Shadowheart (2009) (V)

Director:

Dean Alioto

Writers:

Dean Alioto (screenplay) and
Peter Vanderwall (screenplay) ...

Release Date:

4 August 2009 (USA)

Genre:

Drama | Western

Tagline:

James Conners came for Revenge... He found Redemption.

Plot:

James Conners comes home to the town of Legend, New Mexico in 1865 to avenge his fathers death against the ruthless Will Tunney...

Plot Keywords:

One Word Title

Cast

Angus Macfadyen	...	Will Tunney
Justin Ament	...	James Conners
Marnie Alton	...	Mary Cooper
Tonantzin Carmelo	...	Miakoda
Michael Spears	...	Washakie
William Sadler	...	Thomas Conners
Dean Alioto	...	Spider
Ines Dali	...	Velma
Anthony Michael Jones	...	Charlie
Courtney Gains	...	Finch
Shawn Reaves	...	Johny Cooper
Charles Napier	...	Sheriff Sanders
Daniel Baldwin	...	Mr. McKinley
Steve Pink	...	O'Toole
Rance Howard	...	Wedding Preacher

MPAA:

Rated PG-13 for some intense western violence.

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Certification:

USA:PG-13 (certificate #45331) | USA:PG-13 (Violence)

Filming Locations:

Agoura Hills, California, USA

Company:

Desert Moon Pictures

Trivia:

The film was dedicated to Justin Ament's Grandfather who died right before production.

Soundtrack:

She's almost exactly

Too many slips ups in authenticity prevented me from enjoying this movie.

This movie could have been more fun than it was but some of the people in charge of doing it right either didn't care or lacked the knowledge to do it right.

Some of the plot was predictable and seemed amateurish. The plot lacked realism and it didn't have to do so. For example, at one point our star is seriously wounded, but recovers with amazing speed as does his brother-in-law who experiences a painful injury. Within a day or two both are up and moving around like there was nothing wrong them. The director could have shown these guys slowly recovering and show some pain from their wounds once they do get back into action. Come on. That would have been easy!

The film lacked period authenticity. There is an outdoor evening wedding dance that is illuminated by what appear to be round "Chinese lanterns." Inside can be seen light bulbs. This is suppose to be 1865 and post Civil War. The light bulb hadn't been invented yet! Who was your technical adviser on this show?

A period of time elapses from the opening scene to the later ones and yet some of the characters never aged. The sheriff looked older in the beginning of the movie than he did at the end. In the opening scene two women are seen walking down the street with dome like parasols over their heads. Amazingly these women show up walking down the street years later with the same parasols.

There was no need to make out two surveyors to be bumbling eastern hicks. They could certainly still show fear at having been threatened but surveyors in the west would not have looked, acted and been dressed like that. The costumer, Jenevieve Busseau, and Wardrobe supervisor, Fanny Mac, get low marks for authenticity in this movie.

During the early Civil War battle scenes we see Union infantrymen with bright white canteen straps. These appear to have been newly issued from the prop department. Canteen straps got dirty pretty quick during the war and the prop guys should have dirtied them up so they could hardly be seen.

In the battle scene we see the bright yellow stripe of a cavalry sergeant as he bayonets a Confederate soldier. Possible, but more believable would have been to see another Infantryman doing it. Cavalrymen didn't tend to carry rifles that had bayonets unless they were mounted Infantry and then they wouldn't be showing that yellow stripe.

Questionable authenticity is also true in the scene where a few Navajo Indians are being herded of by some Union troops and being taken to a reservation. In addition in that scene, neither the commanding officer or his subordinate officer wore shoulder straps or any kind of insignia. After the Civil War the volunteers were back in their home states. The Regular Army was back in charge and uniform regulations would have been more adhered to. It is doubtful that two officers would have been dressed like these two were in the herding scene. The subordinate's double breasted coat indicates his rank as being that of a major or higher. That means that you had a major and his superior officer, who had to be at least a colonel, leading a small band of less than a dozen Indians to a reservation. Nope. Wouldn't have happened.

In another scene, the first prisoner that our star brings in to justice doesn't have a hat. Why not? It was hot. Everyone wore and kept a hat. The prisoners face was well tanned though, as if during the day he didn't wear a hat. Maybe he was a 2009 tanned movie star and not an 1860's desperado! Take a look at today's cowboys and farmers. The tops of their foreheads are white from being shaded from the sun by their hats. Put a hat on the bad guy!

There were more but that's enough. In summary, while some scenes were well done and the actors were appropriately dressed, there were too many slip ups to let us just sit back and enjoy the movie. Let's hope the next attempt at a western or a Civil War period movie hires technical experts that will be listened to and will thus help make the film more believable.