Another Jesse James movie

  • Win­ning the prize for longest movie title of the year (I think), we have “The Assas­si­na­tion of Jesse James by the Cow­ard Robert Ford” just com­ing out in the­aters. I admit I’m a lit­tle intrigued with this one. There have been 11 other movies about Jesse James, and the sad fact is that the 1966 hor­ror movie “Jesse James meets Frankenstein’s Daugh­ter” may be one of the most factual.

    Not that I’m an expert. I said last Sep­tem­ber that I was no fan of Jesse James, and I’m still not. But his life is still laid out in this part of Mis­souri, and it’s been exactly a year since I went on my own lit­tle road trip to try to find out about the guy. One thing I noticed is that the real per­son was only occa­sion­ally related with what peo­ple made out of him. And here’s Hol­ly­wood doing it again, and I might as well check out this lat­est installment.

    So here’s the link to the trailer, for those who like watch­ing trail­ers. (I’m start­ing to. Often these days, that’s the only good part of the movie.)

    And here are the four install­ments to my Jesse James road trip, in case you’d rather read these than go look at Brad Pitt for two hours. I mean, it’s not likely, but it could happen.

    1. Intro­duc­tion - I fig­ure out my theme and lay down some ground rules, end­ing with a malted milk ball binge.
    2. Boy­hood and wartime – I take in the James farm where Jesse got off to a very bad start. And I hap­pen to meet up with a his­to­rian at our local grave­yard who edu­cates me on the uncel­e­brated local his­tory of the Civil War.
    3. Rob­bery and the end – Off to the site of the first bank Jesse robbed — the first peace­time bank rob­bery in Amer­i­can his­tory, accord­ing to my guide. And by day’s end, I was ready to take in the house where James was shot. The docent there was sparse on details, but a replica of the St. Jo paper that came out the day after the shoot­ing pro­vided plenty.
    4. Wrap-up – I should’ve been fin­ished with it all, but I found that there were left­over facts and impres­sions still float­ing in my head.

    Related posts:

    1. The No-Dang-Good Jesse James Revue
    2. NDG/JJ R: Wrap-up
    3. NDG/JJ R: Day One
    4. NDG/JJ R: Day Two
    5. “The DaVinci Code” — did I watch the right movie?

    September 24th, 2007 | Grace | 3 Comments |

3 Responses and Counting...

  • BJohnD 09.24.2007

    I say the best take is that old Brady Bunch episode where Bobby gets infat­u­ated with James and Dad arranges for a old, old guy to come by and tell him that James wasn’t a hero, but rather “a mean, dirty killer. Jesse James KILLED my father.”

  • Grace

    I remem­ber that episode. And it’s sad to find out that you share your opin­ions with Dad Brady. But I do. Maybe there are some rene­gade types out there that I’ll think are cool, but not this guy. Just a vio­lent man in vio­lent times. Noth­ing attrac­tive about that.

  • Ronald Neff

    Eleven oth­ers, huh?

    There is one I would dearly like to see again. Alas, I do not know its title. I saw it when I was a lad of about 6. (It was some­time after 1953 and before 1958.)

    I remem­ber only a cou­ple of dis­tinc­tive points:

    There was a bap­tism that con­cluded with some­one scream­ing. I have no idea why.

    When­ever any­one was knocked out, he was not hit on the head with a pis­tol, but rather hit on what seemed to me to be the shoul­der. I’m fairly sure I am remem­ber­ing this cor­rectly: when I men­tioned it to a con­tem­po­rary, he said, “I remem­ber that movie,” by which he did not mean that he remem­bered the title.

    (It was =not= the Robert Wag­ner “True Story of Jesse James” movie from 1957.)

    Any sug­ges­tions will be wel­come: feel free to write me a neff@compuserve.com.

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