we're on a mission from god

wendy so i got that going darling

looks like i picked the wrong way to

quit sniffing blue light

of my life we enjoy your films

i thought they smelled bad on the

outside

[Music]

welcome to vintage video where we're

re-watching the 80s so you don't have to

we'll be reviewing every major film

release of the 1980s in real time i'm

patrick o'reilly

i'm jesse bayless and i'm richard wells

and today marks the 40th anniversary of

the release of tom horn on march 28

1980. it was written by thomas mcguane

and bud shrake

based on tom horn's autobiography and

directed by william wired

or weird weird not sure

it's wizard without a z so however you

want to pronounce that

uh at your own risk and it was released

by warner brothers

uh five directors worked on this film

yeah that were either fired or left

because of disagreements with steve

mcqueen

it's widely believed that he directed

much of the movie himself uh as

wire didn't do weird wizard didn't do

much

else uh i think this represents our

first

like biographical film right coal

miner's daughter

oh that's true i forgot about compliance

but uh well and hero at large was

definitely based off a real story yeah

jan michael vincent

uh actually did the things and then they

adapted it into that movie instead of

definitely

but she's still alive laura we're alone

well my brilliant career my brilliant

career is actually

is that it's based off of a oh yeah but

it was a girl's autobiography

it was her yeah it was her in australia

wow that was way off or no it didn't

take place in australia right

the movie took place in australia but

the actual story took place in europe

did it

i thought i thought it took place in

australia who knows anyway this movie

uh after dawn siegel quit as director he

was replaced with elliot silverstein

and then james william

guercio garcia who was fired after three

days by steve mcqueen who

desperately wanted to direct the film

himself but dga records

uh forbid actors from taking over

direction once a film has started

because otherwise that would happen

constantly

and people would just direct their own

movies so he brought in a tv

director uh to finish the film so that

he could boss him around i guess

yeah mcqueen was very ill from lung

cancer during filming

though i don't think he knew it at the

time he only had one more film after

this

uh which will come out later in the year

the hunter before succumbing to his

illness in november of 1980.

uh united artist was in pre-production

on a tom horne film with robert redford

that was abandoned when this one was

announced uh the first draft of this

script was actually written by william

goldman but mcqueen threw it out

and so it merged with the abandoned

robert redford movie

into a tv movie called mr horn in 1979

and that started david carradine

in the lead but that was also i think

more focusing on his earlier life

right not not specifically the very end

of his life yeah i much would have

rather watched a

uh william goldman version of this movie

than a william wizard movie

uh this is mcqueen's only r rated movie

somehow

why is it r rated oh because

a horrible is because of things okay a

horrible scene with a shotgun

yeah you don't remember oh well yes

okay that you could have easily avoided

that yeah

it didn't have to be all right it had to

be in there because otherwise what would

be

i re-round it four times like what

that whole scene's pretty confusing

actually but uh so

we start the film the opening title says

that horn was a pinkerton a rough rider

and that he was part of the the group of

people that captured geronimo

i didn't check any of that for veracity

but i'm assuming yeah oh yeah he he

he did a lot of crazy stuff and i guess

i mean

some of some of the stuff i'll have to

say will probably be saved for the end

right

uh but uh he was quite a character with

a lot of

career and a lot

of murders yes well before this cattle

wrestling stuff he was known

he killed his first man at 16. right so

this

this little blurb at the beginning you

know makes makes

tom horton sound like an interesting man

and you know somebody that you might

want to make a movie about in fact

somebody that

two people wrote movies about and

multiple studios were trying to make a

movie about

why they wouldn't put any of those

interesting things yeah i would much

rather see

i don't know tom moore the rough writer

it's a much better movie

or even the pinkerton do like a noir

like detective in the west

instead we have a movie that is about

the most uninteresting parts of this

man's life

yeah at the beginning he's checking his

horse into a stable

uh he says to keep it in solitary

because otherwise it will kill whatever

horse he put it in with

he's like oh it's going to be extra for

solitary he's like you can put it

wherever you want but it's going to kill

your other horse so

it's actually going to save you money if

you put it in solitary and don't go in

there with him

yeah he also prices 24 cents cash which

just sounded weird to me out loud

because

when i hear the word cash i think that

that means paper money not just

money in hand or the opposite of credit

yeah it's like you could do

i mean i i'm assuming that they didn't

have credit

yeah i mean i guess you could say oh can

i you know can i pay a letter

yeah or something but i'm assuming you

know barter system was

a fully valid way of paying for things

but he says 24 cents cash

horn walks to a bar uh nearby where some

gentlemen are drinking a toast to jim

corbett who they claim is the future

heavyweight champion of the world

i also didn't look into whether that

happened we

if anyone was put off by the fact that

he helped capture geronimo

and the indians were actually the good

guys this was well known by the 80s

already

they tried to set it right by showing

that tom horne had a lot of respect for

geronimo

yeah who's geronimo next to jim carpet

geronimo's a man so great that corbett

there'd have to stand on his mother's

shoulders to kiss his ass

which promptly gets him beat to [ __ ]

uh he it's basically attacked on his way

out of the bar

and wakes up in the stall with his horse

completely bloodied and

his face is also i i think that he

either crawled there or made his way

there because that's the safest place

right for when he's unconscious but uh

coble

uh goes to visit him in the stables kobo

was uh

there for the fight at the bar and uh he

realized who tom horne was he's like oh

is that is that

v tom horn and he's like i think so he

said his name was tom horn

so he goes to visit him at the stables

and

he says basically i want to hire you to

help me

with my with my cattle and tom horn's

like yeah all right

yeah because he needs a job he's new to

town but he i think he's trying to

settle down somewhere

the two of them together head to brown's

hole

to water their horses and they are

harassed by

some wrestlers so i i was unclear was

like is this their home

i think so and they're just let they

just let people come and drink their

water

i guess yeah i was i was really unclear

as to who these people were and what

this location was

um because they obviously it was felt it

was necessary in order to get to

kobel's ranch right was you have to pass

through here because

the horses won't make it they'll be too

thirsty right and he

immediately notices that there's a bunch

of cattle and some of which are his

yeah because they're they're branded and

he recognizes them

and uh the wrestlers that are outside of

this

shack basically start the

traditional like oh dance for me boy

like firing at kobo's legs yeah

and uh he's having to hop up and avoid

getting shot in the foot

and tom horn has no patience for this

and just pulls out a gun and shoots

through one of the guys feet

immediately they there's these

uh weird cross fades back and forth yeah

um they so they that's basically the end

of the confrontation there they just say

oh we're going to get you

tom horn and they crossfade to

kobel and horn riding the horses but

they're they do a crossfade from one

shot to the next shot and then to a

third shot before the first fade

finishes

and it keeps happening over and over

again and it just

it felt like they were trying to span

time really quickly

but it just comes across as as awkward

it seems very tv yeah it didn't feel

like a movie

cobalt assures horn that whatever he has

to do to keep

the cattle safe he's going to back him

100

and uh right but everybody's being

really like

politically careful here yeah because

they don't want to like

uh you know be accused of uh condoning

murder

right but it's wink wink whatever you

have to do

and it's basically like a group of

cattlemen that all

like they have separate ranches but he's

kind of protecting all three of them

yeah it's an association yeah it's a

basically

a corporation of sorts that they can

board and everything

and they're they're pooling their money

to pay tom horn to basically murder

anyone who tries to steal their cows

i mean they they they put it in so much

as every you know cattle wrestler that

you get to go away

in some fashion you get 200 for and

i feel like you could intentionally

misread the situation and just be like

oh i got him to go away oh he came back

oh i'll get him to go away again you can

give me another 200

yeah it's like no i think they mean go

away permanently and

they're pretty much implying we want you

to kill these people

but they all sit down to like a nice

meal

uh they introduce him to a u.s marshal

at this meal yeah who seems familiar

with his work

and and and even the marshall says hey

you know you come work for me

and and like and he asked like what's

the difference it's like

you get paid on time as far as killing

people like you

you get to kill people still but you get

paid on time yeah and you have the law

to back you up but um he's he's happy

working for cobalt

um he doesn't seem interested in in

ditching him

he meets a schoolteacher here and uh

jesse pointed out something interesting

that he says to the school teacher when

he walks up to her yeah his first line

to her is what do you do

and he's like this is 1890 something

like you don't ask a woman what she does

she's either married and has children or

she's trying to get married and have

children like they don't have

jobs and like this is a rare case where

she does in fact have a job

not just taking care of a household but

that just seems like a very strange

question

yeah it did seem like an interesting

opening line but

by chance she happens he's a very modern

man

yes that's that's definitely the point

of the film is that he's super modern

very progressively

[Laughter]

horn heads off to interrupt a cattle

auction because

he's now he's calling himself i mean

coble gave him the title but he's a

stock detective yeah um which means that

he's basically tracking

all these stolen cattle and returning

them to the ranches that they came from

and uh he tells them okay well let me

see that bill of sale

that's this isn't official these these

people don't own this cow so they can't

sell it

and uh they're like well we're gonna do

whatever we want and i'm the deputy

and what i say goes around here so uh if

you have a problem you're gonna have to

take it up with these wrestlers and he's

like all right

loud and clear yeah i heard you

he basically as those wrestlers are

leaving the auction

chases them down and murders them yeah

all except the one who he just says you

know tell everybody else

tell him what you've seen here yeah

he sneaks up on brown hole at night yeah

after he

kills these three people such an awkward

thing to say yeah sneaking up on brown

hole

it goes in the back door yeah um so

there's this weird

i can't even tell what's happening

because it's it's so dark and yes

there's a lot of people around and

there's a lot of spurs being

chimed yeah a lot of jingle jingle

jingling

i would take those off second of all i

would edit this scene better

yeah someone shoots someone is my note

here yeah

because so he's he's sneaking up on the

building

and we see him start to pick up his gun

and then we see a bad guy notice

something and so he turns his rifle

and he shoots but so we definitely saw a

bad guy fire

a rifle yeah then we see someone else

get hit

and fall down and then without another

gunshot happening

we cut to tom horn and his gun is

smoking like he shot

right but we know that the other guy

shot so they both shot at the exact same

time which is the thing that happens a

couple times in this movie

but it's like who did the bad guy shoot

if they both shot at the same time and

only one of the bad guys died

does that mean tom horne hit a guy and

this guy missed yeah

and they both shot on top of each other

at the exact same time apparently but

they're also using really bad

framing and editing skills here because

of the the screen space that they're

holding like bad guy is sort of on the

right side of the screen

tom horton's on the left side of the

screen and then they the guy that you

know gets hit

by a bullet is on the left-hand side of

the screen and you almost can't even

tell that it's a person you just see

something fall out of frame in the

background but re-watching and i was

like no that's definitely a guy getting

hit

but they're not following the 180 degree

rule yeah

horn in the middle of this dust up

decides he's going to jump up onto the

roof

of the building and uh he's like

scampering over the top as the guy

inside who is now

at this point the only surviving member

of the gang uh

is like oh are you here to kill me tom

horn i'm gonna get you first

and starts firing into the into the roof

and you're seeing these

holes get blasted out of the ceiling as

as horn is climbing around

he ducks down into the building and he

gets the drop on this guy

and just takes the top corner of his

face my note was he scanners that guy

yeah it just it's literally like

from about 12 to 3 o'clock it's just

gone

yeah i i audibly just yelled the f word

while i was watching this i couldn't

believe what happened

yeah it's a cool effect it is a cool

effect but if that's the only reason it

was rated r

it seems kind of unusual i i think that

um

and what is important is

not this murder or killing murder

you will that that's the debate of this

whole thing right

it's murder uh but it's supposed to be

disturbing

yeah it does all the killings were to

reflect

tom horn's actual brutality

his tactic was to be as brutal as

possible to get these men to try not to

because then they were scared to do

anything yeah um

the the historical stuff that says that

people would just like

not be would be terrified when he would

was in town

because they just know what he's capable

of and and they've heard about these

brutal crime scenes yeah

um even there's even a scene in this

movie where he's like walking past a guy

who's like working on a water wheel

water mill

uh windmill water wheel thing you know

water pump

and he's like you tom horn he's like oh

well you seem

you seem like a nice enough fella yeah

like because he's like already aware

let's not be tom horne because yeah from

what i hear tom horn just looks

terrifying well i feel like that it's

in and of itself would have been a more

interesting thing to incorporate into

this film because

at no point in this movie do we do we

see like

the bad guys like get together and be

like oh no it's tom horne like

this guy is really really horrible what

are we gonna do

yeah at this point most of the bad guys

are pretty much already dead

like it's basically the end of these

wrestlers that's not even an issue

anymore for the rest of the movie

uh we cut immediately from the guy's

head opening up to

just they're back at the ranch breaking

a wild horse

and everyone's just like acting like he

didn't just go and murder

like five or six dudes the day before

the horse almost escapes after they

finally uh

get someone to write it for a minute um

and he takes it down to the school

where he's it's basically a gift

and a way of asking out this

schoolteacher on a date as she's walking

through the classroom she points to one

of the kids that says put that mouse in

your pocket

because the kid's like just playing with

a mouse on his desk and apparently his

pocket is a much better place for it

but but as soon as he comes in she's

like everyone's dismissed

yeah she's like congratulations you can

all go home he invites her to try and

ride the horse

and he's trying to give her instructions

and everything but he

come to find out she's been riding

horses since she was a kid yeah

he's not teaching or anything he's just

like wow that's impressive that you uh

you were able to do that yeah she's

doing this to obviously to flirt with

him right he's like oh you're helping me

learn how to ride this is so great

he uh horn heads out and encounters

another wrestler

who's basically just sitting at a table

like sitting down to a meal

in his own home and uh

he starts an argument with the guy and

from

from outside from outside and the

wrestler under the table

fires a gun trying to kill horn but hits

the horse and kills

tom horn's horse and so tom horn is so

angry at his horse dying

that he turns around and he puts like

even as he's falling off of the horse

puts one through the guy's head

and kills him and then he goes in he's

like you kill my horse you son of a

[ __ ]

and he shoots the corpse five more times

and then

burns down the cabin yeah yeah that's

what i have on my notes

puts one through his head five through

his corpse burns the shack

then uh another wrestler approaches and

uh

fires on horn in the middle of town yeah

uh

basically like they've gone they've

declared all that war on him

they're not even trying to steal cows

anymore they're just like we have to

kill this guy before he kills us

um but he's not a good shot and horn has

enough time to get a gun

and turn around and return fire and

kills this guy in the middle of town

in front of everybody children women

he he wings him first and then he walks

up to him

he's still alive and he could be

arrested you are in town

yeah and just blam finishes him off yeah

this is not a pvp

zone yeah so th this this is kind of the

beginning of the end

as far as this version of the story of

tom horne

and that people are like okay that that

there

was was the last straw yeah and we cut

to the first scene with

with no tom horn in it where the rest of

the cattlemen's association are like

this is now a problem we need to

separate ourselves from this guy

at this point it's like okay well who's

gonna fire him

like yeah let's draw straws real quick

and see who's gonna tell this guy that

he doesn't get to pay for food anymore

but kobold is still defending him like

he's just doing what we hired him to do

yeah

and they're like well we have to fire

him from that now because uh

it's done you know but oddly enough i

feel like

this version of tom horn if he told him

tom it's time for you to move on he'd be

like

right all right yeah as he's being

played by steve mcqueen here he would

have just been like okay but maybe in

real life it would have been like

okay so who do i kill now because i need

money

that is an interesting thing that

throughout this entire movie

the way steve mcqueen plays it is just

like super

chill mellow the whole time like there's

no also a little old fish

even yeah yeah yes a little oh fish but

there

you know there's no real emotional highs

or lows there's no contemplation

there's there's really nothing

interesting happening with him in terms

of like

how he feels about what's going on yeah

i think

that in this in this portrayal he loses

a lot of the sociopathy of the actual

person

that went around murdering people for a

living and a lot of this is supposed to

be about

the kind of closing of the west right

like

these these this kind of way of life

that tom horman is living is done with

th this isn't how we do things anymore

yeah

where are we wyoming uh

uh you know what believe me i i think

one thing i didn't write down

i think that's what it is but yeah it's

like as these

states were getting incorporated into

the u.s and they were installing

marshals and sheriffs and

and things were kind of cracking down

yeah at this point it's it's

it's essentially 1900s right i mean

we're we're like 70 years away from the

wright brothers flying a plane i mean

this is the modern era yeah essentially

that we're getting into

and he's still living by the gun

yeah he's he's participating in the in

the world of like

train robberies when we're almost like

shooting the great train robbery

yeah they're mad that he's drawing

attention

to the violence of uh of his job

and uh that kids are getting spattered

with blood basically from

these these shootouts because they want

the town to seem safe

yeah and uh there has been talk before

this point

of this in addition to the cattle

rustling

there someone has been like stealing

sheep

yeah so uh the the real history

was that these two family two families

were

arguing about who owns the land right um

it's and that they were letting these

people graze their animals

on property that didn't belong to them

um which is the kind of arguments that

are like still going on in the present

yeah i mean i don't know if you either

of you saw the movie open range with

kevin costner and robert duvall

no um it's it's about free grain free

rangers

and homesteaders you know these people

are coming from the east to to live on

the land

and buy property but this property was

once available for cattle grazing yeah

and now it's not but it's like well we

used to graze our cattle here it's like

well night you can't it's like but

now we don't have any place you have the

river the river was open to us and now

you're saying it's not

right like this is our we lived here

this is how we're making it's like it's

like issues yeah

they're still going on today we had a

whole shootout about it yeah the uh

because the bureau of land management

was going after the

this family that was because the the

rule is supposed to be that you pay

for the right to have your cattle graze

on this government-owned land

but they were like well we don't have to

do that anymore is the

i want to say bundys bundys yep that was

it um

and uh and they just refused to pay and

they refused to go to court about it and

that was why they ended up like taking

over that building that was owned by the

blf yeah it was the forest management

building or something like that they

they the wildlife refuge they barricaded

themselves inside and had like an fbi

shootout well essentially the the

government's plan was to

not engage them at all and just like we

don't use that building for this part of

the year

it doesn't have electricity like feel

free to hang out in there until you give

up and go home because we want this to

end as peacefully as possible

but then there was like a high-speed

chase and like one of them literally

pulled a gun

and started to point it at the police

and was killed in the

in the shootout it wasn't ammon bundy

that was killed it was

one of the other people that was a part

of their group but yeah so these

conversations

this stuff is still happening so so yeah

so

you know in in the history the

historical part of this is that

there there was a thing it was ongoing

dispute between these families

and uh this boy was

killed yeah he was there with the sheep

when they were grazing on land that they

didn't own

um the they call it's the nolt family

right

um yeah uh i think they changed the

names around between the history

so my notes are kind of muddled on that

yeah so i'll

defer to you but it would also stand to

reason that once he had killed

all of the local cattle wrestlers that

that would be the next

target would be to move to the people

who are grazing illegally

but when we see this happen this kid is

sitting up on a fence with a bunch of

sheep that are grazing

somewhere that they're not supposed to

be grazing and

he thinks he sees something in the

distance there's like a

shadow by a tree and then the kid is

shot and collapses into the pen with all

the sheep

and that's all we see here we don't see

tom horn doing it we don't see anybody

else doing it we just see

a kid is there a gun goes off and

uh he falls dead the next day in the

paper

a bunch of people are reading it in a

bar and they see oh the nolt kid was

killed

uh he got shot by uh 4560 which is the

same gun that tom horne has been using

to kill all these wrestlers yeah and

in i think in the the reality of it he

used 30 30s but it's the same

the same same point is being made is

that he used the same caliber

right um and they said that they found a

rock

under his head like the three in brown

hole

which it's like did he go around and put

rocks under the heads of each of the

people that he killed in brown hall

because if he did then they it seems

like they would have him dead to rights

like that he clearly did the same thing

here

they probably should have mentioned that

sooner if that's something yeah but i

don't think they do

say that um originally but uh the

marshall basically says that

he's gonna extract a confession and he

hires someone to transcribe the

confession

and so he says i'm gonna bring him in

here and i'm gonna talk to him you're

gonna sit and listen

by this door and i need you to write

down exactly what he says

and uh he brings in horn who had been

drinking

yeah and horn says that a 4560 has a

trajectory like a rainbow

and well i gotta kill that kid

could have been the best shot i ever

made and the dirtiest trick i ever done

but the guy on the other side of the

door writes down when i killed that kid

yeah so again this is playing in a

little bit into the history

of it of that uh

he was quoted the history has him quoted

as saying

when i killed him but but he was the the

history of that also saying that the

marshal was intentionally getting him

more and more drunk

right uh so that

you his he would slur his words yeah but

they would also sound like his work

exactly but also i think that this movie

is is playing up is that he is drunk

and steve mcqueen's delivery of that

line is what he thinks he's saying

right but in the reality is which is why

when we hear it later it's kind of like

echoed

right like in this kind of like like i

don't remember this at all this

entire conversation it's like in beer

fest

when uh they have that whole scene play

out where the guy's like suddenly really

good at all the contests then he goes

home with like the hottest woman in the

bar

and then they show what really happened

they do the same joke in wolf of wall

street where he's just like oh man i

can't believe i could just drive this

car

on all this coke and then they show like

in real life he's like falling out of it

and it's like crashed into a pillar

but yeah so he he thinks he's being

suave and

uh explaining that he didn't do it but

potentially confessing who knows

maybe maybe he just really did confess

in real life and just walked in and said

yeah i did it what are you gonna do

about it but uh sheriff sam creedwell

arrests tom in a bar um this is the slim

pickens character yeah

and uh he meets an attorney burke

and uh there's this weird line here he

says

ever seen so many bars in your life i

guess that's why they call it

jail so what does that mean it's like i

don't understand what part of jail

i don't okay whatever anyway we

get uh is it a flashback of him flirting

with the teacher yeah we got a couple of

these

like weird they're just oddly placed

um it's again really weird editing i

think it feels more like a television

show

than yeah than a movie i can't decide if

i feel like it should have been

introduced

more obviously as a flashback or if it

should have just happened earlier before

he got arrested yeah

um but either way we get this

scene of him with the teacher she's in a

tub

out in the middle of a field and

i guess i would say it's a trough yeah

yeah yeah like a watering trough

right and uh another hustler comes up to

attack them

and uh horn kills the guy

and gets blood all over the woman well

yeah again this is like playing into the

brutality like

right he was already down and then he

just hit him so hard that his

face splattered blood all over her yeah

and then when he says we gotta go

he wasn't like are you okay yeah like

like oh you got blood on you like wash

up where he's like he's like let's go

and also when he first shoots the guy

off the horse the horse does a complete

front flip on the ground it looks super

super dangerous

so uh we have walter stoll is the

prosecuting attorney

who's who's playing the prosecuting

attorney i forget it was somebody um

jeffrey lewis oh jeffrey lewis yeah from

any which way

uh both of them but yeah he's uh he's

the prosecuting attorney

and they're basically holding this trial

under a tent outside the courthouse

and uh i don't know why it's happening

outside but for some reason it's

happening outside maybe they didn't

actually have a question

it's a small town yeah kobel says that

he knows that horn is innocent which

from what we've seen isn't true he can't

possibly know that right

but uh again the history of it is that

kobol

yeah like spoke in his defense yeah he

was a he was a character witness

um the writer who was outside of

the sheriff's or the marshall's office

comes to read the quote

when i shot the kid not if i shut the

kid and

uh basically and

horn is not cooperating yeah he's acting

like it's a kangaroo court even though

it seems like they're following the

rules well i also think that he he knows

that

this is right this is just a setup yeah

it's a setup but even if it wasn't a

setup it doesn't matter because whatever

he says

it's it's just one person's judgment

over the others

he makes the point like do you know that

i did it did you see me did anybody see

me kill the kid

no okay then it's just my word against

yours and it doesn't matter so if you

guys want to kill me

then you have to kill me and if you

don't want to kill me then yeah let me

go

um but they've basically made up their

minds

and this isn't the first again in the

reality this isn't the first trial

for murder yeah that tom horn has been

on it's like the coen brothers like with

james franco

first time he's got his head in the news

uh

but uh the judge's voice is ringing in

his head

and uh he asks that uh someone show this

guy how to be in court because

yeah it seems like he doesn't understand

what we're doing that night

horn puts all of these indian luck

charms under his bed that he's like

collected

i think they're probably less effective

when you kill the people they belong to

in the first place

or more yeah but he asked specifically

for earl not to look at them

right like don't look at him when you

come to wake me up

i thought this was pretty clever because

i had no idea what he was getting at

here until the next morning

coble overhears a group of men bragging

that they're gonna get

horn hung um at the bar and he's

obviously just

pissed off about it and disappointed and

i think the point of this scene is

supposed to make it look more like

oh this is a conspiracy against him

again but we're not

given a clear indication as the audience

whether or not he did this

but uh the next day the guard comes to

the bed and he knows that those things

are down there and that he was told not

to look at them but his curiosity

overtakes him

and he leans down to look at them and

right when his head is next to

the bed horn grabs him and just starts

slamming his head against the bars until

he knocks him unconscious

and and i thought initially was he was

doing this because he looked at the

charms and he asked him not to

and it's like no he's not literally

looking yeah i mean i think i knew right

away because

when he went to bed he scooched the bed

all the way up to the bars

and so i'm like well he's planning

something i have no idea what but he's

planning and i thought that

you know that's pretty clever you know

you get the guys close enough to the bar

and knock him out

you know you're to be able to you know

grab the keys off yeah

and at this point i like you still think

okay well maybe he

he does believe in these charms and then

when he punches the guy he's like oh he

was just pretending he believed in the

charm so that he could punch the guy but

later on we get an indication no no he

actually believes in their

and their magical powers too and in

addition to their like factual

usefulness

but uh he knocks the guard out he gets

the key he basically walks out of the

jail with a hostage using the key as a

fake gun

but he's caught escaping because he gets

to a certain point where he's like

someone's going to notice me i should

start running now

yeah but he should have stolen a horse

because he's on foot and

everyone else is on horses oh you don't

want to be a horse thief in wyoming

he's already got the death penalty but

anyway

uh he's caught escaping uh and then we

get another flashback with the teacher

of him and her just standing on a

hillside and she says you know you're

gonna get your comeuppance for

everything that you've done

and uh they meet with this irish

character

who invented a device so that no one has

to kill him yeah

because uh it's just part of like the

the modern

yeah the modern society like we're all

too we're all too know

we're too ethical to actually put you to

death so you're going to commit suicide

at our request and so he builds a

machine where

tom horne would step onto a platform and

it uses like a hydraulic system yeah

where water is dumped into a bucket and

a counterweight opens the door so that

he would fall through and

what i love is that they also build a

bridge from the jail

to this apparatus right because they

don't want him to try to escape again

yeah so there's like no way like he's

gonna we're not even gonna give him an

opportunity to get to the ground floor

yeah we're just gonna have him walk from

directly to the gallow

historically accurate i'm curious if

they built a weird contraption to kill

him yeah i was gonna say it was probably

started as a factoid and they thought it

was too like

too much of a great metaphor for how

everyone was too scared to kill him

that they were like let's let's put this

in the movie and have it be a part of it

yeah this was a real thing that about

how he was killed it was like

they were trying to figure out ways i

guess i don't say more humane ways but

uh more uh guilt-free

yeah kill three ways to execute people

but really he's committing suicide

mm-hmm here and that's now he points

that out yeah

and we get more flashbacks but basically

he

steps onto the platform and the water

slowly fills the bucket very slowly

yeah and it's pretty tense yeah sam i've

never seen such a pasty face bunch of

sheriffs in my life

and then he's hung by the machine and we

see all of the the

indian trinkets tumble out of his hands

through the hole

in the in the gallows and uh that's the

end of tom horn

which is interesting because this is

based on an autobiography i guess he

wrote it in the jail that night

yeah he did he um this trial went on for

quite some time okay

uh this movie compresses down the time

but he had time to

completely write as much as he could

about about his life

that such as it was before he died

uh there was a lot of stuff going on

with this trial where people were

were defending like uh because you know

he used his unique

uh caliber bullet but it wasn't so

so unique like people were saying like

you can get it at the store everywhere

other people use this this gun uh

they talk about like how he was he was

seen like miles away

at that around like like only like 20 or

30 minutes after the killing there's no

way he could have made that distance

um and his point is that that that gun

and that style of bullet like you can't

make that long term a shot

yeah but that's why like the whole line

of it would have been the greatest

shot tom horn was not a good person

i i feel i feel bad saying this about

anyone but uh

while he may have been or may not have

been

involved in this killing i think this

movie presupposes that he was not

but he had done enough other things

in his life that that

just like that lines like you're gonna

your past is gonna catch up with you

yeah and uh i think that that is what

this movie

should have been more about this movie

should have been more about

that less about like was he innocent or

not for this crime but it's like no he

has committed numerous other crimes

that he should have been punished for

and he was on trial for multiple times

for unethical killings of like he's like

this

probably was murder but he was acquitted

of all of them

he especially hated cattle rustlers

because he tried to start a ranch

with all the money he had made while he

was in the service of the government

uh and all of his cows were stolen

all of them all of them he lost his

whole thing he had it he went bankrupt

and how good he is at killing people and

stopping them from

getting cattle why did he let that

happen yeah um

so that's when he became nomadic was

that he he had no money

uh and so he was just doing odd jobs

wherever he could

uh which eventually led him to this

place in wyoming

where he ultimately met his fate where

he met a bunch of guys who were like

i know let's take the guy who just

failed

at stopping cattle rustlers from making

him go bankrupt and have him

help us not go bankrupt from cattle

wrestlers

yeah that makes sense to me tell us um

this is what happens though when you

fire william goldman off of your western

and you whip

someone else come here all it um but

we said before it was directed by

william wired weird wizard

a lot of tv stuff no other features um

the two writers for this movie

uh thomas mcguin and bud shrake did

pretty much exclusively westerns they

have like three or four

westerns each that they had written i

think mcguane had uh

he wrote the missouri breaks um but i

didn't recognize any of bud shrek's

other titles

steve mcqueen obviously here playing tom

horne uh you know i'm from the great

escape

or bullet or papillon is one of my

favorites from him

um he's also in the magnificent seven um

he was the original thomas crown

before he's also in the original blob

he was in the towering inferno but not

towering inferno too

even though he was contractually

obligated to be in it uh because he

passed away in 1980

linda evans was a glendolin

yeah i was like i don't ever remember

them saying her name

no it must just be the name of the real

person but uh she played crystal

carrington in 210 episodes of dynasty so

if you know her from anything it's that

because i didn't recognize any of the

other credits

uh richard farnsworth was john koble i

love richard franco yeah he is

he's great um he's buster and misery

he's uh

red blow in the natural yeah he's alvin

in a straight story the

uh the david lynch yeah david lynch that

movie that doesn't feel like a david

lynch movie

we'll have enough disney's the straight

story yeah and he actually got an oscar

nomination for that that was his last

film

um he was nominated for supporting actor

for uh

comes a horseman in 1978 and uh

in papillon he is uncredited with

mcqueen

i didn't realize he was in that movie

and he also plays slim

in a remake of mcqueen's version of

getaway

uh i'm trying to remember who plays the

lead in the remake of getaway

i think it's like charlie sheen or

somebody or emilio estevez i can't

remember

uh billy green bush is us marshall joe

bell

he played jay brown and critters which

i'm pretty sure that's the grandfather

of the kid that's the main character of

those movies

because his name is billy brown or

bradley brown uh

he also played elton in five easy pieces

which is

a great film and sheriff ed landis and

jason goes to hell

slim pickens was sheriff sam creedmoor

he plays tagger in blazing saddles

he's major king kong in dr strangelove

he famously rides a bomb out of a out of

a plane a

nuclear bomb out of a plane all the way

to the ground just

he's shouting all the way down what else

can you do

yeah he was also in the original getaway

with mcqueen

and he's the voice of b.o.b in the black

hole

which is a very funny choice elijah cook

jr was the stable hand

he plays francis ice pick hofstetler in

13 episodes of magnum p.i

he will be back later this year in

kearney and he's probably

uh better known for mr nicholas and

rosemary's baby

uh harry jones in the big sleep or

wilmer cook in the maltese falcon a lot

of old school

noir stuff that was a stable hand played

warmer yeah

okay i i i that that's i remember

we said you said the multis falcon i was

like oh yeah

roy jensen was lee mendenhauer i don't

remember which character that was i'm

assuming it's one of the wrestlers

he was donovan in soylent green mulva

hill in chinatown

and cully in the getaway with mcqueen

so that's a couple people that were in

the mcqueen one uh jeffrey lewis was

walter stoll i love jeffrey lewis

he's in lots of clint eastwood stuff any

which way but loose

any which way you can pink cadillac more

he was also a villain in macgyver silent

world

the one with the machine for deaf people

yeah yeah um and uh

his last movie was called high and

outside i think we've talked about this

before

it was directed by evol johnson and

written by dan o'dare

a couple pie town employees from our

days back in

town me and richard but yeah jeffrey

lewis was a cool guy

and he's actually juliette lewis's

father too

harry northrup thomas burke he played

doughboy and taxi driver which is one of

the other

drivers i think he plays mr emmel in

silence of the lambs

and he'll be back later this year in

used cars

um jess what do you think about this

movie up or down

uh yeah i don't think people need to

bother

i i agree i disagree okay

uh i actually uh kind of enjoyed this

movie um

i i like i like westerns

uh mostly and uh

i was really intrigued uh by the

character i guess

more so the history of the actual person

than i guess the movie

but uh it kind of led me down that

rabbit hole so

i mean i agree with you i think the

history of this person is really

interesting and i think it could have

made a

really interesting movie but this was

not it oh i agree

there is it's lacking but i did enjoy it

all right um so that's no no yes

and then who wants to go first on their

letterboxed

uh so i would put it just below simon

but above midnight madness i

i i kind of actually am also gonna go

above midnight madness

this is coming up on midnight madness

okay above midnight mattis for both of

you

which puts it below a little miss marker

for me

that would be the same for me they're

right next to each other for me too but

i think

yeah you know what i'm gonna put it

there too right above midnight madness

i think that's fair at least we all all

three of us right above midnight madness

well i think that about covers it for

this one if you guys have any thoughts

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vintage video podcast thank you so much

for listening and i hope you'll join us

next time

when we'll be discussing when time ran

out

which imdb summarizes thusly an active

volcano threatens a south pacific island

resort

and its guests as a power struggle

ensues between the property's developer

and a drilling foreman we leave you now

with the trailer

for when time ran out there's not going

to be

any evacuation another non-believer

won't they ever learn

only this guy's problem is a small

matter of a very active volcano

this thing's a powder kick i think

that's

damned irresponsible conclusion on your

part oh well

then perhaps there's still time for a

little passion in paradise

that's some kiss passion that really

sparks but this sucker makes mount st

helens look like a kid's sparkler

[Music]

i think that's damned irresponsible

conclusion on your part

you said that already

paul newman jacqueline visit

william holden james franciscus

alex carris pat marita

excuse me but don't we have any other

explosions

thank you burgess meredith and hill

street's veronica hamel

they were all having a good time when

time ran out