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The Long Riders

Play trailer Poster for The Long Riders R 1980 1h 40m Western Biography Play Trailer Watchlist
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80% Tomatometer 25 Reviews 73% Popcornmeter 5,000+ Ratings
During a bank robbery by the legendary James-Younger Gang, Ed Miller (Dennis Quaid) impulsively kills a man, much to the displeasure of leader Jesse James (James Keach), who insists that the gang scatter until the heat is off. The groups of brothers go their separate ways, with Cole Younger (David Carradine) considering settling down with his feisty girlfriend, Belle Starr (Pamela Reed). But they soon regroup for an ill-fated bank job in Northfield, Minn., that results in an epic chase.
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The Long Riders

The Long Riders

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Critics Consensus

With its pared down storytelling, The Long Riders delivers with an evocative atmosphere and artful brutality.

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Critics Reviews

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Richard Schickel TIME Magazine 10/07/2011
Hill is very much in the American grain, the inheritor of the Ford-Hawks-Walsh tradition of artful, understated action film making. Go to Full Review
Dave Kehr Chicago Reader 02/05/2008
Walter Hill's first outright failure. Go to Full Review
Variety Staff Variety 02/05/2008
What's ultimately missing is a definable point of view which would tie together the myriad events on display and fill in the blanks which Hill has imposed on the action by sapping it of emotional or historical meaning. Go to Full Review
Mitchell Beaupre Paste Magazine 09/29/2023
7.5/10
Strips away a lot of the steely gazes and taciturn men from Hill's first few pictures and gives us richly detailed interpersonal dynamics in the James-Younger gang and the men and women circling around them. Go to Full Review
Stephen Farber New West/California 11/03/2021
The Long Riders is exceptionally well made, but I came out feeling that there was no pressing reason to make it at all. Go to Full Review
Matt Brunson Film Frenzy 10/03/2021
3/4
The Long Riders sounds like merely a gimmick -- cast real-life brothers as real-life outlaw siblings -- but it turned out to be one of the last decent Westerns to hit the big screen until the early 1990s brought us Dances with Wolves and Unforgiven. Go to Full Review
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Audience Reviews

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Johannes S 09/24/2024 Great, short, and fast-paced western flick. Tells the interesting story without bloating it up. See more John H 03/31/2024 Very good fairly accurate telling on the James Younger Gang. Good story and acting plus stylized action See more 07/02/2023 Good western with a lot of foul language in it so be careful, James Welch, Henderson, Arkansas, July 1, 2023 See more Federico T 04/30/2023 If you're looking for a masterfully directed western that's perfectly balanced between environmental authenticity and elegiac characters' strenght and charisma, this is the movie for you. Rounded in family bonds' fundamental purposes and inescapable backlashes, vendetta's harsh violence and the depiction of a soon to collapse self-regulated and self-segregated provincial world on the outskirts of the modern american society ambition that the Civil War aftermath was going to digest and offer to a yet fragmented country, Walter Hill forges an intense and peculiar movie that loves to the bone the western aestethics but also places itself in an unusual midwestern setting. Everything in this plot progresses utterly epic still remaining realistic, somewhat stiff and composed, as passages of a ritual, to elevate gestures and significant moments, stages of a timetable that from the legendary deeds and renegade conduct of the James-Younger gang end in the downward spiral of these hopeless men that just won't fit at all with the expectations of their country to be. The family element is crucial to underline dramatically the emotions that are in the game but also to gain that kind of credibility to make the numerous cast gel (built upon groups of real brothers actors). The search of an authentic environment is the key to the entire operation, affecting everything from the locations, the historically accurate soundtrack by Ry Cooder, till the toned down, even darkened, film foil. See more Steve D 03/13/2023 Far too simplistic to work. See more Nothing Butt A 01/03/2023 One of the best westerns ever filmed See more Read all reviews
The Long Riders

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Movie Info

Synopsis During a bank robbery by the legendary James-Younger Gang, Ed Miller (Dennis Quaid) impulsively kills a man, much to the displeasure of leader Jesse James (James Keach), who insists that the gang scatter until the heat is off. The groups of brothers go their separate ways, with Cole Younger (David Carradine) considering settling down with his feisty girlfriend, Belle Starr (Pamela Reed). But they soon regroup for an ill-fated bank job in Northfield, Minn., that results in an epic chase.
Director
Walter Hill
Producer
Tim Zinneman
Screenwriter
Bill Bryden, Steven Smith, James Keach, Stacy Keach
Production Co
United Artists, Huka Productions
Rating
R
Genre
Western, Biography
Original Language
English
Release Date (Streaming)
Nov 30, 2016
Runtime
1h 40m
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