YELLOW ROCK – SLIFF Review

Review by Dane Marti

In recent years, there has been a new contingent of excellent Westerns that have been flying under the radar and this film; YELLOW ROCK is a nice addition.

In part, similar to a Peckinpah such as The Wild Bunch, the film has enough of its own style to stand on its two cowboy boots! Director Nick Vallelonga is quite competent in this often-filmed genre.

Evocative music plays in the background of an opening scene in which a lone rider – shades of the marvelous, Clint Eastwood, rides his horse slowly down a rugged hill. The cinematography is appropriately dusty and dirty. The landscape is both beautiful and cruel.

He isn’t in the town very long before another group arrives. The first man is drunk in a church. Something happened in his life – something tragic. The new group’s leader, Max Dietrich, asks his old friend, Tom Hanner to guide them into hostile Indian Territory. Members of the Black Paw Tribe have taken a small boy and another family member. Hanner agrees to the proposition, but only if they first get permission from the tribe, since they will be traipsing through sacred territory.

Although the posse asks for permission, not much time elapses before the cowboys are behaving in rather ruthless ways. Hanner quickly comes to the conclusion that the supposedly ostensible reason for the journey is a sham, but by this point an Indian curse has begun to take malevolent effect – or is the curse actually a wonderful form of justice?

I was most taken with the acting of Michael Biehn as the main character, Tom Hanner.

The film borrows from many Westerns and adventure films such as Treasure of the Sierra Madre by John Huston, but ultimately, the film wears its own spurs.

YELLOW ROCK plays as part of the St. Louis International Film Festival  on Friday, Nov 16th at 7:00pm at the Wildey Theatre and Sunday, Nov 18th at 4:15pm at the Hi-Pointe Theatre