A Gunfighter's Pledge (2008)

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

if their story seems completely bonkers, almost like a feverish work of fiction, you ain't heard nothing yet.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

The film may be flawed, but its message is not.

Oh so familiar western plot in this made for TV western but it's competently done most of the way.Starts off well, but then gets bogged down in standard procedures.Builds up to a shoot out finale, that suddenly becomes muddled when bad land grabber C Thomas Howell suddenly has a conscience attack.Luke Perry has done quite a few westerns and a few good films, this isn't one of them, it's too uneven but it's not too bad.

I picked this up on DVD and it felt like a TV movie, and hey ho, it was, no surprise there. But I brought it on the strenght of the lead actors, Luke Perry and Thomas C Howell both of whom are very under rated (Perry especially) It's a familiar yarn really. Sheriff (Perry) is in pursuit of the man who killed his family (Kim Coates almost sleep walking through the role) and Howell is the greedy land baron who wants it all. It feels a bit like an episode of the A-Team, but in the Wild West except that people do get shot.The film has some strenghts, the acting all round is decent enough, and the photography and sets all blend well, but the dialogue is just so ordinary and the score swamps the film, with music almost all the way through and rather than uplifting the scenes makes them all the more banal. Shame really.

This movie was made by RHI Entertainment, a company best known for making cheap and boring movies. Like their other movies, "A Gunfighter's Pledge" was made for commercial television, so you won't get any nudity, sex, foul language, or serious violence. Despite these limitations, I will admit that this is the best effort to date I've seen from RHI. The cinematography is pretty good, and while it may be low budget, it never looks really cheap - there are plenty of props and extras in the background.But despite all that, and my love for westerns, I didn't find this movie to be especially exceptional. It's mainly because of the script - I don't think there's any scene in this movie that you haven't seen in another western before. There is no effort by the screenwriter to put in a few twists, and it's not directed in a way to pump in some juice. Heck, even some of the locations will be very familiar to those who have watched a lot of TV and movies! So we end up with a tired and familiar movie that will make you think you've seen this movie before.

In playing Matt Austin in A Gunfighter's Pledge Luke Perry channeled both Alan Ladd as Shane and John Wayne as Cole Thornton in El Dorado as he plays a former sheriff who's both on a mission to get the guys who killed his family and paying a debt to a family whose provider he accidentally killed.Luke's long outgrown the sideburns he made famous as Dylan McKay in Beverly Hills 90210, in fact he's now got a three days growth of beard on him. Like Wayne in El Dorado where he kills the youngest son of a family being threatened by a cattle baron and whom he becomes the protector of, Perry in killing one of the two men kills the brother of a widow whose ranch rich landowner C. Thomas Howell wants because it's the source of water for the valley.Howell himself has outgrown his brat pack days and makes a fine villain. Francesco Quinn, son of Anthony Quinn is a nasty crooked sheriff doing Howell's bidding. Also note Jaclyn DeSantis as the widowed sister of the man Perry kills and who he becomes the protector of.One really glaring error in the film. I believe the original intent was to have a sadder ending, but a happier one was shot and tacked on at the last minute. I won't explain any further, but if you see the film, you'll know exactly what I mean.A Gunfighter's Pledge is a good western, the kind we sadly don't see on the big screen any more.