Is this the first action-Western acid-trip movie? The theme is aboriginal shamanism, possibly inspired by the fiction of Jorge Castenada. The opening credits say that this was loosely based on some comic book series. All I can say is that I don't recall comic books being like this when I was young. There is some awesome photography of Western-looking countryside. It's hard to tell where the setting is supposed to be, perhaps no real place. Much of the film is in the recent style of dystopian Western realism, where (almost) everyone is dirty, has bad teeth, and kills on whims. When we get to the hallucinogenic scenes, the filmmakers went a little bit overboard. It looks like they had great fun making up weird and wicked imagery, but it goes on a bit long.
I was not familiar with Vincent Cassel, but he does a creditable job carrying the film as the main character. There is quite a bit of well-known talent in the rest of the cast, also. Michael Madsen plays to type, being thoroughly amoral and quietly menacing. The various actors playing the Indians did quite well. (I wonder what language they were speaking. It did not sound like Spanish to me, but not speaking that language myself, I could not be completely sure) Ernest Borgnine (who I thought was retired) was here in an interesting but small part. Also, Geoffrey Lewis (a fine character actor remembered largely for roles in Clint Eastwood films) did nicely. I was unaware that he was the father of Juliette Lewis, who played his daughter in this film. I noticed from the credits that Tcheky Karyo was in this one, too, but I completely missed him. Kudos to Vahina Giocante for her acting and beauty in a role near the beginning of the film. And, as for Juliette Lewis; wow! She showed a realism in her role that bespeaks real acting talent. And, of course, she was so beautiful here, more so than I had noticed before. I must see more of her work.
If you can stand the weirdness, check this one out. As long as you don't go into it thinking of it as a straight Western adventure film.
I was not familiar with Vincent Cassel, but he does a creditable job carrying the film as the main character. There is quite a bit of well-known talent in the rest of the cast, also. Michael Madsen plays to type, being thoroughly amoral and quietly menacing. The various actors playing the Indians did quite well. (I wonder what language they were speaking. It did not sound like Spanish to me, but not speaking that language myself, I could not be completely sure) Ernest Borgnine (who I thought was retired) was here in an interesting but small part. Also, Geoffrey Lewis (a fine character actor remembered largely for roles in Clint Eastwood films) did nicely. I was unaware that he was the father of Juliette Lewis, who played his daughter in this film. I noticed from the credits that Tcheky Karyo was in this one, too, but I completely missed him. Kudos to Vahina Giocante for her acting and beauty in a role near the beginning of the film. And, as for Juliette Lewis; wow! She showed a realism in her role that bespeaks real acting talent. And, of course, she was so beautiful here, more so than I had noticed before. I must see more of her work.
If you can stand the weirdness, check this one out. As long as you don't go into it thinking of it as a straight Western adventure film.