3:10 to Yuma

3:10 to Yuma

James Mangold’s “3:10 to Yuma” gives back the broken Western heart and rescues it from a swamp of senseless violence. During its heyday, the Western often resembled a morality play where humanistic values were injected into the wilderness of anarchy. However, as in Unforgiven by Clint Eastwood, which follows that tradition, viewers’ appetite for morality plays and westerns might be on the wane. Acting quality and film’s thinking make it seem pioneering although it is a 50-year old good movie remake.

It is such an easy narrative that Elmore Leonard first wrote it as a short story. A one legged Civil War veteran called Dan Evans has moved to Arizona territory to try his hand at ranching. He isn’t doing well at all; especially with a neighboring bully determined to have him forced off his land. The Indian raids still affright the territory just as much as Ben Wade (Russell Crowe) and his lawless gang who stick up stagecoaches, rob banks, kill people casually and outgun anyone opposing them. After some occurrences which look as though they are dictated by fate itself Dan Evans become part of a posse sworn in to escort Wade handcuffed to Contention the near town where 3:10 pm train carries mail car cell for Wade’s transportation from Yuma prison for execution.

This adventure tests both Dan’s and Ben’s characters. Dan believes that he lost faith in him from wife Alice (Gretchen Mol) and teenage son Will (Logan Lerman), who do not believe that he will be able to make ranching work out. Even less does Alice see why her husband should risk his life volunteering when he could die without even her seeing him again. Meanwhile, their son Will who has read dime novels about Ben Wade repeatedly idealizes this outlaw that Dan doesn’t like noticing when boy catches up with their party. Wade senses, however, that Will is really following him and not his dad.

This is a clue to Wade’s personality. He treats it like a role-play act. Reads, draws, philosophizes; he is incomparably more intelligent than his gang’s dregs. After years on the run with them he may find it refreshing to stay with Dan even as their captive. In the end, they wind up in a room above the street in Contention hotel beside each other in earshot of the train’s whistle and surrounded by armed men who want to save or kill Ben.

Similarly, these outlines fit 1957 version of “3:10 to Yuma” directed by Delmer Daves starring Glenn Ford and Van Heflin as rancher and outlaw respectively. The movie’s railway timetable was compared to that which followed advancing clock in High Noon (1952); I saw it at Telluride in the 1980s on 35mm and felt that it was better than High Noon if only because of its changing personalities.

The version by Mangold is still better than the 1957 original as it has more talented actors who think through their lines. Christian Bale does not portray a saintly hero, but someone who, despite taking risks that he had hitherto shied away from, cannot clearly account for why he is arranging to have a murderer prosecuted, other than feel sorry for himself and his family’s economic predicament after they lost everything and now seeking revenge.

Nevertheless, Crowe performs not only as an assassin par excellence but also as a man who can even surprise himself. He could not be so intelligent if he had to behave one way in all situations; maybe the character is bored of such expectations.

Dub Taylor, Jack Elam, Chill Wills, Ben Johnson (when she wasn’t doing a million other things), Shelley Winters I was lucky enough to meet some of these great character actors of Westerns. “3:10 to Yuma” calls for two roles that require a distinctive flavor and fills them perfectly. It is McElroy played by Peter Fonda whose profession is being a professional bounty hunter that would rather claim the price on Ben Wade’s head than let him go and be executed by the government free of charge.

Another actor performing Charlie Prince (Ben Foster) 2nd in command in Wade’s gang who may have been gay or bisexual loves Wade unconditionally or partially knew about his homosexuality. But this individual could tell which category he fell under; however Wade wouldn’t bother because it would give him something else to include in his anthropological study.

While each knows death waits for him on either side of their shared prison room door there are words spoken between the two men involved. In referring any detail about “3:10 to Yuma,” I’ll guess both men recognize each other as speaking partners after years of their lonely lives together in gangs and prisons respectively.

The precision with which Crowe and Bale act this scene keeps it hidden behind its real intent as a mutual gauging of insight. The ultimate evidence of a great actor is how he can make his lines invisible, which you may also find in the upcoming “In the Valley of Elah” starring Tommy Lee Jones with Charlize Theron. There are too many actors out there who laugh at their own jokes before repeating them.

James Mangold made his entry into film-making with an outstanding movie called “Heavy” (1995). In the year 2005, his film “Walk the Line” earned Reese Witherspoon an Oscar. This appears strange to choose remaking “3:10 to Yuma” after other newer movies like “Girl, Interrupted,” but there was obviously a good cause for this choice.

When times have been hard, American people have often come back to Westerns as a way of resetting themselves. But it has got to be one helluva Western when times are really tough. Remember what Ben Wade said during the last minutes in the picture and who he addressed those words to and why?

Watch 3:10 to Yuma For Free On Gomovies.