High Plains Drifter is better Pale Rider isn't bad at all but it's really just a blatant copy of Shane
HPD is fucking awesome! I barely remember Pale Rider, but if it's knock-off of Shane, that's probably why I don't remember it.
No. Pale Rider is a copy of High Plains Drifter. Both films feature a guy that seems to have returned from the dead for both revenge and to set things right...but that is never fully confirmed just strongly hinted...so it leaves the audience having the discussion.
Anyway...I love both..but think Drifter is slightly better but Pale Rider is more satisfying (if that makes any sens at all)
Actually Cdogg, thinking about it, the Shane comparison with Pale Rider is on point too. But for me Pale Rider was always reminiscent of High Plains drifter for the reasons mentioned.
It's literally a more violent Shane with an adolescent girl instead of an adolescent boy The ending is the same exact fucking thing! Shane!... Shane!... Come back, Shane! Preacher!... Preacher!.... come back, Preacher!
Yeah I see that... But the whole phantom from the dead return for vengeance thing was inspired by HPD...and I think that's the more important aspect of the film.
Even THAT is somewhat derivative of Shane in the first place Alan Ladd's past is a total mystery in Shane
John Wayne was apparently really mad about HPD because he thought it was immoral and unamerican More proof that John Wayne was a massive knob
I'm not a huge fan of Shane. I find it dull for the most part, BUT... the ending gun fight between Alan Ladd and Jack Palance is a classic.
John Wayne can fuck off! Speaking of Wayne, I recently watched The Searchers for the first time, since everyone claims it to be one of "the best films ever made." Mehhhhhhhh. BEAUTIFULLY shot movie, I'll give it that.... but besides that, overrated.
"High Plains Drifter" is a crazy fucking movie. I'm not sure any other Western really compares to it. You might even classify it as a horror western. Eastwood was a "literal" fucking ghost in that one, come back for revenge, not only on the bad guys, but the townspeople to. He only had a soft spot for the helpless whores in town............which he also either ghost seduced or ghost raped along the way. He literally as Mike Tyson said "Fucked them till they loved him" and then fucked off back to the ghost world he came from.
HPD is a fun, highly re-watchable movie...especially fans of Clint Eastwood who want to just see him walking around acting cool how come the townsfolk don't recognise him?
The nightmare sequences where he flashes back to Marshal Jim Duncan being killed, the Marshal is portrayed by Buddy Van Horn who was Eastwood's stunt double for decades Eastwood deliberately chose him for those sequences to further puzzle the audience, i.e. Is Clint the ghost of this man or not??? Because he looked enough like him but also different enough to confuse the issue The original script apparently had The Stranger as Duncan's brother avenging him but Eastwood liked the idea of making it more supernatural so he got rid of the brother stuff and made the stranger a ghost but made the nature of the ghost ambiguous
Pale Rider did the same but was far more subtle with it. The girl at the beginning was reciting a bible scripture saying "And there was a rider on a Pale horse and that Rider was Death and Hell followed with him"....as we saw Eastwood show up on the Pale horse. Eastwood's characters had 5 bullet holes in his chest. The bad boy sheriff Stockburn upon hearing his deeds and his eyes was reminded of a guy he had killed years ago: "You think it's the same man" "Can't be, that guy is dead" Stockburn only recognized him once he saw his eyes. Then Eastwood proceeded to shoot him across the chest in the same manner of his own bullet holes. So it suggests that Clint was the ghost of that man and came back for revenge and justice.
Two favorites of mine, but considering that Pale Rider mostly repeats the idea of HPD, I vote for the latter. Also the main character is more interesting in it with all the whore-banging
I always thought that when he came back he had a different appearance. Just like when Jesus resurrected and walked with two of his disciples on the Road to Emmaus they didn't recognized him.
