Wednesday
06Aug2008
Movie Trailer - The Western 'Appaloosa' with Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen
Wednesday, August 6, 2008 at 1:01AM 
I like
Ed Harris. He's a hell of an actor, as everybody knows, but he was
once very gracious to me about an interview. His publicist had screwed up the
time or something so instead of giving me a brief ten minutes from the green
room before he went on Regis, Ed personally rescheduled for right after the TV appearance
and he called me back an we talked for almost 40 minutes. You root for
hardworking guys like Harris as it is, but when they go out of their way, it
says a lot. Believe me, there are plenty of actors who wouldn't have done the
same thing in that position.
Interestingly, during our conversation a couple years ago, Harris brought up
a new movie he was going to shoot in New Mexico, a Western called
Appaloosa. The
movie was going to co-star
Viggo Mortensen, with whom Harris had worked in
A
History of Violence (a very underrated supporting performance in a career lined
with them, by the way). Now, the trailer for Appaloosa is here (gracias,
Trailer
Addict), and the cast
includes
Jeremy Irons,
Renee Zellweger, and
Lance Henriksen.
Harris directed and co-wrote the film, as well, and based on last year's
resurgence of Westerns - 3:10 to Yuma, the shamefully overlooked Assassination
of Jesse James, and the good but easy to misinterpret Seraphim Falls, plus two Best Picture nominees that fit a
little outside the mainstream Western mold, No County and There Will Be Blood
-
another good Western for 2008 will be a welcome addition.
Appaloosa opens in limited release on October 3rd.
Reader Comments (12)
When you remove Hidalgo from his recent resume, Viggo has been one of the most intently watchable and interesting figures in cinema, choosing challenging, powerful roles over mainstream cookie cutter archetypes.
At this point, he could sign on to do Jell-o commercials and I'd probably turn my head and watch.
Harris was smart to cast him, giving Appaloosa instant credibility.
I wouldn't even necessarily remove Hidalgo. That wasn't the worst movies I've ever seen. I thought he was pretty good in it, at least.
It's time to move out of the wild west soon and do something new. There's been too many high-brow westerns recently. As soon as anyone is making a philosophical film these days, it's a western.
I want something new. Please give us some philosophical sci fi for a while. It should be due in the genre cycle.
Oddly, a lot of sci-fi films are just space Westerns, anyway....
Most of the philosophical sci-fi has been pretty tough to sit through of late:
1. Solaris
2. The Fountain
3. The Arrival
Children of Men, 2/3rds of Sunshine, and A Scanner Darkly might be the exceptions.
That's pretty accurate, Will. Sunshine was frickin' fantastic until they ran into the old Captain. Then: Stupid. I loved A Scanner Darkly, though. Children of Men is great if you never once think about the plot holes, 'cause there are plenty of them.
Solaris was horrid. Does anyone know what that movie is really about? The Fountain was gorgeous but made no sense as well. It needed much more explaining because you could basically make it mean anything you want. The Arrival as in the one with Charlie Sheen?
So anyone thinks that James Camerons new sci-fi movie called Avatar is going to be any good and philosophical?
Tough to say Brandon. James Cameron has always been a decent director of provocative mainstream movies.
But he also did Piranha 2 and The Abyss, so who knows.
About all we have been able to get from the most arrogant director in Hollywood the last decade or so is a bunch of 3-D Imax fish, which I'm willing to speculate is a long pout on his part over losing the Spiderman franchise to Sam Raimi.
Now that Mr. Cameron is ready to return to real movies, it'll be interesting to see if he still has the chops to make great movies, or if his career sank with the ship that won him the Academy Award.
By the way, did I say the Arrival? That's a good movie! (Best Charlie Sheen role since he played Ricky Vaughn in Major League!
I meant The Invasion.
(That's what I get for posting while I'm at work!)
Yeh, Solaris made me uncomfortable. I didn't want to watch it again to figure out what I had been missing. Must have been something.
We need some good space westerns again. The last really good ones must have been Aliens and Alien3. Can't think of anything recent that was first rate.
I don't care what the genre is if it's a real movie. I loved The Abyss - ending was a little reaching, but the movie leading up to that is fantastic. Hidalgo I liked, though it was miscast, as are several movies with Viggo Mortensen in them. I like him, but not in a role that's just not right for him. You're right about the need for some good 'space westerns' again. Hasn't been any decent sci-fi in years, really, except for V for Vendetta. Appaloosa has Ed Harris behind it and in it, so it's golden in my book. I'll definitely watch anything he's in - he's never given a performance without integrity in his entire career. To borrow a quote from another wonderful actor, Dame Edith Evans, he's "never told an audience a lie in [his] life." Phenomenal actor, and if he's as good wearing the other hats he wears in this film, it should be amazing.
Forgot to say: Relieved to see that others, too, were completely put off by Solaris, which was one murky mess. Also The Fountain - wanted to like it, but it added up to a big nothing. The Arrival was wonderful, really creepy.