MURDER AT YELLOWSTONE CITY
US, 2022, 127 minutes, Colour.
Gabriel Byrne, Thomas Jane, Scotty Thompson, Isaiah Mustafa, Nat Wolff, Richard Dreyfuss, Zach McGowan, Aimee Garcia, Emma Kenney, Anna Camp, Isabella Ruby.
Directed by Richard Gray.
This is a very sombre Western. In fact, it is often quite glum. It is not the kind of Western that draws in the audience who love westerns.
The year is 1881. Yellowstone City has prospered during the gold rush but has now fallen on hard times. The sheriff, played by Gabriel Byrne, is intensely serious, committed to the city, despite the sometimes erratic behaviour, gambling, womanising, of his son, played by Nat Wolff. The church is present in the town, led by the pastor, Thomas Jane, who has had a rather violent past. He is supported by his earnest wife, played by Anna Camp.
The men, down on their luck, spend a lot of time playing cards, violent reactions. Richard Dreyfus (one of the producers of the film) plays the bartender who is in a personal relationship with one of the men. Into the town comes an African-American, well-dressed, well educated, quoting Shakespeare, a former slave, played by Isaiah Mustafa. When one of the locals discovers some gold and goes on a spree in the town, he is found murdered. The sheriff blames the black visitor and imprisons him.
The women in the town, some have been why is but now are prostitutes. The other woman is the wife of the murdered man, living out alone, seemingly detached from everything, deciding to leave town.
The pastor becomes involved, as does his wife, believing the accused men innocent, enabling his escape, and his being pursued by a posse, wounded and brought back, some of the men wanting to lynch him.
The pastor also investigates the bullet in the murdered man, exhuming his body.
In terms of the mystery of who killed the man, there are quite some complications, involving his seemingly detached wife, the son of the sheriff, her aiming to leave town with the gold but her being apprehended.
Some familiar Western tropes but so much of the action takes place at night, in the dark, and moves with the slow pace, and all very serious, so that it did not do well at the box office.
