Customer Reviews

6 Guns

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

Starring: Barry Van Dyke,Greg Evigan and Brian Wimmer.
Written By : Geoff Meed and Directed By : Shane Van Dyke.
This western movie dvd was really good,Lots of gunplay and characters stayed true to themselves.
A great cast with some surprises from new comers - Carey Van Dyke( redeemed gunslinger) and Erin Marie Hogan( Boss Saloon Girl).
Barry Van Dyke finally got a role that befits all he exudes in persona.
Sage Mears brings all the female hutzpah (google it) not seen in `True Grit' or `High Noon'.
Geoff Meed wrote himself a villian in all classical senses ,Almost `A-Picture' level !
The music was amazing...Need to mention.
One last thought: Anya Benton ALMOST stole the movie in a scene that would take a " Spoiler Alert" to post.

6 Guns is the first out-and-out western by The Asylum, and as straight-to-DVD films of such a genre go, it's a success.

The story, written by Geoff Meed (Universal Soldiers, I Am Omega), concerns a family of homesteaders - Pa, Ma and two boys - whose domestic bliss is shattered by a pack of vigilantes come to enact vengeance for the death of their leader(also Geoff Meed)'s father, killed by Pa back when he was a quick-drawing lawman. Long story short, the men folk are killed and Ma is assaulted multiple times and left for dead. Big mistake.

At this point the film becomes a kind of feminist take on the Randolph Scott/Budd Boetticher revenge classic 7 Men From Now, here with Sage Mears as the wife substituting for Randolph Scott's grieving widower, seeking to enact a vengeance of her own.

(This follows an extended dance between Wifey and the bottle that at last comes to an end when she meets Bounty Hunter Extraordinaire Barry Van Dyke, who she asks to take shootin' lessons from, the training she needs for the recently-mentioned mission of vengeance. This is a pretty big plot point to be a parenthetical, I know, but this is how things got structured in my head, so here we are.)

Said training is finished just in time, fortunately enough, for the murderous vigilantes' return to town. From here there be spoilers, so let's just leave it at, the third act is the best, bringing to fruition all the lingering questions of character raised in the films 1st 2 3rds. One leaves the film fulfilled, if not a little uneasily hopeful, which I suspect was Meed's intention. Real nice resolution, and just a fine tale all around, well-executed.

Barry Van Dyke ("Diagnosis Murder," "Airwolf," "Galactica 1980") carries the film on his reserved grizzled-ness, his performance that of a calmly tortured, conflicted anti-hero of the sort westerns are supposed to have. Sage Mears is equally sweet and sour, soft and rigid, believable as both a victim and an avenger, as a woman ripped from her cocoon of happiness and hardening to the ways of a new world she finds herself navigating alone. Here's hoping this is only the first of Ms. Mears' collaborations with The Asylum.

And I can't forget the always-great Greg Evigan (100 Million B.C., Journey to the Center of the Earth), who shows up in this one as the local peacekeeper, endearingly played as amiable yet stern, a man long in his position and perhaps too comfortable as such, performing his duties with relaxed aplomb and a false sense of security.

Other standouts include, of course, screenwriter Meed as the mirthfully ruthless vigilante leader Lee Horn, a grade-A sociopath, Jude Gerard Prest (Mega Piranha) as the bartender/ whoremaster, and Shane Van Dyke (Barry's son, writer/director/star of Titanic II and the director of this here fine film as well) as a member of the vigilante pack. 6 Guns marks the third film Mr. Van Dyke the younger has directed for The Asylum, and the first time he's directed his father. The look of the film isn't typical of The Asylum, it feels a little cleaner, a little more cable-ready, a little more accessible. There's been a boom in direct-to-DVD westerns in the last three or four years, and this film feels like a wading-job by The Asylum, a test to see how warm the waters are. And like wading in murky water, it's tense fun. The script is tight, true to western themes, and cognizant of the cruelty and brutality that typified this often-glamorized era of American history. There are a few stereotypes present, but each is performed beyond that level by a confident and capable cast. The end result is a fine film, tense and thrilling, engaging and unnerving in parts, in short a quality western, roped together and hog-tied by Shane Van Dyke, who, along with his work on Titanic II has proven himself - if ever there were any doubters - as more than just a legacy; the guy's got genuine talent. Looking forward to a lot more from him, on both sides of the camera.

This one gets high marks all around. I'd love to see more films in this vein.

Just saw it, and WOW... was that seriously an Asylum film??? IT WAS SIIIICK! I loved it!
Great script, acting, set, EVERYTHING!!!!!!!! Make more movies like this, Asylum!

I would say that this one wasn't bad. It will be a DVD on my shelf because I can apperiacte good screen play.

Cons:
Low budget
The backgrounds and sfx was a little too teeth grinding and some special effects were computerized. Some of the research into how a building back then was made needed to be more researched. (understand that it was low budget) Some acting wasn't good and some things just didn't belong. (Detail people!)

Pros:
Great actors, not your run of the mill cast but for what the script demaned it worked. Low budget but the guns, horses, scenery (some..) and everioment seemed good enough to continue the story. Strong writing

Okay okay okay. Its not a bad western but it wasn't good either. If they could have put more money into a project like this I would highly suggest it, but a movie like this focuses on what is important in cinemma entertainment. Pure good acting and most movies today that release nationally are trying too hard to make use of 3D. I'm sick of 3D.. No more 3D, this movie has what most highly award winning movies had in the past good acting. I don't think Clint Eastwood would like it but I think it would have made The Duke Proud for using traditional tech to make a respectable film

I saw it on Encore western so I saved the price of buying a copy but it isn't bad for a western made now of days. Reminds of Hannie Caulder from 1971 with Raquel Welch and Robert Culp who was the bounty hunter who taught her to be a gunfighter after saveing her from thugs. If you can get Hannie Caulder and watch them back to back they were both good flims. A friend gave me a copy he bought from Wallmart so I can't complain. It's good and a bit offesive at the start but they want you to depise the villans and cheer for the heroine as she hunts down and kills thos who murderd her husband and children then gang raped her. the only changes to me were minor.

The DVD was delivered promptly and was in excellent condition, as promised. To date, I've never had a problem with anything that I've ordered through Amazon. ... The main movie was good but it had an unrealistic and stupid ending. He'd barely showed her where the trigger is on a gun and that qualifies her to be a bounty hunter of seasoned bad guys??

not a bad story, and acting was ok, but apparently i'm the only one who noticed some glaring out points with the sets. the poker scene...uhh...modern quarters, eisenhower dimes, and shiny new lincoln pennies? many buildings in town had sheets of plywood nailed on them? modern style hollow core doors on many of the buildings, and my favorite...the modern deadbolt locks and door knobs on most of the town's buildings! in one of the ending scenes of the big gunfight, you get a shot of a modern house off some distance from town, complete with white vinyl siding. i fully expected to see a car or truck drive by at any given time during the movie...

I'm the dimwit that likes gunfire and chewing on electrical wires, so I liked this movie.
It's like a modern version of the old B-westerns (low cost, simple plot, no famous faces)
and was surprisingly enjoyable; the bad guys are really bad, the girl is really pretty, etc.
The director does a good job building tension and keeps it moving. Good camera work.
Though Ms. Mears does not play a drunk very well. Enjoy.

This one was seriously bad. Laughably bad. Problem was, the director was going for serious. That kind of bad. Bad casting, bad acting, bad sets, and bad writing. Only redeeming quality was a plot twist at the end (that's why I gave it one star). And because Sage Mears was cute (when she was trying to act tough).

This film was a joke with small details poking holes in the plot and the film's credibility. The most glaring being the Wanted Dead or Alive posters that were printed on what seemed like 8.5" X 11" printer paper and almost unbelievably (what looked like) to be tapped to the walls of the sheriff's office. The second glaring gaff was using today's coins (pennies, nickel's and quarters) in a poker game - I mean at least try to put in a silver dollar or two - after all the film's setting is the Wild West. The set designer was also clueless using beach sand for a setting of Bisbee, Arizona - which is a copper mining town at this stage in real-life. Pressure-treated 2X4 screwed-in to buildings with the screw sunk holes being perfectly apart. Hello? Anyone hear of nails?
Bad acting just added to the film's disappointment - with Sage Mears playing an almost laughable drunk!!! Waste of time unless you are a dimwit and like the sound of guns going off.

One of the other film's reviews posted here on Amazon was plagiarized directly from [...] which should make the review as irrelevant as the film itself!