Val Kilmer Archives - chimesfreedom

On July 7 in 1900, Warren Earp — the youngest of the Earp brothers — was killed in a saloon in Wilcox, Arizona. Warren’s most famous brother, Wyatt Earp, lived until 1929. On the day he died, Warren was drinking and confronting other customers when John Boyett killed him in a gunfight. In a later trial, Boyett was found not guilty because he was acting in self-defense.

Warren Earp did not participate in the famous 1881 gunfight at OK Corral with his brothers and Doc Holliday. But he was in the town at the time. And later he helped Wyatt with the revenge killings after the gunfight. All of those events surrounding the gunfight are portrayed in the movie Wyatt Earp (1994), a decent movie with an odd ending.

The Ending of “Wyatt Earp” . . . on a Ship?

Wyatt Earp is an enjoyable movie and in some ways superior to the more popular Tombstone from the same year. But there is one major problem with it. The movie has a poor ending. Had director Lawrence Kasden given the movie a memorable ending, the movie would be more highly regarded than it is. (Spoiler Alert: This entry discusses the film’s ending, although it is not a twist or surprise ending.)

In Wyatt Earp, the movie follows Earp’s life from his time as a child to adulthood. The film, of course, focuses largely on Earp’s western exploits. And much of the movie centers on Earp’s time in Tombstone, Arizona. It is in Tombstone where Earp and his brothers participated in the Gunfight at OK Corral.

The movie provides a realistic portrayal of that famous fight. Then, the movie shows subsequent events and the anger among the survivors. As the movie nears the end, we see Kevin Costner’s Earp exacting revenge on other characters who participated in the Tombstone gunfight.

Then, the movie cuts to many years in the future. Earp and his wife Josie Marcus are on a ship near Alaska.

They are approached by a young man who recounts a story, by aid of a flashback, of how Earp saved his uncle, Tommy “Behind the Deuce” O’Rourke (based on real-life Michael “Johnny-Behind-the Deuce” O’Rourke). Tommy’s nephew describes how Earp had intervened to protect Tommy from an angry mob many years earlier in Tombstone.

Then, after Tommy’s nephew leaves, Earp says to Josie, “Some say it did not happen that way.” She responds to the effect, “Don’t worry Wyatt, it happened that way.” End of movie.

The video below includes most of the movie’s conclusion, although it omits the comments by Wyatt and Josie at the end of the scene.

Why the Ending of “Wyatt Earp” Does not Work

This coda to the movie does not work for a number of reasons. First, the scene includes a distracting flashback after a short jump to the future.

We are thrown into a big jump in the future, which could work if the future showed us something meaningful about the movie we have been watching for three-plus hours. But the purpose of this flash-forward is to show a flashback to Earp’s lawman days — a time period the movie already covered.

Further, the ship ending — especially along with the flashback — makes it appear that the Tommy-Behind-the-Deuce character has some big significance for summarizing Earp’s life. But what happened with Tommy does not really seem that significant. It is not any more important than the rest of the movie that already focused on Earp’s lawman. But by ending with a discussion of the flashback, the movie makes the viewer think they should see something important that just is not there.

On the IMDb website, one astute viewer notes that earlier in the movie Josie had mentioned having heard the Tommy-Behind-the-Deuce story when she first met Wyatt. But, even assuming viewers will remember one passing mention of Tommy early in the three-hour movie, viewers may not remember at the end. And even if they remember and make the connection at the end, it is still confusing about why the movie ends on the Tommy-Behind-the-Deuce note.

What Was the Director Thinking?

There does not seem to be much discussion of the ending on the web. But there are a few brief critiques (“muddled,” “neutered climax,” etc.). And Roger Ebert calls the ending sequence “pointless.”

One might concede there is an argument for what Director Lawrence Kasden was trying to accomplish. The scene does reflect on the myth of the Western and how events may be remembered differently than how they really happened.

But without a significant connection to the rest of the movie, the coda is confusing and does not work as effectively as the way the same theme was explored in The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence. I had hoped the Extended Two-Disc Special Edition would add more to explain the confusing ending, but unfortunately nothing was added that affects the end.

The flashback does show Earp as a pure hero. When we watch Earp in the real-time of the movie, we see many flaws in the man. But when we see him in the memory, Earp does his job as a lawman perfectly. So, perhaps Kasden wanted viewers to see that contrast to show how Earp became remembered as a hero and his flaws forgotten in that memory.

That interpretation of the ending makes some sense. But if that interpretation was Kasden’s goal, the contrast should have been clearer for the viewer disoriented by the sudden jump to the future on a boat. Maybe the scene needed to be longer.

Perhaps Kasden was trying to invoke another famous movie scene from To Kill a Mockingbird. In that movie, lawyer Atticus Finch protected a man from a lynch mob, and the viewer saw him as a courageous hero.

That all being said, with the exception of the ending, Director Lawrence Kasden created a very good Western epic biopic with Wyatt Earp. The film does a decent job of trying to convey much of a long adventurous life.

I even prefer Wyatt Earp to the less realistic Tombstone. Kevin Costner does a good job in the lead role, portraying the hero as a dark and troubled character. And Dennis Quaid gives one of his best performances ever as Doc Holliday. One of the best things about both Wyatt Earp and Tombstone are the portrayals of Doc Holiday by Quaid and Val Kilmer, respectively.

If you do not mind the awkward ending and the length of the film, and if you appreciate character-studies and Westerns, you might want to spend a lazy weekend afternoon watching Wyatt Earp.

(The trailer has a better ending than the movie, withe Gene Hackman’s lines summarizing the theme of the movie better than the lines that actually ended the movie.)

Photo via.

Disagree? Have another movie with a stupid ending? Post a comment.

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The original Lonesome Dove is one of the finest miniseries and westerns. Lonesome Dove, based on the novel by Larry McMurtry, originally ran on television in 1989. It followed the adventures of Augustus “Gus” McRae, played by Robert Duvall, and Woodrow F. Call, played by Tommy Lee Jones, and also featured Diane Lane, Danny Glover, Anjelica Huston, and Chris Cooper.

Lonesome Dove’s success spawned several sequels and prequels. Maybe you have not seen any of them and are wondering where to start, or maybe you have seen Lonesome Dove and wondered whether the others are worth your time. Well, Chimesfreedom is grading each series on a scale of 1-10, addressing each one in chronological order by the time period covered. In this post, we rate the prequels as well as the original Lonesome Dove. Future posts will address other series in the franchise.

Dead Man’s Walk (1996)

Set in the early 1840’s, Dead Man’s Walk follows the adventures of a young Gus and Woodrow, including a deadly forced walk across a desert after they are captured by the Mexican Army. Generally, the acting is good, featuring standout performances by Keith Carradine and Edward James Olmos. Johnny Lee Miller also does a very good job as the young Woodrow Call, while David Arquette’s portrayal of Gus leaves one wondering how the goofy young man survived to be the competent westerner portrayed in Lonesome Dove by Robert Duvall.

Overall, the characters are engaging and the story and suspense are very good in Dead Man’s Walk, with the small exception of an odd sequence of events at the end to help Gus and Woodrow get home, leaving one thinking, “WTF?” Rating: 7

Comanche Moon (2008)

Comanche Moon follows a little older Woodrow and Gus in the 1850s-1860s. Of all of the series, this one has the fewest big name actors, with Val Kilmer as the sole major movie star in an odd over-the-top character performance.

You will recognize other actors from TV, such as Linda Cardellini (from Freaks & Geeks and ER) as Clara. Steve Zahn, who often plays the comic sidekick in movies like That Thing You Do!, plays Gus McRae. His performance largely mimics Robert Duvall’s acting in Lonesome Dove, and it grew on me. You may enjoy the Robert Duvall impersonation or be annoyed by it.

You may recognize other faces too. Karl Urban, the Dr. McCoy in the new Star Trek franchise, plays Woodrow Call. Additionally, Wes Studi (Dances with Wolves, Last of the Mohicans) stars as Buffalo Hump, the father of Blue Duck, who features more prominently in the original Lonesome Dove.

Comanche Moon probably received the worst reviews of all of the Lonesome Dove series. And it has the weakest stand-alone story and acting of the series.

But unlike Dead Man’s Walk, which just told an adventure story using two of the main characters from Lonesome Dove, Comanche Moon provides a back story of the characters to set up Lonesome Dove, like the way the Star Wars prequels did. If you really love Lonesome Dove, you might want to see more of the background of the familiar characters, how Newt was born, how the town of Lonesome Dove got started, how Gus lost Clara, etc. But some things may be better left to the imagination. Rating: 5

Lonesome Dove (1989): The Classic

Lonesome Dove is the cream of the crop of all of the Lonesome Dove series. The series follows an aging Gus and Woodrow in the 1870s out for one last big adventure, while also conveying a meditation on friendship, aging, family, mortality, and the end of the West. By far, of all the series, this one has the best story, the best acting, the best music, etc.

Lonesome Dove is not only the best of this series, it ranks with the greatest Western films of all-time. Time Out London recently ranked it among the Top 50 Westerns, although I’d rank it even higher than they did. Robert Duvall recently said in Esquire (Jan. 2011): “When I finished Lonesome Dove, I said to myself, Now I can retire. I’ve done something. Let the English play Hamlet. I’ll play Augustus McCrae.” Amen. The book won the Pulitzer Prize and the series won seven Emmys. Rating: 10

Another Prequel?

In 2014, the movie Lonesome Dove Church, directed by Terry Miles and starring Tom Berenger, was released. Is there any connection between the film and the Lonesome Dove series? Promotional material for the movie, including an interview with Berenger, make no reference to the series. But Barnes & Noble claims that the movie is a prequel to the series started by Larry McMurtry.

Lonesome Dove Church is advertised as the true story of the founding of the Lonesome Dove Church in Grapevine, Texas. Berenger plays a preacher in the old West who works to save his outlaw son and eventually build a church.

Because the church is named after the preacher sees a dove and because it is located in a town called Grapevine, it is likely that the church in the series has nothing to do with the fictional town created by Larry McMurtry. Yet, McMurtry has noted that he came up with the name “Lonesome Dove” while eating at a steakhouse and seeing a church bus for Lonesome Dove Baptist Church from Southlake, Texas. Thus, while Lonesome Dove Church is a decent but not great Western, we are not going to discuss it further in the context of the Lonesome Dove universe.

In Part 2 of this series, Chimesfreedom will consider the Lonesome Dove miniseries that take place after Lonesome Dove, including how the network struggled to keep one main character alive while author Larry McMurtry summarily killed the character with merely a sentence. Check out all four posts on Rating the Lonesome Dove Series.

Rating the Lonesome Dove Series, Part 4: Conclusion

Rating the Lonesome Dove Series, Part 2: The Sequels

Moral Ambiguity and “Lawman” (Missed Movies)

What’s the Deal With the Ending of Wyatt Earp?

Rating the Lonesome Dove Series, Part 3: The Weekly TV Series

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