Rating summary

Movie		3.5
Video		4.0
Audio		4.0
Extras		0.5
Overall		3.5

The Last Hard Men Blu-ray Movie Review

An unfortunate title for a rather interesting film.

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman August 12, 2013

Note: This film is currently available only in this bundle: Movies 4 You: Timeless Westerns

The sixties and seventies were a time of transition for one of the hoariest genres in film, the western. What had once been a reliable box office attraction through the early fifties at least had found its mojo with audiences seriously depleted by the glut of small screen oaters which invaded television from the mid-fifties on, as well as perhaps just a natural attrition of interest caused by so many westerns having been released for so long, and by the time the early sixties rolled around, huge hit westerns were actually the exception rather than the norm. For every How the West Was Won (which was actually marketed as much as an “event” movie as it was an actual western), there were scores of other films, some with major stars and directors attached, which just fell by the wayside. Things seemed to be looking up when 1969 produced two unlikely western hits that couldn’t have been more different, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and The Wild Bunch. But audiences can be fickle aggregations, and while a number of fascinating westerns were made in the wake of these two hallmarks, few actually ended up connecting with audiences in any overwhelming way. The four films collected on this perhaps odd seeming two Blu-ray set from Timeless Media Group (an imprint of Shout! Factory) all fall into that less than stellar category, even if each of them has at least some redeeming characteristics (and sometimes much more than that). All of these films failed to ignite at the box office, and in fact probably were seen in such venues as drive-ins and then on various television broadcasts through the years. While they appear to be a fairly disparate bunch, spanning the years from 1964’s Rio Conchos to 1979’s Butch & Sundance: The Early Years, there are at least a couple of linking elements here, including three scores by the inestimable Jerry Goldsmith and two appearances by Jim Brown (including his screen debut). The four together provide a rather interesting look both at what went right and wrong with the western during this transitional era.

The Last Hard Men is a rather odd entry in the filmographies of star James Coburn and director Andrew V. McLaglen. Coburn portrays a half breed Navajo named Provo, who as the film opens is not so coincidentally on a chain gang helping to repair the transcontinental railroad (Utahns like myself might get that reference more than the general public). Provo manages a rather daring escape, killing two guards in the process, and gets away with a few fellow prisoners, the ones he terms “goats” instead of “sheep”. One of these goats is a nasty piece of work named Menendez (Jorge Rivero), while a somewhat innocent kid named Shelby (Larry Wilcox, pre-CHIPS) also somehow makes the grade. Provo obviously has some kind of plan in store, but it’s not immediately obvious what that is.

Meanwhile retired Arizona Ranger Sam Burgade (Charlton Heston) yearns for the old way of doing things, more than a bit bothered that his young successor Noel Nye (Michael Parks) checks on the status of various crime with a newfangled telephone and actually uses a car rather than a horse to tool around a muddy town. Nye breaks the news of the daring prison escape to Burgade, which catches the old man’s interest. He and Provo have a long history together. In fact, they’ve each shot each other at least once, and Burgade had the pleasure of putting Provo in jail this last time, for what he thought would be a life sentence. It probably doesn’t take a rocket scientist at this point to figure out what Provo’s motivation for getting free might be.

While Nye tries to convince Burgard that all this spiffy modern technology will bring Burgard and the other escapees in quickly, things take a decided turn for the worse when Provo shows up at the frontier house of Burgard’s daughter, Susan (Barbara Hershey), and takes her hostage. This is the first of several rather disturbingly violent scenes involving Susan, and Coburn simply lets loose with a level of viciousness that I personally never recall having seen from this actor in any of his many other roles. McLaglen, who is usually a fairly reserved director, stages the scene with a fair amount of aplomb, making it both frightening and unsettling.

Of course once Burgard becomes aware that his daughter has been taken, it’s a blood feud between two bitter enemies. Provo plays with Burgard, enticing him out into the country, and he repeatedly uses Susan for bait. Provo initially tells the more lasciviously minded of his gang to keep their hands off of her, but Provo isn’t always around to make sure his word is followed. Shelby has to timidly use a gun at one point to maintain order, shooting off the ear of one of his ostensible brothers in crime.

If Provo has Shelby, Burgard has Brickman (Christopher Mitchum), a young buck who accompanies the old ranger into the scrub to help bring about some semblance of justice. The bulk of this film is the cat and mouse game between these two sets of antagonists, something that builds to a literal conflagration in a hyperbolic climax that also features an unsettling slow motion rape and lots of bloodshed.

In fact as odd as it sounds for those who know the films of Andrew V. McLaglen, this seems to be McLaglen’s attempt to ply Sam Peckinpah territory. There’s a gritty aspect to the film that is miles apart from other McLaglen fare like McLintock!. Heston underplays fairly well here, even if his kind of western drawl tends to come and go, but this film is simply owned—for better or worse—by Coburn, who doesn’t just chew the scenery, he pretty much molests it. It’s a fascinatingly visceral performance from an actor who was almost always the paragon of calm, cool and collected.

The Last Hard Men Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Last Hard Men is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Timeless Media Group with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.35:1. This film, along with Rio Conchos, is the best looking of the bunch, with trouble free elements, nicely saturated and accurate looking color and commendable amounts of fine detail. Especially impressive is some of the location work, which features a lot of scrub oak and other "busy" filigreed environments, but which always resolves sharply and clearly. There are some moments of crush in a couple of very dark scenes, notably the big nighttime climax, where even a series of fires can't completely reveal adequate shadow detail, but otherwise this is a very nice looking transfer, with a naturally filmic appearance.

The Last Hard Men Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Last Hard Men features a DTS-HD Master Audio Mono mix delivered via DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0. The film features a rather florid sound design, with everything from the rattle and roar of an early automobile, to the mad galloping of horses across the plain, to lots of gunfire and, lest it go unmentioned, James Coburn screaming at the top of his lungs quite a bit of the time. Though this track is obviously fairly narrow, it's surprisingly full bodied, with a really nice sounding midrange and rather unexpectedly vigorous low end. Fidelity is excellent and dynamic range is exceedingly wide.

The Last Hard Men Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Trailer (1080i; 00:59)

The Last Hard Men Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

There were probably lots of backroom jokes in Hollywood about The Last Hard Men's title when it came out. But if you can stop giggling long enough to actually watch this film, there's quite a bit to like about it. Coburn has rarely displayed this level of outright violence, and he brings a rather startling authenticity to the role of Provo. Heston wisely chooses to underplay, probably realizing there was no way for him to effectively share the screen with Coburn if he adopted the same approach. There are some troubling elements in this film, including a kind of nasty misogyny, and it's a real shocker that it was directed by the usually staid and stolid Andrew V. McLaglen, but The Last Hard Men is certainly visceral, even if it's more than a bit unsettling. This Blu-ray looks and sounds great and comes Recommended.