All right, I'm a sucker for hope.
I've never seen the original (1957) nor read Leonard's short story of the same title, so all I have is the current film.
Russell Crowe and Christian Bale are favorites of mine, and they deliver: Crowe is evil and intelligent, and Bale is stubbornly in need of money and determined to show his son the right way. Both are ruthless.
Though some reviewers have dissed the ending, I loved it - a parable of sorts - the courage of Bale elicits respect in Crowe, and Crowe responds, bloody and cruel, in such a way that Bale could achieve his goal - not the money, but the admiration of a son.
It's a tough and tangled world ... good and evil, wheat and weeds, all run together. We settle for moments of grace - we head for the 3:10 no matter what. The son is rightly impressed, and with a whistle, the train pulls away, and Crowe's horse comes a-running. Good and evil remain, having touched one another, effected and changed one another.
Hope and goodness are sometimes, often times, forged in blood. Evil, in a strange and incomprehensible fashion, becomes a partner with redemption.
I guess that's what the Cross is all about.
Calvary, the 3:10 to Yuma for Jesus.
