The Shooting

Western, USA 1966, 83 min, American English with introduction

This film never had a true cinema launch – and yet it is one of the most famous of all Westerns, because it is an existentialist movie that persistently exploits the traditional values of the genre: Monte Hellman put together this subversive film with Jack Nicholson, who also played one of the of the lead roles: a contract killer. He is one of four characters who circle each other in search of a nameless murderer: the former bounty hunter and gold-digger Gashade (Warren Oates, famous for his role in Sam Peckinpah’s “The Wild Bunch“), the slow-witted Coley (Will Hutchins, Coppola’s “Gunfighter“), a mysterious, nameless Lady (Millie Perkins, who played alongside Elvis Presley in “Wild in the Country”) and the aforementioned Nicholson as a “Stranger in Black“. “The Shooting“ takes a series of twists and turns triggered by the film’s fifth main character, the desert: until it reaches the climax that gave the film its name …