Tom Horn (1980)

• Year: 1980
• Released: 28 Mar 1980
• Country: United States
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• IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0080031/
• Rotten Tomatoes: https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/tom_horn
• Metacritics:
• Available in: 720p, 1080p,
• Language: English
• MPA Rating: R
• Genre: Biography, Crime, Drama
• Runtime: 98 min
• Writer: Thomas McGuane, Bud Shrake
• Director: William Wiard
• Cast: Steve McQueen, Linda Evans, Richard Farnsworth
• Keywords: hero, ranch, shootout, trial, one man army, brutality,

	6.8/10
	71% – Critics
	70% – Audience

Tom Horn Storyline

A renowned former army scout is hired by ranchers to hunt down rustlers but finds himself on trial for the murder of a boy when he carries out his job too well. Tom Horn finds that the simple skills he knows are of no help in dealing with the ambitions of ranchers and corrupt officials as progress marches over him and the old west.—Keith Loh

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Tom Horn Movie Reviews

“I am afraid of losing my ability to be able to come and go as I please.”

Directed by William Wiard and based on a true story, “Tom Horn” opens in 1901, in Wyoming, where McQueen meets John C. Coble (Richard Farnsworth) who offered him to ease up at his place for a while… Tom accepted, but he said I’d to earn my keep…

Seeing Horn with great ability with a rifle, and after speaking with the Association, John asks him to eliminate the rustlers who have completely wiped out their herd profits not to mention what the buzzards and the predators have done to their cash crops…

But after one incident has disturbed the Association in town, and the rustling has stopped, they determined to get rid of Horn forgetting he was only doing what they hired him to do… Mc Queen plays well the Indian tracker “scared to death of lobster, the man of the West “afraid to lose his freedom and not be able to get back up in those hills again.”

Linda Evans is appealing as the school teacher from Hawaii who saw a man of the Old West trying to live in the New…

Richard Farnsworth is the loyal friend John C. Coble who was quite sure that Tom never killed that kid… John advices him not to try to break out of the jail… He knows he can do it, but it’s just admitting his guilt if he tries…

Billy Green Bush is the U.S. Marshal Joe Belle who asks the newspaperman to sit behind the door and write lying down what he hears real good…

Slims Pickens is the old Sheriff Sam Creed who arrested Tom…

With a legendary hero, great photography and good direction “Tom Horn” is very good Western to watch

Odd, Haunting, Noir-Like Western

This is an odd movie. It’s a western, but also is like a film noir where few people, if any, do the right things and the usual Hollywood happy ending is non-existent. It almost leaves you depressed. In fact, it does. Yet, I was glad to have finally seen this movie, however, even if it was so long overdue, and think that many of the poor reviews (not here) are unjustified.

This movie is SO Steve McQueen: a tough guy with few words, a likeble man (“Tom Horn,”the title character) who gets the job done no matter how tough the assignment; a guy the prettiest woman in town goes for and a man who gets respect of the other (good) men in town. However, unlike many of his roles, the last 20-30 minutes reveals a totally unique character, and one that is puzzling.

Viewers of this would not be blamed for yelling at the screen, imploring “Tom” to “say something in your defense! Speak up!! Tell everyone you are innocent!”

McQueen’s “Horn” either is resigned to leaving the world perhaps the way he thought he should, with a shrug of his shoulders as if saying “that’s the way it goes” or he’s imitating Jesus Christ, who did similar when he spent his last day in kangaroo courts. He, too, wouldn’t answer questions and state the obvious. To paraphrase McQueen in this story, it’s like, “Hey, if you don’t know who I am and what I’m all about I am by now, well….do what you gotta do.”

Anyway, much of the film is a good western, nicely photographed and uniquely low-key with McQueen hired by a bunch of ranchers (an “Association”) to put a stop to all the rustling that has been going on in the area recently. He does just that. In fact, he apparently does his job TOO well.

Depsite this being a quiet movie, the action scenes are quick and very violent. Yet, McQueen and many of his friends in here are so low-key it makes for a strange western….and oddly fascinating, I thought. A pity this isn’t better known, especially since it was McQueen’s second-to-last film before dying of cancer. He looks different, too. He doesn’t look well and it must have taken some courage to make this film feeling as he did. Despite the haggard looks, underneath, it’s the same old Steve.

Someday, you’re going to have to pay for your way of life, Tom.

Tom Horn is directed by William Wiard and adapted to screenplay by Thomas McGuane and Bud Schrake from Horn’s own autobiography. It stars Steve McQueen, Linda Evans, Richard Farnsworth, Billy Green Bush and Slim Pickens. Music is by Ernest Gold and cinematography by John A. Alonzo.

Plot finds McQueen as legendary army tracker – turned hired gun – Tom Horn, who is hired by Wyoming ranchers to see off cattle rustlers, only to see them turn against him when his methods threaten their reputation.

As a big fan of both Westerns as a genre and McQueen (in the process of getting the cancer that would kill him) the actor, it’s tricky trying to review Tom Horn (and his final film “The Hunter”) without the heart ruling the head. Fact is, is that Tom Horn is not the glorious hard hitting Tom Horn picture that the character demands. It looks fabulous, is very melancholic, and McQueen is genuinely affecting in his performance, but the production problems (various attached directors, rewrites etc) are evident and give us a film of what might have been.

Nonetheless, this is no stinker, in fact, it’s a very reflective piece dealing with a man out of his time – and he knows it. The narrative is strong on the end of the so called Wild West, a changing of the times, where law and order is about to finally become the dominant force. Horn was the man who helped bring in the mighty Geronimo, which gives the makers a chance to not only nod towards respect for the great Apache chief as a plot device, but to also let Horn, in McQueen’s hands, show us a resignation of time being up for his kind.

One dodgy “special effect” aside, when the violence is required for the story it is an adrenaline jolt, this is because the tone of the piece is ultimately sombre. The hazy romantic thread between Horn and Glendolene Kimmel (Evans is fine in a thankless role) is suffering from flashback overkill, but the tender feel to it sits comfortably within the pic’s earnest intention. The political aspects strike the required chord for narrative worth, and the key aspect of Horn’s ultimate fate being based on fact or otherwise? is deftly handled.

Poor editing and a number of “time filling shots” grate a little, and if not prepared for a sombre pic then this will disappoint. Yet there’s a lot of beauty here and if you be a fan of McQueen or not, his turn is brave, committed and very engaging. 7/10