At first glance it looks like Once Upon a Time in Deadwood is quite simply a spoof movie that might take off of three other movies in an attempt to do its own thing, but when you look closer you still seem to get the impression that Charles Bronson has been brought back to the screen by use of CGI. Once you get past that you might tend to think that it’s an attempt to spoof other movies, but in truth it’s one gigantic mash that seems intent upon creating its own story line while sticking closely to the formulas that have already been established throughout the long history of cinema. B. Alan Orange from ScreenRant has commented on this and seems to think somewhat of the same thing but also tends to be a little more forgiving of it than others since quite honestly the movie looks like something that might be headed to the B pile not long after its release this coming October.
The Bronson lookalike is Robert Bronzi, a star in his own right but one you might not know much about unless you’ve watched his movies or followed his career. As far as the main plot it happens to be that when a woman’s sister is kidnapped she goes seeking the roughest and most dangerous gunslinger she can find, and that happens to be Bronzi’s character. How she goes about procuring his services however is a bit questionable since she poisons his food with a slow-acting agent and then tells him that her sister has the antidote, so it behooves him to go and find the sister just to stay alive. That seems like a huge amount of motivation for any individual to take the job, but once it’s all said and done you can imagine that there better be a backup plan once the sister is found and rescued, otherwise a lot of people might take it upon themselves to repay their poisoner in kind whether they’re being paid cash for the job or not. Maybe it’s just me but being poisoned in order to secure the services one needs is a good way to catch a bullet or some other form of death if the individual either doesn’t want the job or wants a little payback before going to get the job done. Of course that’s not how it works in movies since the gunslinger simply wants to live and therefore is more than ready to go and find the woman’s sister.
In terms of being an original story there’s not really much there from the initial plot and premise since this kind of thing has been done over and over throughout the years, and the old westerns that many of us grew up with are quickly becoming outdated and not emulated as much thanks to the increased sensitivity that movies and just about everything else has been subjected to. What’s funny about this is that people want more realism in their movies and yet they probably couldn’t handle the reality of it all if they were to really get it on the screen with every single movie and TV show that came along. Historically the US was not a nice place back in the day but it did have its moments. But the narratives that we continue to cling to as per those that are more than willing to state factual data, when it’s in favor of their argument, tend to provide a story that is increasingly negative and doesn’t always see the silver lining that has existed with every issue and problem in the country since it was founded. In other words, for all the misery and negativity that’s been portrayed on screen there’s still a great deal of good that people don’t seem to want to admit has been prevalent in human history, especially when the country was actually quite well off as compared to many places in the world.
This movie however doesn’t get all that deep it would seem since it’s about a gunslinger going after a hostage that’s in need of rescuing and at the same time seems quite feisty and more than willing to try and rescue herself. One has to remember that not all women back in history were considered to be weak and in need of help at all times, as there have been plenty of women in every era that have been seen as inordinately tough in one way or another. It kind of goes with the territory in many ways, as Chris Enss of True West might agree women had to be just as tough at times as men to get what they wanted and to keep it. This movie might be worth a look just to see if it’s going to stay faithful to the time period or if it’s going to go off on its own tangent.
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