3:10 to Yuma

Just watched this movie on a slow Thursday morning at home, and was profoundly impressed by this film.

The story tells of a small-time rancher (Dan Evans, played by CHristian Bale) who agrees to hold a captured outlaw (Ben Wade, Russell Crowe) who's awaiting a train to go to court in Yuma. DUring their journey, a battle of wills ensues as both men are confronted with the reality of their ideals and pushed to the logical conclusion of their own beliefs.

The plot - despite its apparent simplicity - is marvelously rich in character content and moral tensions, all backdropped within the larger picture of the meaning of justice, and the complexities that it entails.

The battle of wills between Evans and Wade is riveting (similar to that between Hannibal Lector and Clarice Starling in Silence of the Lambs), and forces us to wrestle with the living consequences of our ideas. Unlike Silence of the Lambs though, the characters in 3:10 are more nuanced and we are compelled to see them as they are - flawed, but with the capacity for goodness and truth; fallen, but not beyond redemption.

Some reviews on this film can be found here, here and here.