What the hell were people in the 80's thinking? These aren't movies! They're just celebrities in specific settings!
I'd like to start off right at the beginning of this failed Western. The opening credits are one of the most ridiculous things I've ever seen. We have this music video-esque Bon Jovi rock intro where the actors actually glare into the camera and smiling, trying to introduce themselves in the most childish way that I perhaps have ever seen. I'm going to build off of that ridiculous intro and elaborate on the music. I realize that Bon Jovi seems like a good idea, but it's not. It's absolutely inappropriate for this film and is completely alienating to the entire viewing experience. People riding across the plains against the sunset doesn't require awful 80's rock power ballads. It just sucks painfully hard. Painfully hard. I can't stress that enough.
Now let's get to the story. Okay, the story is a bit too Western. This movie is oh-so-trying to be a Western that it's filled with a Western cliche' story, but with contemporary language. (What will they think of next?!?) But this movie is just a stretch of the imagination. I think that we all shut our brains off in the 80's because this movie is what Top Gun is to the military movie set. The 80's threw a bunch of big name actors on screen and just called it a day. Now, I pulled this Kiefer Sutherland fanboy card because I thought it was pretty funny. Now, I'm not saying that he did any better or worse than anyone there (except for Emilio Estevez, who delivers an exceptionally awful performance), but I couldn't even support him in this movie. I mean, subtlety and class has nothing to do with this movie. It's riding high on former brat packers looking hot. There's no way that anyone in the old West looked like that. I know that there's the Hollywood West. But there's the West, there's the Hollywood West, and then there's this. This is beyond belief.
I b*tched about Emilio Estevez before, but now I really have to drive the point home. I've never had an outright distaste for the man. He's just been an actor that I've never really given a damn about, but now he's proven that he can't act his way out of a paper bag. The worst part is that he's headlining this group of ragtag Young Guns with lines like "Kiss My Ass." (Of which I didn't shamelessly need to see. Thanks a lot, 80's teenage girls who snuck into the theater. Oh that's right. It was the 80's. No one was carding.) Then there's this sequence of all of them on peyote. Now, I get that you were going for a joke. But that joke went on way too long and just came off as ridiculous. It didn't even lead to anything in the story. It was just silliness. Like the final gunfight. I don't know what it is about slow motion, but it doesn't add badassery to your movie. It just makes the movie fairly awful.
This was a fairly awful movie that has a sequel. The funny thing about the movie is that there's an epilogue and most of the characters die. What? How the hell do you have a sequel based on real characters. I mean, I get the fact that you already raped history, but where do you get the gall to completely ignore what you did in the first film just to bring back your characters? Who do you think you are? Highlander?
Not what I expected! But then again, this was the story of Billy the Kid, a story which I've heard all of my life, but never truly grasped the events that took place in New Mexico that made this man a legend. Growing up, the story seemed like an Aesop Fairy Tale. With an all-star cast like Terrance Stamp, Jack Palance, Charlie Sheen, Keifer Sutherland, Lou Diamond Phillips, and Emilio Estevez ... I had expected to give this movie a 5 star rating. Maybe the last 40 minutes deserved five stars, but in it's entirety ... 3 stars is all I can give it because it was slow in developing the characters and then the story was wrapped up to quickly (more quicker than the ending of ?The Planet Of The Apes? remake). The film should have been lengthy like "Scarface" was, then it would have had plenty of time to develop the characters and interlace an abundance of action throughout the movie, instead of only towards the end.
Um... it's okay. I don't care for Dermot Mulroney's character (he's disgusting). Umm...interesting music, and Emilio Estevez can definitely play crazy, but there were lots of parts I didn't care for, or the movie didn't need.
a great 80s western with the crop of 80s talent, a western for the mtv generation, emilio esteves is great and cocky as billy the kid, who along with his posse of fellow men, charlie sheen, kiether sutherland amoung them, hunt down the men who killed there very nice father figure, who took them all in. but in doing so become running from the law them selves, and legend of billy the kid is born, some great set pieces throughout, and well made in generall, with a superb set piece ending, this is the film that introduced me to the western, and made it fun, backin the good old 80s
I first saw these movies in 2002 and completely, hopleassly and deeply fell in love with these and the legend of Billy the Kid and the "character" himself.
I've loved wild west since I was a kid but never much cared for western movies, so it took me a long long time till I bothered to watch even these and I'm so incredibly happy I finally did.
This is a totally awesome, hilarious and wonderful true-story based vision of Lincoln County War.
Anyone even remotely interested in wild west MUST see this!
I think it's real life history and real life characters that this bases on that makes this so much superior to wetern movies, as this has an actual deeper story to tell.
Man I can watch this one over and over, I've seen this one more times than I can remember and it's still good. Perfect cast for a western, especially Emilio estevez as billy the kid. He gives Billy the Kid that wild atitude and carelessness that you would expect. In my top 10 westerns ever.
William H. Bonney: Hey, Peppin. I see you got Charley Crawford down there with you. Peppin: Yeah. [Bonney goes to the window and shoots Charley Crawford] William H. Bonney: Hey, Peppin. Charley Crawford's not with you anymore.
A film about a true event a great film about bravery friendship and revenge
Billy the kid will never die his legend will never be untold to any generation this freedom fighter billy the kid aka kid antrum made diferens of many lifes in new mexico
Young Guns passed me by when it came out in the summer of 1988 and also with its VHS release a year later. I really had no interest even if i didn't mind Sheen and Estevez. Many many years later i finally watch this flick now being a HUGE western fan. And really, the only reason i somewhat sought this out was because of my love for Jack Palance. And he is hardly in the thing. The man who's always playing one hell of a bad guy in these westerns is grossly underused. So - with that, this movie for me suffers. Its passable entertainment but i can't recommend it. Watch a REAL WESTERN instead.
Despite the obvious pop-culture and teen star power on display in "Young Guns", there is something of a real western inside. It's like what the outlaws in better westerns would have been like just before they turned bad: cocky, bold, and stupid. From there they set off a chain of events that brands them as villains, starting with the murder of their benefactor by a greedy land baron, and the revenge that is sure to follow. At heart this is a true western, but things built around that heart make the film seem more artificial.
: A group of young gunmen, led by Billy the Kid, become deputies to avenge the murder of the rancher who became their benefactor. But when Billy takes their authority too far, they become the hunted.
The acting in this movie is some of the best ever. I always thought the story was a little thin, but the acting and the action more than make up for it. "Hey dog - d'you see the size of that chicken? D'you see the size of that cock-a-doodle-doo?"
Tres fort. Je viens de lachteter donc je lai reecoute, toujours aussi bon. Le meilleur film de "western cowboy' que jai vu. Jai hate de revoir le 2....
MCT:August 3, 2008
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