Rating: R
Genre:
Western
Release Date: 02/10/2004
Sound: DD
Run Time: 141 Minutes
Distributor/Studio: St. Clair Entertainment
Western bandit
Kid Rio (
Marlon Brando) is betrayed by his partner,
Dad Longworth (
Karl Malden). Escaping from prison,
Rio learns that
Longworth has become a wealthy and influential lawman.
Rio thirsts for revenge, but bides his time, waiting for the right moment to strike. In the meantime,
Rio spitefully seduces
Longworth's adopted daughter,
Louisa (
Pina Pellicer). After killing a man in self-defense,
Rio is publicly whipped by the powerful
Longworth. When
Rio's old gang accidentally kills a child during another holdup,
Longworth has the perfect excuse to eliminate the troublesome
Rio once and for all by hanging him. But that's not what happens at all. Stripped to its fundamentals,
One-Eyed Jacks is a workable
Western, worthy of perhaps 90 minutes' running time. But when
Marlon Brando succeeded
Stanley Kubrick in the director's chair, he allowed the film's 60-day shooting schedule to stretch into six months, and delivered a finished product running in excess of four hours. The current 141-minute version of
One-Eyed Jacks isn't as ponderous as some critics have claimed, but it's still too much of a good thing. While
Brando the director isn't precisely in the
Kubrick class,
Brando the actor delivers one of his finest and most focused performances (though he is upstaged throughout by
Karl Malden).
~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
