Although the late, great Gene Hackman appeared in many Western movies, 1992’s Unforgiven is undoubtedly the best of them. While The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly might be the best Western ever made, that doesn’t mean that Sergio Leone’s classic doesn’t carry a complicated legacy. The cartoonish violence and self-aware humor of spaghetti Westerns subverted the black-and-white morality and self-serious tone of classic entries in the genre, but some critics and academics argued that star Clint Eastwood’s trilogy still took a glib view of the violence meted out on the frontier.
Starring in many Westerns gave Clint Eastwood plenty of time to think about the criticisms that the genre received over the decades, and the result was 1992’s Unforgiven. Eastwood’s highest-grossing Western, Unforgiven won Best Picture and Best Director at the 1992 Academy Awards, as well as earning Gene Hackman a Best Supporting Actor win for his role as “Little Bill.” The late Hackman starred in numerous Westerns throughout his lengthy screen career, but Unforgiven remains his best entry into the storied genre.
Why Unforgiven Is Gene Hackman’s Greatest Western Movie
Hackman Is A Force To Be Reckoned With In Unforgiven
The story of Unforgiven follows a feud between Hackman’s corrupt sheriff Little Bill and Eastwood’s supposedly retired gun-for-hire Will Munny, but viewers expecting a standard story of gunfights and one-liners should steer clear of this particular Western. The reason Eastwood’s movie won so much critical acclaim and earned so many awards is that Unforgiven offers a more complex, morally murky vision of the Wild West than most Western movies, one wherein Munny and Little Bill are both more complicated and nuanced than the traditional straightforwardly heroic protagonist.
At the hands of Eastwood and Hackman, Hackman’s familiar Western hero becomes a monstrous, amoral villain whose adherence to his own code allows him to abuse, murder, and rob with impunity.
While Little Bill is one of the best Western villains ever, this is primarily because he turns the archetype of the Western sheriff on its head. Like so many of John Wayne’s Western heroes, Little Bill Dagget is a lawman who upholds order at any cost and believes in enforcing the law with lethal force. At the hands of Eastwood and Hackman, this familiar Western hero becomes a monstrous, amoral villain whose adherence to his own code allows him to abuse, murder, and rob with impunity.
Unforgiven Is Perfect For Anyone Who Isn’t Usually Into Westerns
Clint Eastwood’s Subversive Western Is An Effective Genre Deconstruction
For anyone who finds classic Westerns too black and white in their simplistic morality and spaghetti Westerns too gleeful in their over-the-top gore, Unforgiven is the perfect antidote. It may not be a Western where the villains win, but it is a rare entry into the genre where viewers are robbed of any catharsis in the finale. By the time Eastwood’s story reaches its brutal, inevitable ending, viewers will be wishing for an end to the pointless bloodshed and feel entirely disenfranchised by the idea of gun-toting lawmen saving the Wild West.
Throughout numerous classic Westerns, Eastwood helped build the image of the snarling, tough-talking lawman whose heart of gold meant he always did the right thing. With Hackman’s glowering performance as Little Bill, the director deconstructed this fantasy and exposed the fascist ideology underneath. Unforgiven is bleak, brooding, and harsh, but is also one of the late Gene Hackman’s most mesmerizing turns and a perfect riposte to Hollywood’s sunny, sanitized visions of the old West.
