Unforgiven [Blu-ray]

Customer Reviews:

• Prefection destroys the mould: The last western that can ever come to life on the silver screen. After it there will only be placebo westerns. The ultimate episode of the western wilderness just before it turned so sour that your blood would curdle in your veins and your brain would either calcify into a heartless stone or liquify into a tasteless brew. The solitary cowboy is the real judge and executioner, in one word that last fatal justice maker that represents the final fate of all crooked minds that meet with their destiny in front of the barrels of his guns just before he shoots them dead with no remission, no suspension, no parole, ever and never. Fatal lethal fateful fate of a big bang death of a few trashy men who thought their violence was god's law to all others. And God came down from his heaven in the shape of Clint Eastwood and he struck them dead with the flashes of lightning of his anger. Just before these hooligans learned that women had to be respected, that plain justice, fairness and humanity require strength, righteousness and forwardness. With only one star in sight guiding their steps, the star that leads to Bethlehem and the birth of a really humane world founded on the salvation of the innocent and the damnation of the guilty, and not the reverse. Probably the acme of western films, the final touch to be able to close a long line of inspiration that has to come to its end since the audience has now lost their innocence. When justified violence is the angry redeeming tool of gratuitous and pleasurable cruelty. But that's also the end of a myth, the myth that there is a salvation of the innocent and the weak in this savage world that could not even think of existing if it were not brutal.
  
  Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris I Panthéon Sorbonne, University Paris Dauphine, Université Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines
  
• In my Top Ten List: Unforgiven is not just a Western movie. It is a statement. It is in my top ten list of all time great movies. This is Clint Eastwood at his best. The movie is an allegory, metaphor and masterpiece. The characterization of human failing, guilt, determination, cruelty,love, hate,and indifference in one movie is beyond measure. The blu-ray version captures the beauty of the country with magical sunsets amidst a story of revenge and ultimately a quest for forgiveness.
• Unforgiven Gives: This is one of my all-time favorite movies, and to experience the clarity of the movie on Blu-ray was thrilling. Good stuff!
• Clint's a winner!!: I've have had this film in standard DVD, and now have the HD-DVD version of it, and it's even better. I totally agree with the rave reviews of this film and it marked Eastwood as an important director to watch (witness his 2 great war films, and another Oscar winner-"Million Dollar Baby"). If you have either of the Hi-Def formats, I would seriously recommend you purchase this classic asap. By the way, when I first saw this classic in a suburban theatre, many people in the theatre clapped after it was over which goes to show you how strong a reaction this film has made on the general public!! There are no winners when it comes to the violence within mankind!!
• Greatly executed, ethically challenged: Technically, and acting-wise this is a great movie. The performances, especially by Gene Hackman, Richard Harris and Eastwood, are superlative. Hackman's "Little Bill" is easily his most memorable character since Popeye Doyle in "French Connection" (Too bad he had to do a caricature of it a couple years later in "The Quick and the Dead"). Cinematography, editing and most of the dialogue are also excellent.
  My problem is with the plot. So Eastwood's Bill Munny, after arriving in Big Whiskey, has a dark epiphany of sorts in which he sees the harsh reality of death and the terrible consequnces of his murderous past. Yet he then almost casually goes through with the contract killings, even though he now knows that the account of the mutilation of the prostitute that he is supposedly exacting revenge for was exaggerated. To me, this makes all his dark visions and revelations meaningless; they had no effect. Despite all the pretensions of the script, in the end this becomes just another conventional western, with the "good guy" shooting all the bad guys. Despite all his character falws and all the nuances, in the end Eastwood is presented as just another avenging hero like his mid-seventies characters.