Unforgiven is a brilliant movie because it brings humanity and life to the stock good guy-bad guy western movie. The traditional protagonist/antagonist struggle is more than just reversed. In other words, the protagonist isn't merely switched to the bad guy role. Rather, the viewer is never sure who the bad guy is in the first place. Sometimes we find ourselves rooting for the protagonist, other times we are shocked to find how violent and abhorrent the protagonist really is. We seek to turn to an antagonist as someone to root for, but there are so many, and they are constantly in flux as well. If this sounds complicated, that's because it is! Clearly, this is the resounding message of the movie: that humanity is sloppier and more complex than traditional westerns. However, this message is implicit and it propells the plot further and leaves it embedded in the viewers mind long after the tape is rewound. Traditional western lovers will enjoy the movie's gunfight scenes, and the fairly rudimentary storyline: atonement for the damage of an "innocent" woman. More intellectual types will watch it again and again in search of a message that will speak to their inner psyche and help to reveal to them what lies within.
Review of Unforgiven
