Dead Man's Hand

What a hugely failed attempt at creating a good western to help fill the gap left by Yellowstone! Not even Cole Hauser or several other good actors could save this awful movie. I don't know if it was a combination of bad writing or really bad acting on the part of main characters but I cringed at most of it. The plot was okay, sort of, but somehow just didn't click. I thought it was amateurish, corny, slow, even boring. Maybe if Cole Hauser, Foree, and Brings Plenty had more important roles it could have helped redeem this picture, but as for me, it was a real disappointment. Don't waste your money or time.

AKA a comic book. No surprise there. I mean, this one will certainly not tax the intellect any more than your average Archie & Jughead. But then it's a Western, which even the best of them are most often sparsely plotted and can generally be summed up in no more than just a few sentences. High Noon for instance, and one of the uncontested best of them can be adequately described in two. This film at least has that in common, but it is however, no High Noon. But still, I think if you like the genre, entertaining enough, filling the requirement of lots of action, a lot of outdoor photography, and with the merit of one bit of originality I've never seen before in any film outside Science Fiction (The Alligator People is the only one that comes immediately to mind) that seen in a Western defies the medical science not only of the period plus this one, but anything likely to be accomplished this side of a Star Trek future.

How much we wanted this western to live up to it's 7.9 Rating. Terrible, excessive, painfully poor acting by some of the main characters, barely believable story. Honestly, I wasn't planning to write a review as I am usually far too lazy but, on impulse, I chose to lookup True Grit - suspecting that even that classic would be ranked at lower than 7.9. And so it was. True Grit is rated at 7.4 as of this writing. Spurred by this travesty, here I am to say my piece. We looked forward to seeing Cole Hauser in a new movie. Although he wasn't given much to do, he was believable and gave a credible performance. Steven Dorff didn't have the same presence as he did in Old Hernry, hisThe roles of two of the stars. The actors playing Reno and Vegas just weren't good. Perhaps it was the material they were given to work with. The writing wasn't a highlight. Lots of shooting, blood spatters, fingers being chopped off, etc. If these things are your bag, however, give this clunker a try.

This movie is where actors careers go to die, my kid had better acting in the 4th grade Dr Seuss play at school. Plot line felt haphazardly put together. I would say Hauser and Dorff were redeeming qualities but they weren't enough to help even a little. I'm not sure if the bad acting, poor cinematography, boring plot line, and shot 80s style is what they were going for if so they nailed them all. Maybe it's supposed to be a comedy if so they missed the mark on that too. I can't believe there is director somewhere that put this together and "we've really put together a solid movie here". Like many others I stopped in to drop a review so hopefully no one else makes the mistake of thinking it worth their time. It's not, it's really not.

This might be the worst western I have ever seen. The plot is completely nonsensical, the editing was terrible, and the acting was just the worst. The soundtrack is plain bad. Do not waste your time or money on this garbage. I have never felt compelled to write a review until the credits started to roll on this film. The random violence has no pertinence to the story, the supernatural effects come off as absolutely silly. The only thing that comes close to redeeming this pile is Cole Hauser basically playing Rip Wheeler in the Old West, however even that is not enough to justify the awful things that go on around him in this bad bad bad movie. Do not waste your time.