Western RoundUp: Tombstone (1993)
Was the 1881 gunfight at the OK Corral the most-filmed true incident in Western film history?
I’ve never tried counting how many movies the gunfight appears in, but it’s a significant number. I’ve previously written here about four different films in which the gunfight (or Wyatt Earp) features; in a 2018 column I covered Frontier Marshal (1939), Tombstone: The Town Too Tough to Die (1942), and Wichita (1955), and I also wrote a 2021 review of Hour of the Gun (1967).
This month we’ll return to the subject of the Earps and the Clantons with a look at Tombstone (1993) starring Kurt Russell as the famed lawman Wyatt Earp.
Wyatt’s brothers, Virgil and Morgan, are played by Sam Elliott and Bill Paxton, with Val Kilmer as Doc Holliday.
This was my first viewing of Tombstone, which I’d frankly avoided in part due to my concern about the level of violence, given the R rating. And truth to tell, based on the advice of those who know my tastes, I didn’t watch the first few opening minutes of mayhem; instead I began the film at the point when Wyatt Earp arrives in Tombstone, Arizona. I’m glad my curiosity finally got the better of me, as I enjoyed the movie.
Tombstone covers much of the same ground as other films on Wyatt Earp and his brothers, including not only the famous gunfight but key events which follow. Part of what’s interesting about the Earp movies is what the individual films choose to include and their varied styles; each film has unique aspects while covering familiar ground.
The placement of the OK Corral gunfight in various narratives is especially interesting. In John Ford‘s My Darling Clementine (1946), the gun battle provides the climax of the movie, while Hour of the Gun takes a completely different approach: It’s how the movie begins!
In Tombstone the movie splits the difference and places the gunfight roughly halfway through the film’s 130-minute running time.
I found Tombstone a strong and memorable film which has numerous classic moments. I would not call the film itself a classic, for reasons I’ll go into below, but it’s a well-made film with much to recommend it.
Tombstone begins with the Earp brothers and their wives reuniting in Tombstone. Wyatt has retired from being a lawman, and the brothers intend to live quieter lives. But despite Wyatt’s protestations that he’s done with the law, he can’t resist the challenge of helping a saloon owner eject an unwanted faro dealer from his business.
The Earps make money in Tombstone, and in their free time they also enjoy watching a theatrical troupe whose players include Josephine Marcus (Dana Delany) and Fabian (Billy Zane). However, Tombstone is a wild town, and the murder of the town marshal (Harry Carey Jr.) by Curly Bill Brocius (Powers Boothe) is but one reminder.
Eventually Virgil feels guilty about ignoring the plight of the townspeople at the hands of the Cowboys, a violent gang which includes the Clanton family; he accepts a job as marshal, which ultimately leads all three brothers and Wyatt’s good friend Doc Holliday to the gunfight.
As depicted in some of the other films on Earp lore which continue past the OK Corral, there is later retribution by the Cowboys against Wyatt’s brothers, followed by Wyatt and Doc hunting down the remaining members of the gang.
One of the things I liked best about Tombstone is the way it pulls together different bits and pieces of lore from past films; it’s natural that there’s repetition of story elements, but some of the moments almost seem like tributes to films which have gone before.
In particular, there’s a dancing theme with Wyatt and Josephine which of course calls to mind Henry Fonda and Cathy Downs‘ dance in My Darling Clementine; the Shakespearean actor and even one of the Earps sitting with his boots up on a fence also conjure up memories of the Ford classic.
The depiction of the point-blank shootout made me think of Tombstone: The Town Too Tough to Die, while the dead men in glassed-in caskets called to mind a scene Samuel Fuller‘s Earp-inspired Forty Guns (1957), which I wrote about here last year. Wyatt’s visits to the ill Doc at the sanitarium near movie’s end were strongly reminiscent of Hour of the Gun.
The film’s atmosphere is also greatly aided by its use of some of the great “faces” of Westerns past, including the previously mentioned Carey. Names like Pedro Armendariz Jr., Chris Mitchum, Don Collier, Buck Taylor, and Gary Clarke are threaded throughout the film in tiny roles, with the film itself narrated by Robert Mitchum.
Even Charlton Heston randomly shows up in a couple of scenes, though while he’s great, his appearance is a bit inexplicable. Heston’s memoir In the Arena, published shortly after Tombstone‘s release, offers no insight. I suspect there’s a story there worthy of future research having to do with the film changing directors while in production.
Kilmer rightly receives acclaim for his off-kilter performance as Doc Holliday; indeed, the fateful moment where he winks his eye at the OK Corral is perhaps the movie’s greatest moment, as Wyatt sees the resulting change in expression of their opponents and realizes what’s about to go down. It’s a real “Whoaaaa!” moment which makes the viewer sit up and take notice.
Russell is excellent playing a conflicted Wyatt, who warns his brothers killing someone won’t feel like they expect. And as a Sam Elliott fan from way back, I also loved him in a fairly large role as Virgil, though sadly a bit of the light goes out of the movie when he gets on the train for California about two-thirds of the way into the film.
And that’s really part of the movie’s overall problem, as the strong narrative structure falls apart a little in the last third or so of the film. At that juncture, Wyatt’s brothers are dead or gone, and, like Hour of the Gun, Wyatt and Doc spend the rest of the film hunting down the villains, periodically interrupted by moving scenes with the dying Doc.
Frankly it gets a bit tedious watching men riding around having gun battles, and the movie is a good ten minutes too long, punctuated with the occasional moments of brilliance, such as “Thanks for always being there, Doc.”
The film is quite modern in its “elliptical” storytelling, where we join the film mid-story and not everything is spelled out. Though it’s the current style, it’s also a bit problematic, as we’re left to ponder many questions for ourselves, such as why the brothers, as would-be settlers, don’t have a child among them, and there’s also a curious comment about where they “found” their wives.
Indeed, the brothers seem “betwixt and between” two worlds, often representing the law yet working in a rowdy gambling house; they’re married yet not precisely “family” men, and their wives are of questionable backgrounds.
We also wonder about the disappearance of Doc’s girlfriend Kate (Joanna Pacula), and Wyatt’s abandonment of his laudanum-addicted wife Mattie (Dana Wheeler-Nicholson) also receives short shrift. He puts Mattie on the train to California with Virgil, Allie (Paula Malcomson), and Louisa (Lisa Collins), and that’s the end of that.
An end card mentions Mattie’s fate, though it doesn’t clarify exactly when it happens in conjunction to Wyatt beginning his relationship with Josephine.
Let’s just say I spent quite a while on Google after movie’s end trying to fill in the blanks. Again, that’s both a blessing and a curse, as I love when a film causes me to delve deeper into history, but there was an awful lot of time focused on men riding around shooting guns that could have instead been better spent on more character development.
That said, it was fascinating to learn of some unexpected things in the film which were actual history, rather than screenwriter Kevin Jarre’s creation, including the wounded Virgil telling his wife Allie not to worry, that he still had a good arm to hold her.
The film was directed by George P. Cosmatos, with writer Jarre doing uncredited direction of Heston’s scenes. The movie was filmed by William A. Fraker and scored by Bruce Broughton (Silverado).
The excellent cast also includes Billy Bob Thornton, Jason Priestley, John Corbett, Jon Tenney, Michael Biehn, Thomas Haden Church, Stephen Lang, and Frank Stallone.
The year after Tombstone was released, Kevin Costner starred in the title role in Wyatt Earp (1994), which I plan to review here at a future date along with Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957).
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– Laura Grieve for Classic Movie Hub
Laura can be found at her blog, Laura’s Miscellaneous Musings, where she’s been writing about movies since 2005, and on Twitter at @LaurasMiscMovie. A lifelong film fan, Laura loves the classics including Disney, Film Noir, Musicals, and Westerns. She regularly covers Southern California classic film festivals. Laura will scribe on all things western at the ‘Western RoundUp’ for CMH.
