Wyatt Earp (Single Disc Edition)

I cannot attest to the film's complete authenticity, but it starts out telling an often told tale. Young Wyatt Earp tried at least 4 times--beginning at the age of 13--to run away from home and join the Union Army. In the film Gene Hackman, playing his father, stops him and sends him back home. This scene and the one following where Virgil and James Earp return from the War are two of the most compelling in the film.

The remainder of the two-disk film closes with Wyatt much older having survived the Western frontier and moving on to Alaska. It's a hopeful ending and a beautifully filmed one, too.

The other aspect of this film I liked best was James Newton Howard's soundtrack. The ex-Toto musician can really bring life to a scene and more often than not when I have enjoyed a soundtrack, I've found James Newton Howard was somehow involved in the effort.

Admirable as this attempt was the movie Tombstone was a much better picture. Val Kilmer was awesome as Doc Holliday and Quaids performance is strained and hammy in comparison. The entire cast was excellent and the film had a better quality troughout.

I won't go into detail of either film since others have already done that.
In every way Wyatt Earp is far more historically accurate.
Although I'm no Costner fan I thought he did a fairly good job
as well as the rest of the cast, Dennis Quaid was very good.
History is usually less exciting than hollywood would have us think.
Val Kilmore's "Doc" was over the top for me, especially when he fired 3 shots in
succession from a double barrel shot gun , "happens alot in westerns".
If you want snappy dialog with a bunch of "pretty people" go with Tombstone.
If you want the grimness and a more accurate portrayal
of the life and events of Wyatt Earp then choose, well... you know.

This film has received mixed reviews, mostly focused upon differing opinions on Costner's portrayal of Wyatt Earp. Some say that Costner is too stoic and unemotional, while others comments that, well, that's the way Earp really was. Both miss the point.

The crux of Costner's performance is that he anchors the film. As a producer, he helped give this motion picture artistic direction, and as an actor, he is the keystone of the production. Granted, Dennis Quaid is tremendous as Doc Holliday. Still, Costner's stage presense in the film give it a great deal of its depth. This is one of Costner's best performances, due largely to his success in portraying Wyatt Earp as a man who was motivated and governed by his own internal code, rather than the hardships that continually confronted him.

(Beware: Plot Spoilers ahead!) We follow Wyatt Earp from his boyhood days learning life's lessons from his lawyer father, here protrayed by Gene Hackman. We see Earp enduring the death of his first wife Verilla from Typhoid (watch for the mom from "Little House on the Prairie" portraying Verilla's mother). Earp falls into despair, attempting to drown his sorrows in alcohol. He descends into a criminal existence, only to be incarcerated as a horse thief. He is rescued by his father and journeys west, where he, almost by accident, is drawn into the life of a lawman in Dodge City.

What is most compeling about Costner's portrayal of Wyatt Earp is how his character evolves through his confrontations with outlaws. He begins the film as an idealistic, adventurous young man who is at heart a romantic. The tragedy of his first wife's death, coupled with his continual confrontations with ruthless outlaws, causes a profound shift from youthful exuberance to cold, tough survivalism. Earp depends on the enforcement of the law, because in the old west that's all there was to depend upon. Costner successfully portrays Earp's abandonment of his youthful ideals as his reputation as a lawman grows.

It is not until Earp finds love again that his inner self appears to be reawakened; this is portrayed in a believeable, if not overly emotional fashion.

As aforementioned, it is Costner's stage presense that gives this film its anchor. He presents Earp as a man whose sense of identity was stronger than the wickedness and lawlessness of his countrymen, and it was this quality that gave Earp what he needed to survive and triumph over the criminals that hounded him continually. To the film's credit, this facet of Earp's character is not presently overtly, but rather very successfully inferred by Costner's intense portrayal of one of the Old West's most controversial and misunderstood figures.

I strongly recommend this film, particularly to Costner fans. Just about anyone with an interest in the Old West might find merit in this film, so give it a shot (no pun intended). You'll be glad you did.

Note: Watch for Tea Leoni's "cameo" as a prostitute attempting to seduce Wyatt during his formative years in the west. Remember her from "The Family Man" with Nick Cage? She's almost unrecognizeable here.

Apparently this is Kasdan's attempt to turn the murderous old west into some kind of Spielberg-ian morality tale. Instead we get a film so stale and hollow it manages to make a mediocre actor out of even Gene Hackman. Uninspired dialogue delivered with all the craft of a voice-mail message. If the Old West isn't quite dead yet this one will do it. My biggest regret is that I had to contribute to this production in order to learn this. Comes with not one, but two cram-packed disks. Yippee-eye-ay!