Kurt Russell’s Bone Tomahawk Is 5x Better Than The Hateful Eight

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When it comes to quality over quantity in Western films, Kurt Russell is a name that immediately comes to mind. He first appeared in the genre in 1976 with the TV movie The Quest: The Longest Drive, but it was his role as Wyatt Earp in the 1993 film Tombstone that truly established him as a Western icon. This made his return to the genre in 2015, with both Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight (as John “The Hangman” Ruth) and S. Craig Zahler’s Bone Tomahawk, highly anticipated. Bone Tomahawk, a unique horror-Western, remains an underappreciated gem.

Despite receiving fewer reviews than some of Quentin Tarantino’s other Westerns, Bone Tomahawk actually has a much higher rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Tombstone currently sits at 76%, and The Hateful Eight is even lower at 74%, while Bone Tomahawk scores an impressive 91%. This demonstrates that director S. Craig Zahler can achieve great results even with a very limited budget – just $1.8 million. The film also benefits from a strong supporting cast, featuring actors like Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox, Richard Jenkins, and David Arquette.

Kurt Russell Feels Like a Grizzled Wyatt Earp in This Engaging Horror Journey

The movie starts like a classic search and rescue Western. A woman is abducted, and her husband teams up with the town sheriff, a deputy, and a skilled gunslinger to find her. The first half of the film takes its time building the characters and following their multi-day search. However, the story dramatically shifts into the horror genre in the second half.

The group is pursuing a dangerous tribe of cannibals and soon realizes that anyone in their party could become a victim. Characters we’ve gotten to know are killed off slowly and horrifically. The situation quickly becomes a desperate fight for survival, with little chance the woman they’re looking for is still alive.

Kurt Russell stars as Sheriff Franklin Hunt in Bone Tomahawk, a seasoned and straightforward lawman who leads the remote town of Bright Hope. He’s hoping for a quiet life with his wife, but his strong sense of duty and courage lead him to rescue a local woman. Russell also brings a subtle humor and intelligence to the role, particularly evident in the playful conversations he has with Richard Jenkins, who plays his deputy.

Hunt embodies the seasoned authority of Wyatt Earp from Tombstone, but with even more grit. He’s the driving force that keeps his group moving forward, even in the face of disaster, and delivers one of the most iconic final defenses seen in horror-Westerns.

Bone Tomahawk Has One of the Most Gruesome Horror Scenes Ever Made

Though not intensely frightening throughout, the film becomes truly brutal in its second half. When the rescuers confront the cannibalistic tribe, they quickly realize how fast and deadly they are. While horror films often feature violence like beheadings and stabbings, this movie moves past them with a relentless and shocking level of brutality.

The film features a shockingly violent scene demonstrating the tribe’s brutality. They capture several people and, in a particularly gruesome act, split one of them in two using a bone tomahawk – stripping him and turning him upside down first. The scene is incredibly realistic, showing Russell’s character – and the audience – experiencing intense fear and pain. It’s easily the most disturbing moment in the film, and one that’s impossible to forget.

This scene is the main reason the film wasn’t rated and didn’t get a wide release in theaters. If the filmmakers had planned for a major theatrical release, the MPAA would probably have demanded cuts or significant changes to the graphic scene. Fortunately, they decided to preserve the film’s intended intensity, resulting in what many consider Kurt Russell’s best Western.

Bone Tomahawk is available to stream on Hulu.

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2026-01-23 05:06