Western Religion

Great story line but totally pathetic acting, proves if you pay peanuts you get monkeys

Firstly i acknowledge that the film is a very low budget one so i had low expectations of it. Most of the lines from the actors are very flat, no passion and generally it gives me a taste of a school play Then the scenes are just to short, and changing like a slideshow which made me think that this movie has some unwanted details in it and could have been 25 minutes less of running time Then you have characters like the host presenter getting excited by himself, and people just clapping for no particular reason, which was quite pointless In addition i do not think that homosexuals were dressed and used to act in such an obvious manner at that time like they present in the movie, nor they would be treated like the movie shows, lets not forget is 100+ years back Now the story its just average, without it being something special but if there is nothing else to watch and you are not sleepy you might as well watch i..but do not pay for it.

As you can tell from the title, the dialogue is filled with double meanings as the devil has come to Religion...Religion, Arizona that is. The town of Religion is holding a high stakes poker tournament. Some of the language is unappealing to Christians: "The town is going to be bigger than God's illegitimate son." Almost a John Lennon quote. The tournament attracts many colorful characters which make the film worth watching. Saint John (Gary Kohn) is a man of the cloth who is tied to Anton Stice (Claude Duhamel) our dark character looking to gain a soul for the prize of a Cross of Gold. Some characters include Salt Peter (Louie Sabatasso) , a flamboyant morphine addict who is bisexual. Bootstrap Bess (Holiday Hadley) the town madam and a sure shot. Waylin Smith (Miles Szanto) a man raised by Apaches who has guidance from a spirit. Bobby Shea (Sean Joyce) a quiet man who loves Bess. Prince Zain Mohammad (Merik Tadros) an Arabian Prince of Azir. There is also a reporter who says, "Freedom is an illusion created by servants to help them sleep at night." He notes that the players are treated like gods. An illusionists and a man with finger puppets. The players have to decide what on earth is worth the price of their soul as the card game plays out. The film is clever and the characters are developed with flashbacks. Guide: No swearing or nudity. Brief sex scene.

The film surprised me by starting off as a shoot 'em up, then gradually transforming into a spiritual film. Without giving too much away, the group of gunfighters, charlatans, harlots, and occult types that gather to compete in a poker tournament in an old mining town, gradually realize they are in a battle for something more profound. The movie has a peculiar fable-like feel, in that you can take what's happening on a surface level, or read more into it if you make the connections. There is a stylized aspect to it, which includes the performances, from the gunslinging madame Bess and her carpenter suitor Bobby Shea, to the Clint Eastwood like Preacher Saint John and the carnival barker Harvard Gold, who runs the town. There's some compelling mystical types, too, such as the Ben Kenobi-like Indian who guides one of the half Indian gunfighters, and a magician/trickster named Raven, who may or may not know alchemy. But the performances that drove this home for me were Anton Stice, played with creepy mystical perfection by Claude Duhamel, and the hilarious dandy Salt Peter, who had me in stitches. This is the kind of movie you can watch many times and get something different from it with each viewing.

I watch what is on. I could pay more to get movies from sources other than broadcast TV, including paying for regular cable channels. I don't. So this is the second time in a month I have seen a Western where The Devil makes deals for people's souls and we see dead people. It's not that I want to see these but it's what's on. This is not a family friendly Western but once cleaned up for TV, I suppose it's not too bad, though the V-chip rating was TV-14. I didn't think it was all that violent. The language had to be sanitized a couple of times. It's not a comedy but there is plenty to laugh at. And some good acting. James Anthony Cotton James Anthony Cotton is your typical old West huckster. And there are Holiday Hadley as Bess, Peter Sherayko as Southern Bill and of course Louie Sabatasso as Salt Peter. Not exactly groundbreaking, but I suppose it is entertaining if you like Westerns.

A sign outside the town says "Religion, AZ." AZ is a zip code designation that began in 1963. The sign should have said, "Religion, Ariz."

Sometimes you can't believe that you sat through a whole movie and this is one of them. Religion is a fine example of the contempt that many Movie/TV execs have for the viewing public. Religion is a prime example of how a script written in a drug induced haze, thrown together quickly using no name actors, cheap sets poor acting, and even worse direction can still get airtime. It felt strangely Canadian. The high point in it, funny enough, was the flamboyant performance of the quirky character of Salt Peter who seemed more out of place in a western than any of the other weird characters.

I dunno what to make of this flick. For the first 15 minutes or so, all I could think was "are they serious, or is someone playing a joke on me?" It's like some high school trust fund kid bought a couple of expensive cameras, wrote a script in 2 hours, then asked all his friends and relatives to act in it. It doesn't get better, though 2-3 members of the cast actually do quite a respectable job with the painful lines they were given. The rest of the cast must have made a wrong turn on the way to the * set, and stumbled into this one by mistake. I suspect part of this is due to the director, though, as the entire thing feels like a live-action cartoon. AND YET: I actually kinda' enjoyed it. (watching for free, late at night, too tired to get any work done & so just vegging out.) The cinematography, sound, and even the soundtrack are all actually quite excellent. That trust-fund kid must have hired the best PD in Hollywood. The basic plot isn't bad either, (though it takes an awfully long time to get to any sort of, you know, point) so the flick does move along in an entertaining way. Very, very strange. I find it hard to even give it a rating.

I think this can be best described as a good effort. The acting is terrible, how some of these "actors" got their jobs I'll never understand. They shouldn't ever even perform in a commercial. Other than the, at times, terrible dialogue though, writer and director James O'Brien actually does a good job. The soundtrack is decent and flows nicely along with the plot. The premise is good though I really wish it had a better budget to get the best out of it. Mostly it's the awful acting that brings my score down. I think it's a shame really. If you're bored and you like Westerns I'd recommend you give it a go, despite my problems with the lack of talented actors it somehow managed to hold my attention till the end. So it can't be all bad.