The Last Hard Men (1976)

Some things I liked some I did not.

Best movie ever!

A bit overrated, but still an amazing film

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Fans of Andrew V. McLaglen movies (McLintock!, Chisum, and The Wild Geese come to mind) won't mind the dark, nasty, gory The Last Hard Men with James Coburn and Charlton Heston. It's standard revenge stuff until you notice that it's way more violent and sociopathological than something fluffy like McLintock! or the all- purpose, crowd-pleasing Chisum.What the six years from Chisum to The Last Hard Men wrought. McLaglen had no trouble dabbling in a bit of gore here and a skosh of savagery there, but The Undefeated and Chisum were rated G. TLHM brings you lots of close-up impalings and incinerations and splashy gunshot wounds, sometimes in slow-mo! It seems that ol' Andy McLaglen was watching a lot of Sam Peckinpah and Sergio Leone in the early 70s!The biggest change might be McLaglen's treatment of women. In McLintock!, John Wayne woos Maureen O'Hara by stripping her to her undies, dragging her through molasses, showering her with feathers, spanking her with a stove shovel, and boinking her as the lights come up. To quote Judith Crist, "What girl could resist?"In The Last Hard Men, Barbara Hershey, a woman I find much more real and appealing than the actressy O'Hara, gets pummeled by Coburn, leaving her gasping on the floor of Heston's home, with a sprig of hair across her face, daring not to brush it away for fear of getting hit again. Jump to Coburn releasing two of his henchmen to chase down Hershey, as her dad, Heston, watches from a distance. They catch her and rape her while Coburn taunts Heston with "They're xxxxxxx your daughter!"The switch from chauvinism to sadism, from the early 60s to the mid- 70s, couldn't be a pleasant one for the likes of Hershey's character.With that said, I sat engrossed in The Last Hard Men when I saw it as the lead up to The Enforcer in December, 1976. It was just the sort of intense, brutal movie that I grooved on in my late teens. I learned to really like Charlton Heston and James Coburn, so much so that I have searched out movies with these two actors, long before I really noticed them.I got my prurient kicks some years later seeing Barbara Hershey nekkid in the imbecilic The Entity, but the more I think about it, I realize she was more appealing, sexier when she was fighting back against the thugs in the western. Cripes, where am I going with this?I miss Heston and Coburn. I miss Wayne (and the PC police in California can pound sand with their complaining about John Wayne being a hater). I think I liked The Last Hard Men not in spite of its sadism, but because of it. Kind of like The Professionals and The Dirty Dozen.Does that make any sense?

This western keeps you tense from beginning to end. reminding one of "High Noon". James Coburn is Zach Provo, the cold blooded killer set upon getting his revenge on lawman Sam Burgade (Charlton Heston). Barbara Hershey is Susan, Burgade's daughter and she will be what Provo will use as a prey to get to Burgade. Provo would be a better villain if he did not talk so much at the final scenes, I missed the laconic Britt from "The Magnificent Seven". The rape scene is shocking and adds emotion to the final showdown, which is not deceiving, but also not up to the expectations. Still, this is one of the best directed by Andrew McLaglen. Christopher Mitchum is Hal Brickman, Susan's boyfriend and he brings to mind Jeffrey Hunter in "The Searchers".

"The Last Hard Men" is a typical western for the 70's. Most of them seem to be inspired by Sam Peckinpah. Also this one, but Director Andrew McLaglan is a John Ford Pupil and this can be obviously shown in many scenes. IMO the beginning is very good. In a certain way McLaglan wanted to show the audience a travel from the civilization to the wilderness. In the third part there are some illogical flaws and I complain a bit about Charlton Heston. He has to play an old ex-lawman named Sam Burgade but he is in a fantastic physical shape. I never got the feeling that he really has problems to climb on a horse or on a rock. For me he didn't looks very motivated as he usual do in most of his epic movies. Same goes to the beautiful Barbara Hershey who is playing the sheriff's daughter. Maybe both had troubles with the director or were unhappy with their roles. Hershey and Coburn are not showing their best but they are still good. If the scriptwriter had John Wayne in their mind as Sam Burgade? Also Michael Parks as modern sheriff is a bit underused in his role. On the other Hand there is James Coburn as outlaw Zach Provo. Coburn is a really great villain in this one. He is portraying the bad guy between maniac hate and cleverness. His role and his acting is the best of the movie.Landscapes and Shootouts are terrific. The shootings scenes are bloody and the violence looks realistic. Zach Provo and his gang had some gory and violent scenes. What I miss is the typical western action in the middle of the movie. I would have appreciated a bank robbery or something similar. Overall it's an entertaining western flick. Not a great movie but above the average because of a great Coburn, a very good beginning and some gory and violent scenes.

This movie's not so bad, but I went into it with really low expectations. Yes, it's violent...no big deal. The movie's flaws are many, but it's heart is in the right place in trying to play around with the concept of a traditional western. Only problem with this is that by the mid 70s when it was made, everybody was doing the same thing, with better results I might add. What I mean by that is the script and story just copy some of the innovations of other new-style westerns -- the casual violence, the moral ambiguity, etc. -- but doesn't seem to really appreciate the full import of what it's doing in terms of the narrative and the characters. So what you get is the packaging of a new-style western draped across the same old saccharine BS that westerns typically have; hence the ending, when 'hero' and 'villain' shoot each other, the villain dies, and then the hero's daughter and fiancé attend to the hero's wounds...fade and cut. So it goes. All in all, better than I would have thought, but far from good.