“Deserves got nothing to do with it.” These lines said by William Munny (Clint Eastwood) are the truest lines said in a western ever. As William Munny stands above the bleeding Little Bill (Gene Hackman), now a shadow of his former self he cocks the gun and prepares to kill him in cold blood. Bill says that he doesn’t deserve this, to die in this situation. William looking dominant with a low angle shot, mutters the opening words, more to himself than to Bill. Unforgiven is a film that is not only the greatest career choice by Clint Eastwood, but is also a slap in the face to his most of his previous movies.
In the 1992 film Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood forsakes the traditional western to create a realistic dire portrait deglamorizing the genre. Clint Eastwood known as a hero of the western genre, the biggest badass of them has made a radical change. He has decided to look past his fame and make reflection true to western life, violent realism. A character study showing violence for what it rally is, dehumanizing and sad.
The film starts off in a rolling text as William’s house presented in a extreme long shot hangs in the sunlight of the day. A sad song from the score creates a simple life mood with tone of loss. The audience learns that Will’s wife has passed away and of Will’s savage past. Knowing Eastwood films this is quite expected, that he has or was known as a man who knows how to cause conflict. William Munny now lives with his two children in the middle of nowhere (that means a lot when talking about a western) and farms pigs. At the first look of Will, it looks as if the previous text was wrong. He is an old broken down man who spends more time on his back being tossed around then this killer described. What changed?
Like many western characters a woman changed him. His past is just a painful memory and a new future waits. The future doesn’t have to be bright, just a change from what he was. It looks like Will is different, until a little visit by “The Schofield Kid” (Jaimz Woolvett). The Kid has come to ask Will to come out of retirement, and kill two men. What kind of request is that? Killing two men for 500 dollars (still a lot back then). The Kid comes off so casual in his words as if the request is simple conversation. That is why the west is such a dissident place, where killing becomes casual. It is for a just cause, to avenge the mutilation of a woman (with false rumors), but is it right? Gandhi once said, “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” It would appear here that it would have been better said an eye for a head.
Will joins The Kid and along with the also now unretired Ned Logan (Morgan Freeman) head out to kill these two men. On their way The Kid asks questions about Will’s past, his killing to be specific. We learn more and more of Will’s past as he answers bluntly. With a quite gaze Will looks out nearly every time his deeds catch up to him. His “thousand yard stare” is one created by his hands. Clint Eastwood plays Will as a silent and clumsy hero. When he’s not killing he’s not good at anything else. How sad that your only talent is to end life. However when the gun is in his hand, gunpowder turns into his air, liquor his fuel, blood his essence and red-hot steel his life; he is at home. He appears uncomfortable in his savage body when a gun isn’t present. Will is a killer, but Eastwood does not make him a glorious one.
Clint Eastwood has played some of the greatest gunslingers of all time. “The Man With No Name” or Blondie as he is known by some may just be the greatest of them all. He killed dozens and “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly” is the pinnacle of his legend. We look at Eastwood as badass killer. That raises the question, why do we praise one who takes life? It appears that Eastwood has seen this and wants to answer this question. It would look like he has said “ While I’m sorry for everything I’ve done (character/film speaking) this is who I am, I can’t run from it.” Eastwood creates Unforgiven as a eulogy of sorts; he is looking for redemption, but is lured back in. If we were told that Will is in fact Blondie, then this film would make even more sense. Eastwood starring in Unforgiven shows the deeds of his past characters as heinous and wants to step in the right direction. However it’s hard to change who you are as a person (Ex. saloon shootout). Some people just don’t change, they endure.
Eastwood arrives in town to be in turn beaten up by Bill. The scene shot in natural light showing how the darkness can be reflected with the character’s morals. Bill is a strict sheriff, one with complicated morals. However by the end of the film, he be may be the closest we having to a textbook hero. Now to call him good is a stretch, but at least he symbolizes something beyond evil in this film. He looks to punish the men responsible for the mutilation, but instead organizing a trade for the damages, with the saloon manager (who is in competition to be the most self involved bad character in the film). Bill agrees to not because he wants to, but because that is what the west is. Women are treated like cattle out there, because men hold all the power. It may be even more appropriate to call all westerns the problem with this. Bill follows the pattern of the western more than his own morals. He then keeps guns out of his town to avoid the threat of assassins. Bill beats up English Bob (Richard Harris) because he lies about his possession of firearms. The scene continues to darken (shadows/light) reflecting the violence as it gets worse. Once again he has good ideas, just bad morals. Some would say that later his killing of Ned is too much, that Bill deserves his death. Bob looks at this as the same that Will, The Kid, or Ned would, “An eye for and eye” (an assassin for a cutter). The later part of that saying is lost on them; they are already blind by the chaos of the west. Killing Ned is not just, but furthers Bill being a product of society, same as Will. The two characters are very similar; both are a result of their environments, which makes them good at killing. They try to justify it and avoid the conflicts that life throws at them (Will a farmer and Bill keeping guns out of town). Yet they can’t hide from who they are, Bill enjoys the violence and Will would call it home. They are trapped in the west, a prison they created.
However Eastwood as a director wants to keep people out of this lifestyle by deglamorizing the violence often seen in westerns. He shoots the first cutter and we see his long agonizing death. Back in those days a bullet to the gut was the biggest insult, they had no way to fix it yet. It meant a long gruesome death. The audience feels something for the man as he dies as we witness his last moments. Will sits on top of the ridge, looking into the sun. He knows what he did and wishes he didn’t, but it’s already done. William is often shown in medium close-ups and rarely shown closer. It’s possible Will is shown this way saying no one knows who he is (including him), he’s always at a distant. The next cutter is killed in an outhouse as “relieves himself”. Both kills are ambushes to kill the men in the safest way, and cowardly in a sense too. Not the usual Eastwood way where he takes on a dozen outlaws as he stands in the center of town. We don’t celebrate these killing but we still want to see it done. A insight to the audience that we want to see these men draw their last breath.
Will and The Kid wait for the money to arrive and The Kid reveal’s the truth about his killing past. They are presented in an extreme long shot with a deep depth of focus showing their isolation from their world. He says “it doesn’t seem real” and that’s what it is. In a nanosecond, life is over and he is no longer a man, but a corpse. The Kid realizes his mistake in taking another life, yet he is still guilty. “We all got it coming” Will says more to himself than to The Kid. All those in the west or the western genre are guilty of killing, of making violence cool. They have taken lives and Will feels they deserve to have their own candles go out. Not because it would make them even with the victims if they died, but to avoid any more sorrow for those who know the dead. To continue to live means more death for Will. He will just add to the tears if he continues on this way. He doesn’t deserve it more than other men. His death will just go hand in hand with what the west and the western genre makes it to be, chaos.
Clint Eastwood ends the film in a way that would seem to be going along with the western genre. Will walks into a saloon and shoots nearly everybody inside. Sound editing makes the scene loud and explosive. This is similar to many westerns and Eastwood films in general. This ending is not to make westerns cool and blow up the genre, but saying westerns cannot change. Similar to Will that he will always be a killer, Westerns will always be about violence. The natural light not only creates a realistic portrait, but as well as dark portrayal similar to the film. Will leaves the saloon not to ride off into the sunset, but a dark rainy street as he yells threats. The American flag hangs in the background still in focus (depth of focus) saying that Americans are guilty of promoting and continuing this way of life.
Nobody in this film is innocent; there are just different shades of grey to black. Will is guilty killing many men, because that is who he is. Bill has let paranoia ruin his life. Ned goes to kill men and cheats on his wife, the hookers want to take two lives for some scars; she is still a whole person. The saloon manager Skinny thinks of women as cattle. The Kid wants to become a killer. English Bob damns the west (in a way saying period English pieces and westerns should not mix) yet is guilty of doing the same things everybody else has done. The two cutters scar a woman over a small thing. Then there is W.W, the man responsible for allowing it to live. He writes and idolizes these men. Who looks at killing as just a way to sell books. His words bring others out to try make their own legends. W.W may just be the most ignorant “bad” character in the film.
Men are not men on the battlefield. They are creatures that would tear apart anything to live. Yet we don’t blame them, it’s simply survival. Westerns go beyond it and make these men heroes who do it for money and fun. “I’ve killed everything that’s about walked or crawled at one time or another,” Will tells Little Bill in the saloon. We look at this man as the hero of the film. Most cheer for him as takes on the saloon full of men. Instead it might be better to look at him as a sad hero. A man with empty eyes as he proceeds to take the lives of others. Clint Eastwood did not make this film to blowup the western genre. The man wanted to show what the western genre is, a way of promoting violence and what makes men and monsters similar.
Recommendation: One of the greatest westerns ever made and just one of the best films ever. That should mean I recommend it to anyone.
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