X
  • 1980
  • R
  • United Artists
  • 1 h 40 m
  • 1980
  • R
  • United Artists
  • 1 h 40 m

Summary Walter Hill's major contribution to the group of westerns about the James-Younger gang, which robbed trains and banks, wreaking havoc in post-civil war Missouri.

Directed By: Walter Hill

Written By: Bill Bryden, Steven Smith, Stacy Keach, James Keach, Walter Hill

  • 1980
  • R
  • United Artists
  • 1 h 40 m
  • 1980
  • R
  • United Artists
  • 1 h 40 m

The Long Riders

Metascore Generally Favorable Based on 15 Critic Reviews
68
User Score Generally Favorable Based on 5 User Ratings
7.8
My Score
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Where to Watch

Summary Walter Hill's major contribution to the group of westerns about the James-Younger gang, which robbed trains and banks, wreaking havoc in post-civil war Missouri.

Directed By: Walter Hill

Written By: Bill Bryden, Steven Smith, Stacy Keach, James Keach, Walter Hill

Where to Watch

Top Cast

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Critic Reviews

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Metascore
Generally Favorable Based on 15 Critic Reviews
68
60% Positive
9 Reviews
33% Mixed
5 Reviews
7% Negative
1 Review

  • All Reviews
  • Positive Reviews
  • Mixed Reviews
  • Negative Reviews

Critic Reviews

 View All
Metascore
Generally Favorable Based on 15 Critic Reviews
68
60% Positive
9 Reviews
33% Mixed
5 Reviews
7% Negative
1 Review

  • All Reviews
  • Positive Reviews
  • Mixed Reviews
  • Negative Reviews
100
Hill wants the viewer to read his frames, not his dialogue; lighting, angles and cut ting carry the weight of meaning. Perhaps he sends too many people to meet their maker in balletic slow-motion. But that is only a small reservation. Hill is very much in the American grain, the inheritor of the Ford-Hawks-Walsh tradition of artful, understated action film making.
FULL REVIEW
90
Concentrating on familiar rituals - the funeral, the hoe-down, the robbery (a stunning tour de force in slow motion) - Hill pays tribute to such directors as Ford, Hawks and Ray, emphasises the mythic aspects of the Western, and focuses on the subjects of kinship and the land (probably suggested by Scotsman Bill Bryden's screenplay). This last theme is emphasised by Hill's coup of casting real-life brothers as the members of the gang. A beautiful, laconic and unsentimental film.
FULL REVIEW
88
The Long Riders takes more than a few cues from John Ford, favoring laconic characters whose projected confidence masks an inability to vocalize basic desires.
By Jake Cole FULL REVIEW
80
The screenplay (by Bill Bryden, Steven Phillip Smith, Stacy and James Keach) is basically an assemblage of bits and pieces that doesn't build toward any real emotional payoff. Yet The Long Riders is still the best Western in many years -- it has the laconic elegance of a ritual. [02 Jun 1980, p.87]
By David Ansen FULL REVIEW
60
A striking Western but empty as it is elegant. [25 Jan 1987, p.5]
By Kevin Thomas FULL REVIEW
60
What’s ultimately missing is a definable point of view which would tie together the myriad events on display and fill in the blanks which Hill has imposed on the action by sapping it of emotional or historical meaning.
FULL REVIEW
30
Walter Hill's first outright failure, this revisionist western draws on the major themes of his work—the relationship of pursuer and pursued; the beauty of clean, planned action; the attraction to violence and resultant moral revulsion—but none of them ignites.
By Dave Kehr FULL REVIEW

User Reviews

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User Score
Generally Favorable Based on 5 User Ratings
7.8
80% Positive
4 Ratings
20% Mixed
1 Rating
0% Negative
0 Ratings

User Reviews

 View All
User Score
Generally Favorable Based on 5 User Ratings
7.8
80% Positive
4 Ratings
20% Mixed
1 Rating
0% Negative
0 Ratings

There are no user reviews yet. Be the first to add a review.

Details

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Production Company United Artists, Huka Productions
Release Date May 16, 1980
Duration 1 h 40 m
Rating R
Genres
Tagline They were nine men from four families. They rode together from Missouri to Minnesota, and from Texas to Tennessee. This is their story...and it's as close to the truth as legends can ever be.
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Awards

Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards
• 1 Win & 1 Nomination
Cannes Film Festival
• 1 Nomination

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