"Gunslingers" Misfires in a Blaze of Style Over Substance

Low-budget maven director Brian Skiba returns with his latest film, Gunslingers, from Lionsgate. He also pens the screenplay for the film. Gunslingers opens in 1903 and introduces us to the Keller brothers, Thomas (Stephen Dorff) and Robert (Jeremy Kent Jackson), during a scuffle with some heavies over a mysterious item.

While Thomas gets away and is convinced his brother is dead, he makes his way to Kentucky to hide out in a town called Redemption. In this town, Jericho (Costas Mandylor) is the man in charge and helps Thomas fake his death so he can spend the rest of his days cooling out since he's dead on paper. Naturally, things aren't what they seem when damsel Valerie Keller (Heather Graham), her daughter Grace (Ava Monroe Tadross), and a battle-torn Robert show up in town looking for a payday and some revenge.

One of the first things viewers will notice about Gunslingers is that Nicholas Cage appears primarily in the trailer and on the poster, but classically, it's a bait-and-switch, as he has a minimal role in the film. In addition, the supporting cast is composed of B-list talent, including Tzi Ma, Bre Blair, Forrie J Smith, Eric Mabius, and action legend Sly Stallone's daughter, Scarlet Rose Stallone.

The pace of Gunslingers' gunfire surpasses the speed of its dialogue, representing the movie's main shortcoming. What should've been a tense, gritty modern Western about blood ties and revenge instead plays like a highlight reel from a Red Dead Redemption knockoff: all flash, minimal firepower.

I'll admit that in a throwback way, the premise is ripe with potential: America's most wanted man emerges in a quiet Kentucky town where he brings a trail of turmoil, bounty hunters, and his troubled past. Sounds good, right? The movie Gunslingers fills its six-shooter with clichés and misses its target often.

The cast performs well, but the writing by the directors fails to impress. There's plenty of violence, sure. Despite all the intense shootouts and family conflicts the film presents, it does not take the time to develop memorable characters. 

Within the first ten minutes, all characters in the film become hardened, driven by revenge, or killed off. The film's fleeting character development makes developing emotional investment in its relationships difficult.

Gunslingers uses gritty visuals, including dusty roads and neon bars, with excessive slow-motion gunfights that would annoy John Woo and Walter Hill. Its excessive style completely overwhelms its substance, mimicking Western classics without delivering meaningful depth.

Gunslingers rush with well-executed action scenes that display a B-movie allure through its earnest self-importance. The movie is not terrible to watch but fails to deliver because it presents an empty shootout with no emotional core.

Final Grade: C-

GUNSLINGERS will be in theaters on demand and digital on April 11, 2025.