kosmasp You have heard of the expression "cooler heads prevail(ed)" ... not in this case. Talk about things spiraling out of control. And it's all based on a real family feud. So during the end credits you get some of the "history" of the characters you just watched. One thing is for sure: Kevin Costner shows his love for Western once again. And him and Bill Paxton do a phenomenal job carrying this movie.Of course there are a lot of other people. Even one regular Deadwood actor (Powers Boothe) is in it. Which while generally a good thing it might remind some of how great Deadwood was. Not knocking this down in any way, it's really good, but compared to Deadwood it does slack in a couple of things. But this really is about human drama, about not being able to let go of things and having trouble to find peace. Now there might be some moments where you find yourself also raging at what characters do. So it's not that it is completely easy to just forgive and forget. Especially at a time where revenge was more common, even though it was considered illegal ...

eryui The plot, being a real story could be interesting, if it not for its silly premises and the execution that, my bad, leave much to desire.The whole movie indeed, between a spit and a gunshot it is not, despite its potential, as gripping or engaging as it could have been. The problem is, as well, that all the premises to this eternal fight, turn around a couple families that look like really a bunch of specious and forceful idiots! Maybe it needed some poetic license to adjust the aims.The script is somehow flat, many secondary characters, impersonal and banal. The photography, that should accompany a now day film of this scale, isn't that great. Locations, sets and costumes, generic and not studied and not really characterized. Many characters so shallow you wont really care about. Kevin Costner is good but, wow, seems like that to enter into his hard soul cowboy character he had to (obviously) spit on the ground every now and then. Doubtless his charismatic presence, greatly helps the entire movie, anyway.Don't get me wrong, this three episode movie still watchable but, it is a shame the fact that with this main cast (Costner, Paxton, Berenger, Boothe, Howard and the beautiful Parish) and this plot, with a bit more attention and build effort, and maybe some gripping poetic licenses, it could have been great. It is just not really well executed to me, despite the now day cinematography possibilities. It looked like made right to the TV without any (but necessary) extra efforts. The fight scenes were often out of focus and barely comprehensible and the whole movie a little stretched and not well edited, so, also the pacing and the linearity are loosed in here.I have read "best miniseries" everywhere but if you watched enough TV series and miniseries you should know there are many better executed and gripping one out there. Cause those sentences and the actual 8.1/10 I really expected much more. It is instead around a barely simple 6-7/10 to me, that precisely, does not mean it is excellent at all.

iamyuno2 When I say the only thing missing are the great lines I mean to say that this is a truly excellent historical recreation of dramatic and fascinating real events and I almost wanted to give it a 9 - but its screenplay is more journalistic than artistic. No memorable lines here. It doesn't quite soar to the heights. Not Shakespeare. Not even The Lion In Winter.But do I have a right to expect that of it? Not really. This was, after all, a hillbilly blood bath, and its intention, I believe, was to recreate it with a stark realism. And it succeeded there, very honorably.This is one of the better made-for-TV multi-part movies in a very long time and one that is largely faithful to the true events - which is no small accomplishment to achieve. And hats off for its honesty and veracity.Here you find fine acting, cinematography, direction, editing...it was one of the must-see broadcasts of the year, certainly (I couldn't wait to see the next part as it unfolded). While having to tone down the violence for TV somewhat, it's not toned down all that much. And that's one of the ways Kevin Costner gets his point across. You get more than the average feel for the horrors of a blood feud, with great intensity. Deaths are upsetting - as they should be in any fine production. Could they have been more moving? Perhaps. That's why I rate this 8 and not 10 stars. But Kevin Costner's Hatfields & McCoys hits on all cylinders and has nothing to apologize for. To achieve greater heights requires genius and we cannot require that of every movie we feel is praiseworthy. This is a taut, quality film and one that contains many fine performances. A cautionary tale, too, of course, and on that level alone it is worth seeing.One last thing - because multi-part TV movies are by definition longer than the average film, they also tend to seem overly long and be a bit more daunting to view - especially when considering whether to watch them a second or third time. This inherent structural challenge is the only thing that has kept me from viewing it for a second time - and perhaps if it had not been a multi-parter but had been cut down to just one long movie (even if three hours long) it might have (with the proper editing) been able to tighten up enough to qualify for a 9 star rank. Yet...it's definitely worth summoning up the patience to view once. In retrospect, I have to marvel at the amount of work Kevin Costner put into this effort and how well he served his subject and purpose.

alexandre michel liberman (tmwest) If one looks at the writing for this TV series , you cannot deny it is very good, but what really is outstanding is everything else. In this case you can say that the content is good, but the form is magnificent, the cinematography in Romania, the sounds of the guns and the battles, the action scenes, for the first time in many years I think there is a chance westerns might become popular again. The film tells the story of the feud between the families, which ends up in a real war. One might ask if they could not guess that for every killing there would be an equivalent or even greater response. So they were basically destroying themselves. What is the point of that? Preventing a massacre on the side that shows weakness, I guess…This series has what "Deadwood", in spite of all that was positive in it, lacked: a great style.