Unforgiven (1992)
Dir: Clint Eastwood
Stars: Clint Eastwood, Gene Hackman, Morgan Freeman and Richard Harris
*** Burke Favorite ***
Even if the Western isn’t your preferred genre, I can’t recommend this Clint Eastwood starring & directing classic enough. If you’re in the mood for a thought provoking and challenging editorial on violence – entertaining though it may be – you’d be hard pressed to find a better title than Unforgiven. From the truthful acting to the convincing cinematography, the efficient yet eloquent writing to the subtle music, this is a film that is “firing on all cylinders”. It uses all of the collaborative arts that comprise a film and maximizes them all to tell an involving story.
The tale concerns a group of hookers living in Big Whisky, Wyoming. In the second scene of the film, one of the hooker’s customers cuts her face with a burly knife because she “gave a giggle” at the sight of his private parts. Unfortunately for the hookers, the town sheriff, Little Bill Daggert (Gene Hackman), doesn’t really take their side in the matter. In fact, he sees them as “property”, just as their pimp Skinny does. Skinny describes in gross detail how he has a signed contract between himself and Delilah Fitzgerald, the victim, who he brought all the way out to Big Whisky from Boston. And now, well, she’s damaged property! So, in lieu of a hanging or at least a whipping (with a bull whip mind you), Little Bill decides the best retribution would be for the cowboys to bring a collection of six horses to Skinny for the trouble. He makes no mention of any retribution for Delilah, however. Uh oh.
As in all classic films, the question of this film is very simple: will the hookers tolerate this kind of violence and subsequent injustice? As Strawberry Alice, the “A Dog” of the hookers so eloquently puts it, “They may ride us like horses, but they sure as hell can’t brand us like horses!” Now, to me, that’s a great question for a film: never mind your own ethics or levels of morality regarding the “oldest profession”. To Strawberry Alice and the girls, they have a line they won’t cross. By God, they’ll get retribution for this obscene violence done against them all. So, they combine their earnings from the “billiards” as they call their relations with men, and put out a bounty of $1,000 to have the cowboys who cut their friend, well, killed.
And if there was any doubt whatsoever that these ladies could be bargained with, let me mention the scene in which the cowboys bring the horses for Skinny. The nicer of the two cowboys – the one who didn’t even lay a hand on Delilah, by the way – brings her a pony of her very own. She can do what she pleases with it. Well, Strawberry Alice and the gals let that option sink in for about six seconds before Alice responds with, “She ain’t got no face left and you bring her a goddam pony?!?!” Then, the gals literally throw feces and mud and whatever else is in the street of Big Whisky at the poor bastard until he’s run out of town! These hookers want the cowboys dead.
The remainder of the movie concerns Clint Eastwood’s character, William Munny, his old partner Ned Logan (Morgan Freeman) and a young gunfighter named the Schofield Kid (Jaimz Woolvett) as they travel to Big Whisky and attempt to collect on the bounty by, well, killing the cowboys. While these three characters are fascinating in their own right, I was struck by something else in my latest viewing.
This time around, I couldn’t help but pay close attention to how the film focuses on how stories would grow into legends in the old west. As you watch Unforgiven, you’ll catch yourself saying, “Hey! What he just said about the cowboys that assaulted the prostitute isn’t close to true!” Was the poor woman’s face severely scarred? Yes, indeed. However, as Munny and his little gang continue to justify their hunt for the cowboys, you’ll note that the reported violence done to Delilah grows exponentially in its exaggeration.
In fact, one of the best scenes of the movie for me was between Hackman’s Little Bill and a biographer named W.W. Beauchamp (Saul Rubinek). Please bear with me as I do my best to set this scene up: Beauchamp accompanies an “assassin” named English Bob (Richard Harris) into Big Whisky. English Bob planned to cash in on the hookers’ bounty, but unfortunately for Bob, Little Bill catches him violating a county code. Signs on the way to town detail that no firearms are to be carried in Big Whisky. Anyone carrying has to surrender said weaponry to the proper authority for the duration of their stay. Well, English Bob had a peacemaker and a cute little .32 as well and refused to give them over to Little Bill’s deputy (not knowing that Little Bill was the town sheriff). For this violation, Little Bill kicks the living hell out of English Bob in front of the entire Big Whisky population. This scene is one of several terribly violent episodes in the film.
That evening, Little Bill sits in his jailhouse with English Bob safely behind bars and chats with Bob’s biographer, W.W. Beauchamp. Little Bill’s goal is to help Beauchamp with the accuracy of some of the stories Bob has told him. One in particular is about a shooting in a bar many years ago. English Bob’s version of the story to Beauchamp was so courageous and admirable in its nature that it was worthy of a being published in its own magazine entitled, “The Duke of Death”. To hear Little Bill tell the story – as an eyewitness to the shooting in the bar, no less – English Bob sounds little more than a cold blooded killer than any kind of killer. After you finish the film, did you kind of have the same feeling towards Eastwood’s little gang?
For those of you who’ve seen Unforgiven, I’m sure you’re wondering when I’m going to get to the Clint Eastwood parts: after all, William Munny is a layered character capable of fueling a two page piece of his own. But the fact is, I’m not going to comment on Munny. Go and watch the movie again! His scenes are equally impeccable, but this is my blog and I’m just trying to react to the film as I saw it this time.