IN A NUTSHELL:
When Gina Carano was kicked off the set of the Star Wars Mandalorian and blacklisted in Hollywood for Tweeting a political comment that Disney declared was "abhorrent", the crew from The Daily Wire jumped into action and secured a movie script for her within days. A lot of liberal film critics have refused to even watch or review this movie simply because it's co-produced by Gina Carano and distributed by the conservative The Daily Wire.
While I think films should be reviewed on their own merit and not be used as political ammunition, I have to explain that I just didn't understand this movie at all, especially based on what I know about The Daily Wire. Fans of The Daily Wire are generally conservative, so why would The Daily Wire think their audience would enjoy a bloodbath of a film? It's extremely violent, gory, foul-mouthed, and just not good. One of the characters is a vicious murderer who quotes scriptures, as if that isn't an offensive trope against Christians, the very people who truly want to support The Daily Wire. It's as if The Daily Wire doesn't truly understand its audience at all.
The Daily Wire claims that it wants to make non-political movies, yet all but one of them so far have been violent, two of them extremely bloody and gory. I don't get it. This just didn't make sense to me. I wanted to like this movie to back The Daily Wire's support of an actress who was unfairly treated and canceled by Disney for exercising her right of free speech, but I just didn't enjoy this movie at all.
The film was directed by Michael Polish and written by Josiah Nelson. It's about a frontier woman on the Montana plains who must protect herself against a ruthless gang of outlaws bent on revenge.
THINGS I LIKED
Those who enjoy hard-hitting Westerns with plenty of shoot-em-up scenes and simple stories guys might like this.
No animals were actually harmed in the making of the movie. Daisy, the cow, is alive and well.
The cinematography is very good.
The homestead looks very realistic.
The young boy played by Rhys Becker did a great acting job and appears to be a natural. He has the talent to do well if he wants a career in the film industry.
The lack of a strong musical score gave the movie a raw feeling.
THINGS I DIDN'T LIKE:
There were a LOT of bad acting moments. I was surprised and completely disappointed. So many moments were underacted, while others were overacted. Strange.
So many Western tropes and stereotypes.
The villains just acted like paper-thin caricatures.
How could bad guys in the West miss so many shots?
We see a rattlesnake in the dead of winter. I've heard they're not really active in cold weather.
My husband and I rolled our eyes countless times due to so many dumb decisions by the characters.
I hate shaky cam.
Who knew prostitutes in the 1800s had fake breast implants?
TIPS FOR PARENTS:
This is NOT appropriate for kids due to the immense blood, gore, violence, and language.
An attempted rape.
A prostitute tries to get a customer.
THEMES:
Grit
Family
Revenge
Sins of the past
Family
Self-reliance.
You can see the full review on the Movie Review Mom YouTube channel.
