American Gun
In His Search For The Truth...The Journey Brought Him The Answer.
Stars Academy Award winner James Coburn (Snow Dogs, Affliction) in his final, highly-acclaimed screen performance, and Virginia Madsen (TV's American Dreams, The Haunting). In the tradition of In The Bedroom, critics called American Gun "One of the most serious performances ever from topliner James Coburn!"
Member Reviews
Coburn's Final Film - eoguy
When James Comburn died in November 2002, he left a film legacy spanning half a century. His final film, American Gun, came just a few years after his Oscar winning turn as an abusive father in Affliction.
American Gun is an extremely subtle commentary on gun availability in the United States. Unlike most left-wing films of our time, this one doesn't beat you over the head with any messages, or even reinforce its opinion. Instead, the story simply unravels through one of Coburn's most subtle screen performances, and lets you do the thinking.
This is a Coburn movie, everyone else in the cast is secondary. Sometimes that makes for slowly paced developments. The film moves through several stories about the gun, but none of them really make a connection. The short tales aren't developed enough to hold their own and they repeatedly interrupt Coburn's journey. The film's conclusion adds some twists to the story, which help to explain the ineffective first 20 minutes of the film.
While the American Gun isn't nearly as powerful as Affliction, Coburn's performance is almost as impressive. While the previous film gave him the opportunity to project anger and madness, American Gun only lets him covey through subtlety. If Coburn were replaced by another aged actor, say Clint Eastwood, this might've turned into a cheesy drama like Blood Work. The DVD is bare of any film-related extras, but includes James Coburn: Bang the Gong, a 40 minute summary of his life, which originally aired on A&E's Biography. The show covers the man's youth up until his voice performance in Monster's Inc. For those unfamiliar with Coburn's career, this will offer an opportunity to look up some past films and discover an actor whose soaring career was brought to a screeching halt by severe arthritis.
Member Reviews
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Coburn's Final Film - eoguy
When James Comburn died in November 2002, he left a film legacy spanning half a century. His final film, American Gun, came just a few years after his Oscar winning turn as an abusive father in Affliction.
American Gun is an extremely subtle commentary ...