It has taken me a very long time to watch this film in a single sitting, and a very long time tolerating it, so much so that upon completion and having given it some years, I immediately searched the internet for people of a like mind as me; that being that it's a load of rubbish.
There are a few out there, mostly on hidden secret dark little corners; of which clearly this is another example.
The open chorus of plaudits for this film, if we can call it that, all fall into two broad but terrifying categories. The first are Cohen brother fans, they won't be deterred and I can agree with them on some of the points they raise. It looks great, the cinematography and sets are for the most part great and it has call backs to great westerns.... Like the name of the Bank.... Little nuggets of gold itself. And individually the performances are great.
The second group are those voices which really annoy me, they say "you have to be smarter" to get the joke... To read between the lines.... To understand the history.... These people are the worst, not the least as their attitude is very insulting, which it very much is, and condescending. But really we are not dumb, we are not being obtuse and really should we need a social education background in order to comprehend some of these stories? No, not really.
So in order, and I am going to go from memory here, we have:
Buster the gun slinger story.
The Bank robbery.
The Gold Prospector.
The limbless Thespian.
The Wagon Train.
The Stage Coach.
The weakest is the Stage Coach, just extremely weak, and unlike the others it looks the worst. And it was really hard to watch, really quite boring and ultimately had no point. You can tell me it did have a point, but watch it again... Did it? Really?
The Wagon Train, it had something, there was something there.... I was even hoping that Billy/William and Alice would tie the knot but then the other Wagon Guide would fly into a jealous rage, like there was some homosexual tension or active romance the younger man was basically calling off; just something which would have explained the story, nothing did... Sure I watched the story, but it was a pointless story.
The Bank Robbery had a very strong start, you had the explanation of the previous robber being kept alive for the Marshal for three weeks and ending up doing hard labour, instead we cut to James Franco strung up... Twice... Just... Erg, there was no fabric, the two halves of it made no connection to one another save for his horse not listening to him, that was the only link between front and back.
We're half way through this production, I can already see in the last story it was simply rushed and done very much to a budget, but was pointless, so we're not far from useless.
Again the Wagon Train, slow burn start, quite interesting middle, the tension over the marriage... But then, just as you think... "Oh the lover of Billy saved Alice, now he's properly torn between the two" or something... boom... literally, killed the plot.
The title carrier, Buster Scruggs, well that was my favourite of the stories (closely followed by the Prospector) I thought that was going to be the whole style of the film, heck it is its very title. But then they shot that down fast, and the looney toons soul rising to heaven scene.... It reminded me of the laughing hyena's at the end of Who Frames Roger Rabbit.... And just was no in keeping, it was so jarring for the whole rest of the film. And it ultimately made no sense, like if we saw the spirits of the other gun slingers he fought, maybe.... There might have been an Undead PD thing, or a Frighteners Wild West style thing... But no, no pay off, just... a song.
This leaves the Prospector to save the film, and I have to be honest, it was slow, but my favourite story.... His throwing away ANY gold though, even little flakes in the first few pans... Just so they can say "keepers, we're getting to keepers" is pointlessly annoying, and really flies in the face of the "you need to know the history kind"... really, know the history, ever seen anyone knowingly discard gold? But it had an interesting parable with an echo of echo message, he entered a virgin, un touched wild, dug holes, shared with the owl, nature reclaiming it almost immediately with the deer at the end... Even though they were just holes he made little impact but got what he wanted, which is a good way to think.
Rather than watch, ride on someone else's efforts and steal from nature, from the Prospector.... It's a moral tale and the only one to pick out of the bunch.
If either of the brothers were to ever read this meager gaggle of gripes, I'd say to them to loose the yes men, sometimes things aren't very good, you done goofed boys.
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