zardoz-13 Steve McQueen delivers a memorable performance filled with character and nuance as the real-life Indian tracker, cavalry scout, and range detective in television director William Wiard's biographical western "Tom Horn," co-starring Linda Evans, Richard Farnsworth, Billy Green Bush, Elisha Cook, Geoffrey Lewis, and Slim Pickens. Superb production values, a solid cast, and splendid scenery stand out in McQueen's second-to-last film when he felt the first effects of the inoperable lung cancer that killed him in 1980. Unfortunately, despite these strengths and the quotable dialogue in the Thomas ("Missouri Breaks") McQuane and Bud ("J.W. Coop") Shrake screenplay, "Tom Horn" qualifies as a dreary, pretentious western that falls apart during its last half hour. The problem is simple. This is one of those tedious end-of-the-frontier yarns where hero bites the dust, and McQueen's protagonist tumbles to the status of a pathetic wretch before he hangs. Neither "Tom Horn" nor "The Hunter," his last two starring efforts, captured McQueen at his height in "The Magnificent Seven," "The Great Escape," "The Getaway," and "Bullitt." Clearly, McQueen must have been reevaluating his career because he doesn't play it cool in either "Tom Horn" or "The Hunter." He draws attention to his short statue; he stood five feet nine and a half inches and refers to himself as a little fellow. Similarly, in "The Hunter," he plays a character who encounters trouble after he climbs behind the wheel of a car! This revisionist philosophy on McQueen's part can even be traced back to his decision to star in the Henrik Ibsen play "An Enemy of the People" where he sports a beard, clutches an umbrella,and plays an environmentalist."Tom Horn" opens with this foreword: "He grew up in the violence of the old West. He became a cowboy, rode shotgun for the stage lines, was an agent for the Pinkertons, and fought with the Rough Riders under Teddy Roosevelt. He made his reputation as a cavalry scout by capturing Geronimo in the bloody Apache wars. In 1901, he drifted into Wyoming Territory." Indeed, aside from their catchy dialogue, McQuane and Shrake's pretentious screenplay confines itself to the twilight years of Horn's career in the great Northwest. McQuane and Shrake based their script on the "Life of Tom Horn, Government Scout and Interpreter, Written by Himself." Sadly, this represents one of those times when sticking to the facts wasn't the best idea.Anyway, "Tom Horn" gets off to a promising start. Our hero rides into a frontier town for a drink in the saloon and tangles with future heavyweight boxing champ 'Gentleman' Jim Corbett. Horn criticizes the dapper pugilist (Steve Oliver of "Angels from Hell") for being a lesser celebrity than Geronimo. Wiard cheats us because he doesn't show the fisticuffs the ensued between Horn and Corbett. Later, cattleman John C. Coble(Oscar winning actor Richard Farnsworth) finds Horn nursing his injuries in a stable and persuades him to recuperate at his ranch. Coble explains the cattlemen's predicament in a deftly photographed scene lensed through the slats of a fence. "Any means that you have to take to eliminate this rustling problem, we're all behind you 100 per cent." Later, at a big Cattlemen's Association picnic at Coble' spread, as the guests dine on lobster, another cattleman summarizes their situation to Horn. "We've got a hell of a range problem here. The damned rustlers have completely wiped out our herd profits. Not to mention what the blizzard and predators have done to our calf problem, people are homesteading our range land and raising sheep on our grass." The bottom line is the Cattlemen's Association wants Horn eradicate the rustlers, but they want no apparent connection between Horn and them. Indeed, Horn takes care of the rustling crisis. He isn't afraid to gun down the rustlers, and he gives no quarter in a gunfight. The scene where Horn interrupts an auction and identifies himself as a 'stock detective' is dramatically satisfying, especially when he backs his horse off the premises, something you rarely see in westerns. The night-time shoot out with the rustlers in the barn is interesting and Horn shows his anger later when he kills Lee Mendenhour (Roy Jenson of "The Ambushers") after Mendenhour shoots his horse. Tom pumps three extra slugs into the dead man. The violence, however, takes a terrible toll on public sentiment,and the cattlemen want to distance themselves from Horn. Somebody then kills an innocent homesteader's son, teenager Jimmy Nolt (Clark Coleman of "Kuffs") and frames Horn for the murder. Later, sneaky U.S. Marshal Joe Belle(Billy Green Bush of "Five Easy Pieces") arranges an interview with Horn while a journalist in an adjacent next room transcribes their conversation."Tom Horn" loses any sense of momentum about 65 minutes into the action when our hero winds up behind bars. Wiard fractures the narrative structure with flashbacks of Horn and schoolmarm Glendolene Kimmel (Linda Evans of "Avalanche Express") and events occur definitely out of place. McQueen and Evans generate no sparks as a romantic couple, and their romance frizzles. Their best scene occurs when they are standing between their horses and Tom's horse nudges him closer to her. Prosecutor Walter Stoll (Geoffrey Lewis of "High Plains Drifter") uses Tom's altered testimony taken down without his knowledge to convict him. In real-life, Horn was railroaded; the likely culprit was the jealous marshal Belle."Tom Horn" suffers from severe editing problems and things bogs down after Horn ends up in jail. Nevertheless, "Tom Horn" boasts some funny low-key humor, especially during the lobster scene when Horn proclaims, "Be darned, I never eaten a bug that big before," and a couple of tautly handled gunfights. Meanwhile, McQueen looks cool in his broad-brimmed Stetson, and he handles his rifle as if he's put some rounds through it. Wiard stages several interesting zoom outs when Horn fires at his targets. Altogether, "Tom Horn" boasts a lot of authentic atmosphere and the dramatic irony is effective, but the film is too disillusioning to be entertaining.

rhinocerosfive-1 This idea must have sounded good over lines and drinks in pre-production.Mostly an uninspired retread of a standard Western formula - "a man of the old west trying to live in the new," as Linda Evans bluntly rasps in one of the awkward love scenes. The wild frontiersman clashing tragically with the very civilization he made possible - this conceit underlay many good Westerns; not much of Hawks or Mann, but some of Ford and Hathaway, most of Eastwood and Penn, and all of Peckinpah. The elements of the formula are durable, and scenery goes a long way. Unfortunately the bad habits William Wiard learned in 70s TV - not a stylistic golden age for the medium - fatally cripple this, perhaps his only bigscreen attempt. Unnecessary zooms and irritating fades dominate the look of the movie, which otherwise suffers from questionable editing, uneven performances, sporadic dialogue, and poor storytelling generally.McQueen was dying, and looks it, and it's perfect for the part. He walks as if he's just been thrown from a saddle, but his hands still work, and his eyes are heavy with experience. He is as good here as he ever was, but as usual, in the scenes where he isn't on a horse or handling some tool (rope, gun, whiskey glass) he is less interesting. This stupid movie locks him in jail for almost half the running time. Denzel Washington had this problem in the nineties, playing a series of crippled or incarcerated leads, a moderate waste in his case but a national crisis with McQueen, who only lives when he's moving. "Papillon" also mostly sucks for this reason. The opening of "The Getaway" is the best prison use of McQueen's restless energy, pressure building up to violence later when he gets sprung. "Tom Horn" takes a wrong dramatic turn when it follows its few action scenes with a long, dull mope behind bars.Tom McGuane, Bud Shrake and Tom Horn himself, channeled through his autobiography, are credited with the story and script; I suspect that most of the good dialogue was McGuane's, but there are issues not usually associated with his writing. Especially atypical of McGuane, his main character's words never betray any kind of... character. Of course, "Bullitt" has a terrible story, and "The Getaway" is just a two-hour chase sequence, and they run fine on the smoke of McQueen's tires, as effectively driven by good directors.So it is, ultimately, Wiard who queers this picture; but sometimes the writing and direction collaborate to offer a really frustrating experience. The scene with Jim Corbett and Horn in the bar is a choice example - it's a Western, for Christ's sake. Show the brawl. Wiard wants an elegy, a la "Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid" or "Cable Hogue," but Peckinpah learned to direct on "Gunsmoke" and "The Rifleman." Wiard helmed that saccharine standard, "Bonanza," before graduating to "Love, American Style." In the writers' and director's defense, McQueen was a notoriously difficult fellow to work for, and certainly by the last couple of pictures his Solar company was largely dominating his productions. Therefore it is possible that his famous ego was responsible for some of what is wrong with this one. But very few of his movies, after he became a star anyway, are this bad.Richard Farnsworth is cast to type, and Linda Evans performs apparently while suffering from laryngitis. Nobody else is worth mentioning except Elisha Cook Jr and Slim Pickens, both of whom have been in much better company, and several terrified and badly injured horses, who must have had to be shot after making this bad time possible.

gverdin-1 This film removes any doubt that at this stage of his career Steve McQueen had moved beyond his King of Cool persona and had become a great actor. The hanging scene is especially moving in light of the fact McQueen was dying of cancer. When he looks at his real-life good buddy Slim Pickens and tells him "Keep your nerve Sam, 'cause I'm gonna keep mine", it's one of the most poignant farewells in movie history. It's a shame that this was not Mc Queen's final moment on film, or that "Tom Horn" was not his final movie. Instead, that distinction went to the "The Hunter," an earnest but flawed action movie. Yet, even here, McQueen manages to impress with his self-deprecating humor: his inept driving and his "I'm too old for this s**t" facial expressions.

revdrcac This film, while not a classic, is an important and entertaining view of the dying days of the American West. Tom Horn, as portrayed by McQueen, is a legend past his prime.... misunderstood and out of place in the new century. In a number of ways, the film is similar in this respect to the films Unforgiven as well as the Grey Fox (which also featured Richard Farnsworth).My only real disappointment in the film was the short amount of screen time for Linda Evans. She was dynamic in the few scenes in which she appeared and had excellent chemistry with McQueen.This film was superior to the earlier Nevada Smith and is a must-see for fans of the genre .