The Quick and the Dead (1995)
Average Rating: 5.9/10
Reviews Counted: 40
Fresh: 22 | Rotten: 18
No consensus yet.
Average Rating: 4.5/10
Critic Reviews: 10
Fresh: 2 | Rotten: 8
No consensus yet.
liked it
Average Rating: 3.1/5
User Ratings: 63,360
My Rating
Movie Info
Director Sam Raimi brings his trademark comic book-influenced visual panache to this post-modern Western. Sharon Stone stars as Ellen, a mysterious female gunslinger who arrives in the frontier hamlet of Redemption for a contest pitting quick-draw artists against each other. The event is the brainchild of Redemption's evil, corrupt mayor, Herod (Gene Hackman), a criminal who has taken over the town and charges a 50% tax on local businesses. The pot for Herod's deadly game has swollen, attracting
Feb 10, 1995 Wide
Nov 7, 2000
Sony Pictures Entertainment
Watch It Now
Cast
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Sharon Stone
Ellen -
Gene Hackman
Herod -
Russell Crowe
Cort -
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Tobin Bell
Dog Kelly -
Lance Henriksen
Ace Hanlon -
Roberts Blossom
Doc Wallace -
Mark Boone Jr.
Scars -
Olivia Burnette
Katie -
Bruce Campbell
Wedding Shemp (cut out) -
Keith David
Sgt. Cantrell -
Oliver Dear
Young Herod's Man -
Greg Goossen
Young Herod's Man -
Pat Hingle
Horace the Bartender -
Fay Masterson
Mattie Silk -
Sven Ole Thorsen
Gutzon -
Josef Rainer
Virgil Sparks -
Scott Ryder
Gunfighter -
Raynor Scheine
Ratsy -
Woody Strode
Charlie Moonlight -
Kevin Conway
Eugene Dred -
Mick Garris
Young Herod's Man -
Gary Sinise
Marshall -
Scott Spiegel
Gold Teeth Man -
Mike Stone
Counselor -
-
-
John Cameron
Bordello Swell -
Jonothon Gill
Spotted Horse
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All Critics (40) | Top Critics (10) | Fresh (22) | Rotten (19) | DVD (18)
A deadpan black comedy, Sam Raimi's fast-paced movie looks and sounds like a Leone oater but more so.
Top CriticMr. Raimi is limited by a sketch mentality, which means his jokes tend to be over long before his films end. But his tastes for visual mischief and crazy, ill-advised homage can still make for sly, sporadic fun.
What Raimi can't find is a center. He hankers for us to giggle at the brutal archetypes he's parodying and to warm to them, too. It won't wash, pardner.
Rarely dull, it is not noticeably compelling either, and as the derivative offshoot of a derivative genre, it inevitably runs out of energy well before any of its hotshots runs out of bullets.
As preposterous as the plot was, there was never a line of Hackman dialogue that didn't sound as if he believed it. The same can't be said, alas, for Sharon Stone...
Raimi's choice to give the film a comic book-like aura of mingled camp and grit makes for some fitfully energetic and entertaining moments, but it's not enough to overcome The Quick and the Dead's primary fault.
Just a little too one-dimensional . . . even for a two-dimensional medium.
Sam Raimi does a lot of interesting things in The Quick and the Dead and Sharon Stone plays a convincing female gunfighter, but the one-horse plot with no subplots to generate additional interest becomes a drag.
Raimi's movie borrows heavily from classic spaghetti westerns, but Raimi has a style of his own, and plenty of it.
Raimi's gimmicky but endlessly inventive direction gives it plenty of gas, and the excellent cast takes it the rest of the way.
Sharon Stone misses the mark on this one.
Stylish Raimi western is violent, unpredictable.
See it for yourself - surprising
Awesome western. Raimi's technique heightens the standard gunfight drama.
Audience Reviews for The Quick and the Dead
Super Reviewer
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- Herod: If the swede had been any slower, he'd had birds nest in his hat.
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- Herod: As soon as the rain ends I'm going to make an example out of you.
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- Herod: It takes a lot to scare me. I love the sensation.
Discussion Forum
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Latest News on The Quick and the Dead
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Crowe & Di Caprio to Team up for Ridley Scott's "Body of Lies"Man, Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe must really like working together...
January 30, 2007:
Sam Raimi Has Been Discussing "Hobbit" PlansAt first it just seemed like a smart fanboy's best-case scenario: If Peter Jackson can't (or won't)...
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There are names like Gene Hackman, Russell Crowe, Sharon Stone and Leonardo DiCaprio involved in this film and and all of them seem to be lifeless and blank characters without that much interest in them. Especially Stone is completely lost as a vengeful woman in the mission to set things right from her past.
Makers of this film possibly intended to do somekind of a visually overblown western but in the end this is just dull and lifeless experience to sit through. It is a work far from Raimi's own inventive Evil Dead.