It all feels disorienting and truncated.
All the Pretty Horses (2000)
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:98
Fresh:31
Rotten:67
Average Rating:4.8/10
Consensus: This adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's novel comes off as rather flat and uninvolving. Scenes feel rushed and done in shorthand, and the romance between Damon and Cruz has no sparks.
Runtime: 1 hr 57 mins
Genre: Dramas
Synopsis: Billy Bob Thornton's ALL THE PRETTY HORSES is about John Grady Cole (Matt Damon), a young rancher growing up just after WWII. After his mother sells the family ranch, John convinces his best... Billy Bob Thornton's ALL THE PRETTY HORSES is about John Grady Cole (Matt Damon), a young rancher growing up just after WWII. After his mother sells the family ranch, John convinces his best friend, Lacey Rawlins (Henry Thomas), to accompany him to Mexico, where ranching is still a big part of life. Along the way they meet Jimmy Blevins (Lucas Black), a winningly enthusiastic boy with a volatile nature. Eventually, John and Lacey end up on a huge ranch south of the border, where John falls for the wealthy rancher's daughter (Penélope Cruz). This leads to deadly trouble for the two young men, but John won't be dissuaded from pursuing his new love. Thornton has made a credible modern Western with this film, which gets strong performances from Damon, Cruz, Thomas, and, in a star-making turn, Black as the fiery Blevins. ALL THE PRETTY HORSES is at its best when focusing on the dusty details of the ranchers' hard existence. Barry Markowitz's cinematography and Ted Tally's script (based on Cormac McCarthy's much-loved novel) capture a sweet and melancholy flavor in depicting a way of life that seemed long since lost even while a hardy few were still living it. [More]
Starring: Matt Damon, Penélope Cruz, Henry Thomas, Lucas Black
Starring: Matt Damon, Penélope Cruz, Henry Thomas, Lucas Black, Ruben Blades, Robert Patrick, Bruce Dern
Director: Billy Bob Thornton
Director: Billy Bob Thornton
Screenwriter: Ted Tally
Studio: Miramax Films
Reviews for All the Pretty Horses
A cinematic corpse which lumbers about like one of the undead for a couple of hours before grinding to a merciful halt. Ship this nag off to the glue factory, boys.
A familiar and satisfying -- if not entirely memorable -- eulogy to a lifestyle that rode off into the sunset some time last century.
Gives us ample time to concentrate on the title characters of the movie and put the laconic human beings out of our thoughts.
The movie's fighting spirit is still there as well as Thornton's noble intentions, and in this year of crassness, I'll take a noble intention over shady condescension anyday.
People's personalities barely emerge from the shroud of mythology, reducing passion and conflict to set pieces with little emotional resonance.
Hopscotches from one condensed scene from the book to another, without ever sweeping one up in the journey or tapping into the mother lode of rich comedy that exists in McCarthy's brilliant dialogue.
For a slow moving film, there was the contradiction of scenes happening too fast to be developed and fully realized.
Misses the mark as a classic drama about coming of age....what we see on the screen is curiously devoid of soul.
A hollow shell--the frame of a story that either hasn't had a chance to fully gestate or a more full-bodied beast that was ultimately stripped down to the bare essentials.
Latest News for All the Pretty Horses
September 13, 2007:
Viggo Mortensen to Walk The Road?
The film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy's Pulitzer-winning, Oprah-certified novel, The Road, may have found its star. More...
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