CANNES 1995: CLOSING DAY

About the project

THE QUICK AND THE DEAD (Sam Raimi, USA/Japan)
Screened out of competition

The revisionist Western wouldn't exist without star and co-producer Sharon Stone, who hand-picked the director and two of her three co-leads; but it barely survives her (and that "barely" is me being more generous than the movie deserves). Her shallow, anachronistic performance is grating enough that even a rarely-worse Russell Crowe seems good in comparison. It's not right to lay all the blame on Stone, though: Simon Moore's screenplay is a nightmare of clattering dialogue and a tediously repetitive structure with no dramatic momentum. Raimi does what he can to spike things with his usual cartoon flair, and the opening quarter-hour is a marvel of camerawork, weird characters, and comic energy. He even manages to make the endless series of gunfights all feel meaningfully different. But he mangles the tone as the film goes on, turning a playful satire into a leaden, straightforward slog. At least cinematographer Dante Spinotti and production designer Patrizia von Brandenstein make sure that things stay pretty, and three years after Unforgiven, Gene Hackman makes a terrifically hissable Old West villain. 6/10