but that does not excuse rape. Clint Eastwood's character is meant to be an anti hero but he's not really. Ultimately his portrayal is far closer to a conventional hero than to say a Walter White.For a point of reference, I'm a man in my thirties. The 70s were definitely different in terms of attitudes to movies!