Blackthorn

(Mateo Gil/2011/Spain)

Sam Shepard plays a fictional Butch Cassidy who has survived into the late 1920’s and lives in Bolivia, raising horses. On learning of the death of Etta Place, the woman who accompanied The Sundance Kid and himself to South America years ago, he resolves to sell up and return to America to visit her son, who is his son. His plans are interrupted by a Spaniard on the run from a posse chasing him for stealing money from a wealthy mine owner. Cassidy gets embroiled with helping him out before discovering he has been lied to. The film finishes out with Cassidy exacting vengeance for the lie and heading across the mountains to freedom leaving the gate wide open for a Blackthorn 2. Some of this movie works really well, Shepard is great as the wizened, hard as nails ex-outlaw and the fantasy of him surviving is told convincingly. The scenery of Bolivia is beautiful and absorbing. Mateo Gil has developed a good premise and has a brilliant setting but he fails to generate any real tension within the arc of the story. The film consistently feels like it is playing out well rehearsed steps and there is no space for surprises. It is a pleasant 90 minutes of western whimsy but no more than that.

(2.5/5)