GUNSLINGERS
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Scarlet Rose Stallone, Heather Graham, Stephen Dorff, Bre Blair, Cooper Barnes, Eric Mabius, Costas Mandylor, and Tzi Ma
Director: Brian Skiba
KATIE
Gunslingers is laughably, outrageously bad. The only redeeming aspect of this film is that if you view it through a satirical lens, it's quite hilarious, but that was not the intention. From its suspiciously AI-generated-looking establishing shot, the calibre of filmmaking is clear. Each performer feels like they’re in a different film, and some of them are so wooden that I was not surprised to learn at least one cast member has a recognisable surname. Everything looks cheap, and the hair and make-up are distractingly modern. Together with the choppy editing, nonsensical plot, and absurd shoot-outs, not even Nicolas Cage’s ridiculousness could salvage this mess.
ROBERT
There is a standard of quality for straight-to-VOD efforts that Gunslingers, on its best day, couldn’t achieve. I will say that the title indicates what type of film to expect, but other than that, it gets no grace. The acting is comparable to an elementary school play, the sound design reminds me of a screechy drive-thru window, and you could put a GoPro on a flying squirrel and have more logically composed shots. And lastly, there is off-kilter Nic Cage, but this isn’t even bad to the point of fun. Pirating this would cost too much.
QUENTIN
You already know that I only watched this because I am a Nic Cage completist. Once again, he proves that, as an actor, he is always doing something interesting even if the movie isn’t, because Gunslingers is BAD bad. I’m talking so bad that if the right people find it, it could 100 percent be the next The Room. It’s cheap looking, unintentionally hilarious, terribly acted (outside of Cage, of course, who is making choices), and just an all-around disaster full of genre clichés and stereotypes. It might be, no exaggeration, the worst western I’ve ever seen. Still, one reel for Cage and midnight movie potential.
