Pale Rider Movie Review

Pale Rider is a classic Clint Eastwood Western that was released in 1985 that tells another tale about an Eastwood portrayed “Man With No Name.” Eastwood’s direction as well as playing the part of Preacher alongside strong performances from the supporting actors and actresses have garnered strong critical praise for this movie as well a very successful time at the box-office where Pale Rider earned $41, 410, 568. While at the time this movie was being released there was much talk about “the decline of the Western,” Eastwood continued to show his profess at directing and acting in these American epics, with many critics discussing the amazing nature of Eastwood’s improvement of his already iconic status.

This film begins with a raid by the hoodlums of the antagonists, the LaHoods, on a simple tin-panning community where the protagonist Hull Barret resides with a surrogate family of Sarah and Megan Wheeler. After the raid Megan Wheeler is shown burying her dog that was shot by the attackers. She offers a post-burial prayer for her and her entire community, which calls out for God’s help at the same time that it doubts his existence. She ends the prayer by stating, “If you don’t help us we’re all gonna die. Please just one miracle.” The next scene cuts to an unknown man on a white horse riding through the wilderness who is shown coming to a stop in town to protect Hull Barret from more of the LaHood hoodlums. This mystery man goes home with Barret only to have his existence and manner questioned until it is revealed that he is a preacher. From this moment there is a sharp change in the manner of each individual in the Barret household. The young Megan, who marked his arrival on a white horse by reading Revelations 6:5:8; “I looked, and there before me was a pale horse! Its rider was named Death and Hades was following close behind him.”

From this point on the traditional Western plotline of bad guys escalating tensions and good guys gaining the courage, coming mainly from the presence of Preacher, until there is a final showdown between Preacher, the representative of the good and defenseless, and Marshal Stockburn, the representative of the greedy, evil Lahoods. The introduction of Preacher with this verse, though, and his arrival immediately after Megan’s prayer offer two very opposite possibilities of Preacher’s true identity; God and Death. In regards to the first possibility, Preacher shows up in response to Megan’s prayer and begins immediately to give hope to the poor, disheveled people of Carbon Canyon. While he uses violence to protect them, it is only in the name of a righteous cause, and his more important duty is to inspire and give hope and courage to the residents of the Canyon so that they will stay and fight LaHood and prevent his raping of the land. He appears mysteriously out of nowhere, with a horrific scar on his back, and every action he takes seems to be providing the salvation of the residents of Carbon Canyon. As he gives courage to the townsfolk and they decide to fight back against the LaHoods, a lawman is called in to take care of the problem. This man, who is said to do anything for the right price, is the most evil and immoral character in the film. While LaHood, the antagonist is blinded by his greed, he does not directly advocate murder or any unlawful nature. Because of this he has to call in the Marshal to kill all of the residents of Carbon Canyon. When this Marshal is called in he claims to know someone similar to the Preacher, but is sure that Preacher can not be the same person, as the man he knew is now dead. The relationship between Preacher and the Marshal is revealed during the climax when Marshal Stockburn’s face dons with recognition of the Preacher’s face. After this revelation Preacher shoots Stockburn, multiple times, and the resulting bullet wounds are in the exact same pattern as the scar on Preacher’s back, with good having won over evil.

The other possibility for his existence is that of Death, the rider of the pale horse and the Fourth Horseman of the Apocalypse. While animals had been killed and homes destroyed by the raids of LaHood’s men, no humans in Carbon Canyon had been killed by LaHood’s men. Once Preacher showed up, however, and started resistance to LaHood’s domination, the peaceful and subdued men of Carbon Canyon were rearing to fight against the Marshal and his deputies, one of them got murdered by the Marshal and his men, dynamite was being used to destroy mines, Megan was almost raped and the town of LaHood, California was turned into a bloodbath as a result of Preacher. He protected most of the individuals of Carbon Canyon, but was able to reap many souls of the wicked by inciting a little resistance by the tin-panners.

Much of the nature of Preacher offered strong challenges to religious stereotypes and was extremely oppositional to many traditional thoughts about the roles of a religious figure. One of the most oppositional characteristics of Preacher is how the women of the movie turned him into a sexual being. As soon as he is seen in his preacher’s collar the women’s attitudes towards him change, from an apprehensive and detached annoyance, to huge smiles, sensual touches and a fawning nature. There are two scenes with just Preacher and either Megan and Sarah Wheeler where they profess their love for him. The first one put the sexual nature of Preacher front and center as the 14-years old Megan asks him to teach her how to make love. While this could confirm a stereotype of a religious leader having an inappropriate relationship with a child, that came into mainstream culture years after this film. Also, the relationship is reversed, as in this case it is the young woman propositioning the preacher. Because of this the nature of Preacher’s sexual magnetism is extremely oppositional and offers a rebuke to some religious stereotypes of the devout, desexualized religious leader.

His violent nature as a man of God is an extremely complex aspect of Preacher’s persona, one that is both subversive in nature and one that elicits a strong rebuke to modern religion and society. It is extremely strange to think of a preacher being able to beat up paid thugs, carrying a gun and single-handedly defeating over ten men in one fight, but Preacher does all of these things. This is in sharp contrast to the nature of a priests in reality, but also in this movie as the older LaHood talks about how he is much different from the “Bible-thumping Easterner” that he was expecting. While it is strange that he can be so violent in nature, the concept of violence with religion should not seem strange, as over the course of history they have quite often been closely related. In this film, however, the notion of a preacher being able to use violence to do the Lord’s work catches everyone by surprise and seems quite unnatural. By portraying it in this light the film offers a rebuke to the historic relationship between violence and religion and shows how the two should not be naturally akin.

This movie is driven almost entirely by Clint Eastwood’s character, Preacher, even though he is not the protagonist. While Preacher stays mysterious, says little and doesn’t seem to change at all over the course of the movie, Hull Barret does an about face from a cowardly, beaten man, to a courageous savior. Nevertheless all of the nuances of Preacher are what make this film most interesting and his characteristics and actions are what offer the religious and social commentary that are so prevalent in this classic Western.

Bibliography

Canby, Vincent. Pale Rider (1985): Film: Clint Eastwood in ‘Pale Rider.” The New York Times. 28 June 1985.

Corliss, Richard and Richard Schickel. “Some Sideshows of Summer.” Time. 1 July 1985.

Ebert, Roger. “Pale Rider.” 28 June 1985.

Bingham, Dennis. “Men With No Names: Clint Eastwood’s “The Stranger” Persona, Identification.” Journal of Film and
Video. Winter 1990. 42, 4. ProQuest Direct Complete. Pg. 33.

Thompson, Anne. “Beyond-the-Pale Riders.” Film Comment. Jul 1992. 28, 4. ProQuest Direct Complete. P. 52.

The Holy Bible, New International Version. Zondervan. Grand Rapids, Michigan. 1973.