Unforgiven

In the late 1950s, Western TV shows filled the air.  There was my favorite Have Gun Will Travel (Richard Boone) plus others like Gunsmoke (James Arness), Wagon Train (Ward Bond), The Rifleman (Chuck Conners), Maverick (James Garner), Cheyenne (Clint Walker) and Wanted: Dead or Alive (Steve McQueen).  But there was another whose second lead character (Rowdy Yates) caught my attention.  That was Rawhide and the actor Clint Eastwood.  

Some time ago I watched one of Richard Boone's early films, Star in the Dust (1956).  And there, a character named Tom walks across the street and has a brief conversation with John Agar, the star of the movie.  It's Clint Eastwood.

In 1964, Clint Eastwood broke free of his Rawhide TV character when he starred in A Fistfull of Dollars, a Western movie directed by Sergio Leone and filmed in Spain.  It was the beginning of a long, varied and successful career as a Hollywood star.

I especially enjoyed Clint Eastwood's 1992 Western, Unforgiven, which he produced, directed and starred in as William Munny.  It was nominated for nine Academy Awards, winning four, including Best Picture (Eastwood), Best Director (Eastwood) and Best Supporting Actor (Gene Hackman).  Clint Eastwood was nominated for Best Actor, but lost to Al Pacino in Scent of a Woman.

The story of Unforgiven concerns two cowboys (1881 Wyoming) who disfigure a prostitute's face with a knife after she laughs at one of them.  Outraged at the punishment of the two cowboys (Is a fine justice?) handed out by the local sheriff (Hackman), the brothel owner and the other prostitutes offer a reward of $1,000 to anyone who kills them (Is death justice?).  Hard up for cash, Munny (formerly a notorious outlaw, but now a poor widowed pig farmer with two young children) accepts the offer along with two colleagues.  

Thus, the hero of the film (Munny) is an assassin.  Really!  If the story were told from the point of view (POV) of the sheriff, he would be the villain.  Interesting!  

Munny and one of his gang (Kid, played by Jaimz Woolvett) kill the two cowboys.  While waiting for their reward, they discuss what they did.

Munny:  "It's a hell of a thing killing a man.  You take away everything he's got and everything he's ever gonna have."  

Kid:  "Yeah, well, I guess they had it comin'."

Munny:  "We all have it comin'."     

The third member of the gang (Ned), played by Morgan Freeman, leaves the other two before they do their job, but is captured and killed by the sheriff.  His dead body is put on display outside a bar in town.  Munny goes there seeking revenge.  He enters the bar at almost the same moment the sheriff is organizing a posse to find him.  Munny is outnumbered almost twenty to one, but has the drop on them with his double barrel shotgun.

Munny:  "Who's the fella who owns this shithole?"

After the actor Anthony James (Ralph, In the Heat of the Night) identifies himself as the owner, Munny shoots him dead.

Sheriff:  "Well, sir, you are a cowardly son of a bitch.  You just shot an unarmed man."

Munny:  "He should have armed himself."

Sheriff:  "You would be William Munny out of Missouri, killer of woman and children."

Munny:  "That's right.  I've killed women and children.  I've killed everything that walks or crawls at one time or another.  And I'm here to kill you for what you done to Ned."

And does he?