Aces 'N' Eights (2008)

Please don't spend money on this.

It is a performances centric movie

An action-packed slog

Blistering performances.

I was surprised at first when Bruce Boxleitner (D.C. Cracker) starts out as a gun thug with a murdering leader named Tate, who is thoroughly despicable and ugly too. He leaves the gang because he will not kill a kid. Ernest Borgnine is the old rancher who refuses to sell to make way for the railroad. So if you have seen this plot before guess what happens now? Ernest gets killed off while in town but so does every one of the gang except, of course, Tate. He has to live so he can die by the right man. Casper Van Dien character also left Tate's gang when Cracker did. Then there is the hot love interest schoolmarm played by Dierdre Quinn. If you watch many westerns you are led to believe that all school teachers are at the least pretty and always falls for the hero. The showdown happens at the ranch property fence. Here a Chicago RR man offers a plan that both sides agree on. So Tate makes his move and shoots at the ranchers. Many of the RR men that came along get shot, Bruce gets shot up and dies. Tate is about to finish Van Dien, who has been shot to doll rags as they say, when the Chicago man kills him. I guess CVD lives to marry the teacher. There a couple minor points that were very unrealistic. CVD fanned his gun. Doesn't work, your shots go all over the place and you have no accuracy. CVD was using a double barrel, breech loading shotgun. He used it one handed, rather hard to be accurate. Also he shot it twice and then without reloading, shot it two more times. Got to love those Hollywood infinite ammo weapons!!!

Local railroad boss William Atherton sends hired killers Jeff Kober and Bruce Boxleitner to get rid of pesky landowners like Ernest Borgnine, who refuse to sell out. Complicating things for Atherton is progressive thinking railroad executive Jack Noseworthy and Borgnine's hired hand Casper Van Dien.A competent cast of familiar character actors try hard, but this is pretty much done in by the extreme familiarity of the material (see Once Upon A Time In The West) and the fact that the script focuses on too many characters at once, resulting in a lot of half-formed characterizations, sort of like a television series highlight reel.As usual with director Craig R. Baxley, it's well made and the action scenes are expertly handled. However, Baxley (as well as most modern filmmakers) seems to have left out the nuances that made many of the older westerns true classics.One thing I could never understand about these type of westerns is the railroad's desire to to take the whole ranch in order to lay a single five-foot wide track. Didn't those wackos ever hear of an easement?

Yes, sadly, we have a look into DVD Perdition, where ex-actors who used to be something are consigned to doing bad films.This film has three guys who used to have name recognition- Casper Van Dien, Bruce Boxleitner and Ernest Borgnine. Hell, Ernie won an Oscar. (He's also 91 and still acting, that says a lot.) The plot is that the railroad is coming through, and Ernest doesn't want to sell his land. The railroad hires a bunch of thugs, who used to know ranch hand van Dien. A bunch of clichéd western themes, you aren't going to mistake this for Deadwood, that's for sure.The movie is plodding and slow, there is little chemistry between the characters. The ending is the typical showdown that John Wayne did 50 years ago and much better. Boxleitner could have been John Wayne 40 years ago, but maybe we've outgrown a need for John Wayne.

Its been a long time since I have watched a western and this one, to some extent, did make it worth while watching.People in a small town are violently forced to sell their ranches at a railroad price as the the on coming railway would go through their land. But the Government sends in their man from Chicago to sort this out in a peaceful manner. And just as things seem to go well, one of the ranch owners is killed in a shootout.The movie, directed by Craig Baxley, stars Casper Van Dien, Bruce Boxleitner, Ernest Borgnine and Jeff Kober.As much as I liked this movie and as much as I like to watch westerns, I felt that the script in some areas and that writers along with with the director and the the actors could have done something to make it stronger. Perhaps it was even trying to make some actors be the likes of James Stewart, John Wayne and Clint Eastwood who would have suited more. But never the less it was a good movie and be aware there are some violent scenes that one with a weak heart may not want to watch.