Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

There is just no beating around the bush when people mention Michael Cimino's 1980 film, "Heaven's Gate." You either love it or hate it...there is only black and white when discussing this film. Having just seen the reconstructed director's cut, I will follow that trend and state: "Heaven's Gate" is a superior film. I first saw the butchered, approximately 2+ hours version in the theaters several years ago and had to agree that it was pretty bad: incoherent, of course... badly edited...in both sight and sound. At the time it reminded me of those badly made European productions in which every actor is speaking a different language and after the fact, the film is dubbed into Italian or French. The film was literally a mess. In its glorious 3-½-hours+ state, though, "HG" is a pleasure to behold. It is a grand saga dealing with greed, the loss of innocence and how money corrupts...to name a few issues it tackles. It's scope is on the grand scale of such films as Luchino Visconti's "The Leopard," Sergio Leone's "Once Upon a Time in America" and Bernardo Bertolucci's "1900." What makes these films special, thoughtful and important though is that they all tell their stories from the personal perspective of individuals: and "Heaven's Gate" does this as well...in the person of Jim Averill (Kris Kristofferson). The film is gorgeous to behold (Vilmos Zsigmond was the photographer) but one big scene bears mentioning: the scene shot in the huge dance hall (actually called Heaven's Gate) in which the entire town is in attendance, everyone roller-skating to fiddle music, several cameras swirling around with the crowd...so involving, so dynamic as to take your breath away. On the other side of the coin the scene with Ella (a young, fresh-faced Isabelle Huppert) and Nate Champion (a rouged and mascara'd, Christopher Walken) in Nate's digs couldn't be sweeter: innocent and personal...Nate brushing off bread crumbs and straightening Ella's place setting on the table, Ella, nervous and jittery...is unforgettable. All of the acting is first-rate but Walken, I think steals the movie with his quirky portrayal of a somewhat fey, yet obnoxiously macho, Nate. In one particular scene, Nate senses that Jim is back in town and tells Ella: "I can feel when he is around." In another scene, Nate sneaks into Jim's room and watches a sleeping Jim with, for want of a better word, Desire in his eyes. Nate also picks up and rubs Jim's boot lovingly: interesting, distinctive stuff especially in the context of this great big, masculine film. Isabelle Huppert is also a standout as a Madam, torn between her love for both Jim and Nate and as such is the catalyst for the jealousy and fire in the scenes between Walken and Kristofferson. At the very least, this version of "Heaven's Gate" will stand the test of time as a personal and loving statement to a period in America when we began to lose our way and our innocence to boot. At the very most, this version will survive as a testament to how wrong a lot of people can be about a film's worth and importance. If you are a fan of American Films, you owe it to yourself to check out this beautiful, resonant, complex and resoundingly heartfelt movie.