Homestead

I was expecting a decent western flick. The story had promise but there was so much missing. The acting was decent and some of the dialog was well written. What ruined it was all the missing ingredients for a decent western. Using a brass frames pietta 1958 Remington black powder pistol was a big sin. Remington never made brass framed pistols, Those are cheap replicas made today. Pa stated he had a heifer and was waiting for a bull to start breeding. Where did the heifer stay? All they had was a one room shack with a good electrical service as the lighting was poor and too bright. No corral, barn, of any kind for animals, Not even a single horse in the whole movie. There was too much un-needed conversations that drug on forever.

Beware of any film that sets to improve on a very well defined genre.

Westerns have given us some real masterpieces, films that stand out in the long list of great american films.

It's really too bad when a director feels he can improve on the style by showing his own talent and aiming much too high.

Here we have a situation that has been treated many times, a group of people, in this case a family, trapped in a house in the middle of nowhere under siege from a group of particularly mean killers.

What could have been the twist is that the person who will fight back is the one you'd least expect : a litttle girl.

Only every move every line of dialog take ages, it's so long and boring that it kills all tension, you just wish they would get along with the story and move on.

The director wants you to see how clever and intelligent he is and to do this he really takes his time. Long shots on people who don't say anything, meaningful looks that lead nowhere....

Had he played the story and directed his film more humbly he might have had a really good film to show.

This is not the case.

Special mention to the cast and particularly the little girl, but it's not enough.

1. Animals. It is set on an isolated homestead. Yet, there is no livestock. This is a western with not a single horse. How did the gang of bad guys get across country..bus?

2. Injuries that stay, well, injured. Bad guy gets stabbed in the foot. In following scenes there is a total absence of blood on, well, boots, floor etc.

3. Dead guys that stay dead. Dead man's buddy picks him up from the porch, and dead guy lifts his arm to hold on.

The plot holds together, but is highly derivative. And why do they keep the ammo in a box on the hill, and not in the house?

Had some attention been given to continuity, and stitching together some plot holes that were overly large, and given the gang horses and not Shank's pony, it would not have been such a frustrating watch.

Having a guilty pleasure for what read as the "darker" element of the genre, checked it out.

The cinematography just brought back the 70s westerns that I grew up watching almost immediately, so settled in. Like most westerns, the antagonist is usual prevalent in the onset. Solid enough acting on all fronts, but what felt like it might head in the direction of interest...it plods along with very limited content, and even more limited expansiveness. Even the scenery, which can elevate these films, fell flat.

It's basically a broken family, a cabin, and some bad dudes out for revenge. That's it. Where some take this next level, the more recent (and pretty excellent) "Old Henry" excelled in bringing forth that classic feel...The Homestead just spins it's tires for the better part of an hour filled with unspectacular series of missed opportunities. I found it reminded me of a made for television (are these still a thing?) film. Very short, very uneventful, short on captivating violence that comes with even the most modern of the genre, and certainly mislabeled along the way as "horror", which confused me about the half way point, as the violence was pretty tame throughout. I can handle crossover appeal with the implied supernatural elements entwined with western films (High Plains Drifter) and horror element (Bone Tomahawk), this was more comparable to a Little House on the Prarie reinterpretation.

What comes is a very predictably boring run into the third act and an anticlimatic finish. Nothing stood out as anything more than mediocrity and a dud of a film.

Decent movie if it was a movie. Just so everyone is aware before they go spend money to see this. It is basically the first two episodes to their show. A show that is only available on their app that also requires a monthly a subscription. This is either genius or stupid. For someone like myself that does not like shows because I cannot commit the time I feel totally ripped off. If you watch the movie and don't subscribe to continue the show you are basically left completely hanging at the end of the "movie" overall it was ok. Just feel they may have a better response if they were more clear on what this actually was.