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Product Description
"Unforgiven" is dedicated to Don Siegel and Sergio Leone, Clint Eastwood's two cinematic mentors, who represent, respectively, the legacy of the classic Hollywood Western and the radical updating of the genre by Italian Westerns in the 1960s. William Munny, wonderfully played by Eastwood himself, finds himself confronted not only by the formidable sheriff Little Bill Daggett (Gene Hackman) but also by his own inner demons and the awful realities of violence and death.On its appearance in 1992 the film proved a popular and critical success, securing Academy Awards for Best Picture, for Eastwood as Director, for Gene Hackman as Best Supporting Actor, and for Joel Cox as Editor. "Unforgiven" is Eastwood's last Western to date, and the film may prove to be his swan song in a genre he has graced for more than forty years. Edward Buscombe explores the ways in which "Unforgiven", sticking surprisingly close to the original script by David Webb Peoples, moves between the requirements of the traditional Western, with its generic conventions of revenge and male bravado, and more modern sensitivities.
About the Author
Edward Buscombe has written about Stagecoach and The Searchers in the BFI Film Classics series. He is the author of Cinema Today (2003), among other books.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Fantastic!!,
By
This review is from: "Unforgiven" (BFI Modern Classics) (Paperback)
Fantastic, in depth review of the best western in years. A must have for anyone even remotely interested in the genre.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta) Amazon.com:
4.0 out of 5 stars (2 customer reviews)
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Very Good Analysis,
By Dash Manchette - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: "Unforgiven" (BFI Modern Classics) (Paperback)
Just when Westerns were apparently over, Clint Eastwood, the old dog, outdid even his best and gave us Unforgiven. It was, and still is, a fantastic movie. Fortunately, Edward Buscombe gives us one of those thin, little BFI books that spares us the technical jargon and adds considerably to our understanding of the movie. Like the characters in many of the best Westerns, he just gives it to us straight, writing for a general, rather than niche, audience.UNFORGIVEN (the book, here) delves into the history of the Western genre, both in movies and on TV. Eastwood's own contributions to the genre are traced back to their beginnings and are placed firmly in the context of his predecessors and contemporaries, with Buscombe describing both how he fits comfortably into the world of Westerns and also how he has kicked the boundaries out a little bit. After that introduction, the book starts going into the movie itself. Unforgiven is often viewed as a movie that upturns the genre. As Buscombe shows, though, that is not necessarily the whole of it. There are some clichés overturned but the movie actually falls quite comfortably into line. Rather, Unforgiven is notable for drawing the lines of some of those clichés so crisply. The necessity of violence to maintain a civil society, the toll that violence takes on those who must wield it for the greater good, the role of women not only as the objects of violence but as its instigators (both of which are prominent here, with the prostitutes paying for the killers after one of their own is cut up). And in a breath of fresh air, Buscombe considers the friendship between Bill Munny (Eastwood) and Ned (Morgan Freeman) without once using the word `homoerotic.' If you have read too many of these BFI books, you can appreciate my gratitude. It is Eastwood's character, Bill Munny, that seems to be the big mystery in the movie. Even by the ambiguities of the Western anti-heroes, he seems to be in a position by himself, allegedly reformed, as he repeatedly reminds us throughout, by his late wife. Yet does the final act completely undermine this and turn Unforgiven into the typical Western? Personally, I do not think so. But others do, and UNFORGIVEN gives them their say. In all, this is one of the better books in the BFI series. I see that the same author has written similar books on The Searchers and Stagecoach. Based on this book, I shall explore both of those.
3.0 out of 5 stars
Good Supplement,
By Patrick Mc Coy - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: "Unforgiven" (BFI Modern Classics) (Paperback)
Unforgiven by Edward Buscombe for the BFI Modern Classic series looks at what I consider to be one of the greatest western revisionist classics. It does a thorough job of debunking the myths of the west, while simultaneously creating them. I recently re-watched the film and enjoyed it as much as I did on the first viewing. It is only recently that I have been steeping myself in the genre after essentially avoiding it for years. Not so long ago I saw Peckinpah's The Wild Bunch began to wonder if I had been missing something. Buscombe gives a close reading of the film in context with the history of westerns and Clint Eastwood's career in particular. I also think it also has one of Gene Hackman's finest performances. It was interesting to know that Francis Ford Coppola originally bought the rights to the screenplay and that Eastwood didn't make significant changes to the script in the filming of this masterpiece.
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