I think it's the more accurate version too, it tallies pretty much with the contemporary newspaper reports I've read.
It's much, much more accurate than the 40s, 50s and 60s attempts, which are purely imaginary (because if you're setting up the gun fight as the climax of your picture, the real one is rather anti-climactic), but it isn't
quite right. Though admittedly it would be almost impossible to reconstruct the fight without a time machine as nobody seems to agree on who shot first, or who exactly shot whom, or which guy was holding the reins of the horse (was it Tom or Frank McLaury?) or whether Tom McLaury was actually armed or not (his gun was found in a hotel a block or more away and no weapon that could be associated with him was found at the scene) and therefore was he an active participant in the fight or merely gunned down in cold blood by the Earps? The partisanship of the witnesses, and contradictions in the statements of supposedly neutral witnesses leave all these questions open.
But anyway, after pleading that he wasn't armed, Ike Clanton fled the scene of the real fight. The movie has him take Johnny Behan's gun and exchange gunfire with the Earps from inside the photo studio. That's made up. He ran and kept running.
Billy Claiborne's presence at the corral is either ignored or played down in the movie. He, like Ike, claimed to be unarmed and fled the scene. Instead, it has a character called Barnes (played by the guy who was the radio DJ in 'Northern Exposure') and another unnamed cowboy you hardly notice scarper out of there. Maybe that other guy is meant to be Claiborne. He is named in the credits, played by an actor called "Wyatt Earp", oddly enough.
Tom McLaury staggered across the street after being shot before collapsing wounded, and Frank tried to flee the fight and also crossed the street. Doc Holliday pursued him and shot him down. Neither Tom McLaury nor Billy Clanton died at the scene, both were moved to a nearby house where they died later on that day.
Whether Wyatt had the Buntline Special at the gunfight (or at all, ever) is something I'm not even going to go into, it will give me a headache.
So, apart from all that, it's pretty good.
I like most of the other films mentioned, but none of them approach Tombstone's coolness really, do they? It just has a certain something going for it.
Something I never noticed until recently is that the troublesome Faro dealer who Wyatt humiliates early on (
"you gonna do something or just stand there and bleed?") is none other than Billy Bob Thornton. I guess he wasn't famous at the time, hence the retroactive recognition.
09 July 2010, 04:52:36 AM