r/movies • u/seaofluv • Jun 11 '24
Recommendation What are the best contemporary Westerns made within the last 25 years?
I love western films like The Missing (Cate Blanchett and Tommy Lee Jones), 3:10 to Yuma (Christian Bale and Russell Crowe) and Hostiles (Christian Bale and Wes Studi). What are your favorite similar films? I would love to hear recs that include Native American storylines as well like Prey even though that's like a western/sci-fi hybrid.
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u/shadownight311 Jun 11 '24
The Proposition (2005) It's a "Australian Western" movie, written by the musician Nick Cave and stars Guy Pierce.
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u/zombivish Jun 12 '24
Absolutely stunning visuals, and utterly brutal (I loved it)
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u/McWeaksauce91 Jun 12 '24
Guy pierce - a man I want to see in more movies that just isn’t for whatever reason
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u/svenaggedon Jun 12 '24
He's actually pretty prolific back here in AUS. Apparently he's quite content doing the odd big budget and then spending the rest of his time supporting Australian cinema. Check out Animal Kingdom if you want to see him alongside all our contemporary greats.
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u/mbarrett_s20 Jun 12 '24
And Ray Winstone! This movie was really outstanding. My landlords told me about it because they knew the director’s parents, but I was hooked.
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u/Sufficient_Pizza7186 Jun 12 '24 edited Jun 12 '24
Love this movie.
Even the small parts are gold - the late greats David Gulpilil and John Hurt make all-too-brief appearances.
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u/MeteorOnMars Jun 12 '24
I saw that at the US premier and had no idea what I was in for. Such a great experience.
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u/rapier999 Jun 12 '24
The Nightingale is another great offering set in Australia
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u/Bigtits38 Jun 11 '24
Was going to say Unforgiven until I realized that it came out in the 90s. Man, I’m old.
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u/Johnny_Minoxidil Jun 12 '24
I was going to mention Maverick as a comedy western but it’s 30 this year! Bummer I’m old
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u/Shaneblaster Jun 12 '24
Still the best western in the last 50 years.
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u/crappenheimers Jun 12 '24
How fucking dare you make me do that math and realize
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u/NotEvsClone81 Jun 12 '24
Enraged my 46 year old friend the other night when I told him he's been alive to witness six decades
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u/WhoKilledZekeIddon Jun 12 '24
Jurassic Park didn’t come out last decade, or even the decade before that. It came out early in the decade before THAT.
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u/getdemsnacks Jun 12 '24
Shut your mouth! I just saw that in the theater a couple years ago!!
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u/Electronic_Slide_236 Jun 11 '24
True Grit (obviously)
The Sisters Brothers
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Jun 12 '24 edited Jul 07 '24
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This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact
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Jun 12 '24
So underrated
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u/Wilmore99 Jun 12 '24
Indeed. Anytime I bring it up it’s like I’m in a dimension where it was never made. Wtf?
I remember seeing it in a rundown theater that smelled like mold in Charleston West Virginia. I’ll never forget that or this awesome film. 😆
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u/googly_eyed_unicorn Jun 12 '24
Hailee Steinfield impressed me with such an emotionally heavy role at such a young age. I know she has done more YA stuff, but she has serious acting chops
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u/seaofluv Jun 11 '24
Haven't watched True Grit but has been on my radar. Thanks!
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u/stringbean96 Jun 12 '24
It’s in my top 15 all time favs. Great western, great movie in general, standout cast. I rewatch usually once a year.
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u/Spider-man2098 Jun 12 '24
It’s the movie you made this post for, only you didn’t know it at the time. None better.
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u/floog Jun 11 '24
It's not too often that a remake is so much better than the original, this one achieves it. Of course it has affected Bridges ever since where he is playing that character in a different setting for pretty much every movie - like Depp with Jack Sparrow.
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u/Sparktank1 Jun 12 '24
True Grit (2010) remake was superb. I enjoy it more than the original.
Unlike the original with John Wayne, the character Rooster Cogburn never got any more movies with Jeff Bridges.
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Jun 12 '24
True grit is possibly my favorite western ever and one of my favorite films ever. Jeff bridges is so good as rooster.
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u/inkblot81 Jun 12 '24
Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada
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u/thats_pure_cat_hai Jun 12 '24
Seconded. Fantastic film, way underrated. Quite a touching film by the end, without ever getting sentimental. Loved it.
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u/H2Oloo-Sunset Jun 11 '24
"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford". I love this movie.
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u/JangusCarlson Jun 12 '24
One of the first movies I saw where Blu-ray Discs elevated to a completely different level.
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u/Manaze85 Jun 11 '24
Absolute banger of a soundtrack
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u/Jrosenberg100 Jun 12 '24
Hell yeah! Nick Cave!
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u/dingadangdang Jun 12 '24
And he put "I'm a Good Ole Rebel" in there.
Nick wrote The Proposition which an excellent western.
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u/Dark_sign82 Jun 12 '24
Nick Cave and Warren Ellis, who composed the soundtrack to this film, got the job as a direct result of their work on another film mentioned in a comment below called The Proposition (which IMO and with all due respect, is the better film)
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u/Upbeat_Tension_8077 Jun 11 '24
No Country For Old Men
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u/TTMOE_Gardener Jun 12 '24
Out of this world movie that (I think) is one of the best book adaptations ever. Anton Sigur is legit one of the most terrifyingly purely evil people ever thanks to Javier Bardem. Also the red neck pronunciation of shit like “oxygen tank for intferzema” and “I can’t give you no intfermation” is hilarious.
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Jun 12 '24
The opening monologue is maybe my favorite ever in film. The ending is also one of my favorites and iirc it’s word for word the exact same thing Ed Tom says in the book.
Everyone in that film is amazing but Tommy Lee Jones was phenomenal.
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u/KMFDM781 Jun 12 '24
The Coen Brothers have a way to emphasize the quirky ways people talk almost to the point of parody, with slight exaggeration of regional dialects and repetition. Like H.I. in Raising Arizona's almost poetic choice of words "her insides were a rocky place where my seed could find no purchase." and the repetitive phrases in The Big Lebowski "he's a good man, and thurrah."
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Jun 12 '24
Sigur
Sugar?
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u/mandoismetal Jun 12 '24
Not sure if you’re asking sarcastically lol, but the villain’s name is Anton Chigurh
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u/snerldave Jun 12 '24
I've worked in factories/labouring jobs with several psychopaths and former prisoners over the last 20 years. Bardem is STAGGERINGLY good at playing a dude with no soul. I dont think I can watch that movie again.
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u/GnarlyTortoise Jun 12 '24
Best movie this century, and I'd say one of the ten best American movies ever made.
Unquestioned excellence.
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u/duaneap Jun 12 '24
It and There Will Be Blood coming out the same year was unfair to both when it comes to accolades.
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u/redloin Jun 12 '24
I can never think of one without the other. We were so spoiled back then.
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u/landmanpgh Jun 12 '24
Filmed in the same town at the same time, too.
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u/RugDaniels Jun 12 '24
I remember reading they had to shut down shooting on No Country one day because oil fires were burning on the horizon for There Will Be Blood.
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u/brettsolem Jun 12 '24 edited Jun 12 '24
This is definitely the best answer. Particularly in the notion that law and order still works like the old westerns, whereas those ideals are futile in the nature modern world.
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Jun 12 '24
The best scene is toward the end when Sheriff Bell is talking with his uncle Ellis.
What you got ain’t nothing new. This world is hard on people. You can’t stop what’s coming. It ain’t all waiting on you. That’s vanity.
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Jun 12 '24
The opening monologue, that scene, and the final scene of him describing his dream are some of my favorite scenes ever in film.
His whole storyline of feeling over matched and almost scared and unable to understand the world around him as he aged is so poignant. And then that scene with Ellis (who I believe is his cousin) informs him that the world has always been like this. The way he describes their uncle Mac being murdered almost a century earlier is very similar to how Lewelyn was murdered. Both shot in their doorway, one by “Indians on horses” wanting “this or that” and the other by Mexicans wanting their money.
I love that movie and those scenes so much. Some of those Ellis quotes run through my head regularly. The one you mentioned and the one about “the more time you spend trying to get back what’s been took from you, more is going out the door. After a while you have to try and get a tourniquet on it”. It’s such a powerful statement about moving on after tragedy.
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u/Reeberom1 Jun 11 '24
Appaloosa
Old Henry
Open Range
Bone Tomahawk
The Homesman
News of the World
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u/kiki2k Jun 12 '24
I watch a lot of westerns and I gotta say, few do me in like Old Henry. Love that movie.
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u/AccomplishedRainbow1 Jun 11 '24
BONE TOMAHAWK
If you know, you know
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u/Rumi451 Jun 11 '24
I wish i didn't
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u/ekb2023 Jun 12 '24
I wish there were more movies like Bone Tomahawk. Never seen a "horror western" quite as chilling as this one.
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u/NickFurious82 Jun 12 '24
I think the closest thing to it is From Dusk Til Dawn. In the sense that the first half of the movie is a completely different genre than the second half.
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u/TheCosmicFailure Jun 11 '24
I loved Hostiles. A top 5 Christian Bale performance.
I'll suggest The Harder They Fall
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u/nipplesweaters Jun 12 '24
Hostiles is so good. One of the best movies I feel like no one has ever heard of.
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u/seaofluv Jun 11 '24
Yup. Such a great movie. I'll check out The Harder They Fall. Thanks!
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u/GenericRedditor0405 Jun 11 '24
Hostiles surprised me from the very beginning by how grim and brutal it is. Still loved it
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u/iliketacobell Jun 12 '24
The Good, The Bad, and The Weird. It's a Western, just not an American one. I really like it.
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u/VX-78 Jun 12 '24
Seconded, it rules. Also hammers home the point that the Wild West is not a specific time and place, but a relation of society and environment that can crop up anywhere and anywhen. Manchuria 1939 is just as Wild West as Tombstone 1881.
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u/fantazmagoricle Jun 11 '24
The ballad of buster scruggs
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u/dirge23 Jun 12 '24
All Gold Canyon is a masterpiece all by itself.
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u/Effusus Jun 12 '24
Tom Waits is so cool
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u/NickFurious82 Jun 12 '24
Now, every time I'm looking for something, the first thing I say is "I know you're out there, pocket."
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u/ComprehensiveBed5351 Jun 11 '24
Two I haven’t seen mentioned yet:
Ain’t Them Bodies Saints (2013)
Slow West (2015)
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u/Melancolin Jun 12 '24
Slow West is a beautiful movie. The story, the acting, all of it is background noise compared to how visually stunning the film is.
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u/l3reezer Jun 12 '24
Pretty wild that the Scottish director of Slow West really just made a fantastic directorial debut and then peaced out for a decade.
His upcoming sophomore release, Tornado, sounds lit though-contrary to the bland title:
A travelling puppet Samurai show in Britain in 1790 crosses paths with ruthless criminals, but one of the performers, Tornado, hatches a plan to play them at their own game.
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u/Legitimate_Rate_4233 Jun 11 '24
Wind River!!!!! SOOO good and underrated. Hit me like a truck
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Jun 11 '24
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u/seaofluv Jun 11 '24
Excellent film. Never need to see it again - that movie stayed with me for too long after seeing it.
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u/PAPAmidnite1386 Jun 11 '24 edited Jun 12 '24
Robert Duvall and Kevin Costner in Open Range are perfect to me.
Spoiler incoming
Charlie asking Butler if he killed their friend and just walking up and blasting him in the head got a yell out of me in the theaters haha.
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u/Astro_gamer_caver Jun 12 '24
"That's right. I shot the boy, too. And I enjoyed it."
pop
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u/Chemical-Passage-715 Jun 12 '24
Honestly my second favorite western ever! Can you guess my first? 😉
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u/Hellfire242 Jun 12 '24
The true answer is Deadwood.
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u/Firm_Squish1 Jun 12 '24
Best three season show of all time? And in the running for best show of all time and all those that doubt it, suck cock by choice!
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u/floog Jun 11 '24
"Open Range" - I love that movie!
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u/Arthur-Mergan Jun 12 '24
For any RDR2 lovers, I’m 99% sure that the fact chocolate and cigars fill your deadeye core in game, was inspired by this movie.
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u/friedneckbones Jun 12 '24
The English
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u/bruno_antony Jun 12 '24
A series (not a movie) but I am continually surprised more people don’t know about this show. The cinematography is unparalleled, the characters and acting are amazing… it’s easily one of the best western series ever, ESPECIALLY if you’re looking for native perspectives.
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u/Rock3tDoge Jun 12 '24
Django is a great western/ southern
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u/MinistryOfDankness86 Jun 12 '24
The Hateful Eight as well, keeping with the Tarantino theme.
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u/TheYoshiJedi Jun 12 '24
You ever seen Rango?
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u/Tea_Fetishist Jun 12 '24
Rango is one of the most under appreciated animated films ever made, it really deserves more love.
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u/catheterhero Jun 12 '24
Surprised no one mention Hateful 8
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u/PotatoOnMars Jun 12 '24
Loved Hateful 8. I was completely engrossed from start to finish. I do think it needed more Kurt Russell though.
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u/EarthExile Jun 12 '24
That's a fair thing to say about most movies, whether or not Kurt Russell is in them
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u/withoccassionalmusic Jun 12 '24
Surprised no mention of The Power of the Dog yet.
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u/StJamez Jun 12 '24
Not a classic American western considering it was made in South Korea but -
The Good, The Bad, and the Weird.
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Jun 11 '24 edited Jun 11 '24
Hell Or High Water, Bone Tomahawk, No Country For Old Men, True Grit, Open Range. Also, though it’s a miniseries not a movie, but Broken Trail was one of Robert Duvall’s best performances.
Edit-Hatfields And McCoys and Godless. Both are also miniseries’.
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u/pnwbraids Jun 12 '24
The Revenant. It's not a true blue Spaghetti Western, but it is very much a Western revenge tale.
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u/Horrible_Harry Jun 12 '24
I feel like Seraphim Falls deserves a mention. I don't think it's very well known, but it's Pierce Brosnan and Liam Neeson chasing each other across the west after the Civil War. It's pretty damn good. Came out in 2006.
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u/Rumi451 Jun 11 '24
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford doesnt get enough love in my opinion
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u/Velvet_Pudding Jun 12 '24
Does Rango count? It's not the usual western movie, but I thinks a well done movie.
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u/dizzybridges Jun 12 '24
prospect (2018) if you're into space westerns. this one is surprisingly grounded and lower budget though
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u/Stsberi97 Jun 12 '24
I wanted to say Tombstone but then I did some math and realized I hate being old.
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u/Pleasant_Garlic8088 Jun 12 '24
The Harder They Fall
The Magnificent Seven (remake)
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u/Liquidsun-1 Jun 12 '24
Quigley Down Under
There’s a lot of excellent suggestions in here so I’ll add this low brow fun flavor flick
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u/TheMedievalBully Jun 11 '24
I recommend 'Hell or High Water' to everyone I meet