The Quick and the Dead (1995)

"Gunfights every hour on the hour starting at noon" is the gimmick in Sam Raimi's revisionist western The Quick and Dead. Heavy on the style and lite on the substance I was disappointed, I had been curious about this one for two decades or so. While some performances more or less work, like Gene Hackman's and then newcomer Russell Crow's, some try a little too hard (Leonardo DiCaprio) and some just don't come off, such as lead Sharon Stone's. I had been thinking lately that Western's, especially post 1970 are one the hardest genera's to get right for me, with something like a 50% fail rate. Sadly The Quick and the Dead ended up on the wrong side of that draw. **