Ride with the Devil

Amazon.com

Great period pictures make you feel as if you've stepped into another era, heard its language, breathed its spirit, and come away with a fresh perspective on that time as well as your own. Ride with the Devil is one of those special films--why wasn't it more widely embraced by reviewers and filmgoers? Did it rely too much on our patience for slow accumulation of unforced rhythms and meanings (as opposed to The Patriot, which "moved" audiences with cattle-prod simplicity and manipulation)? Ride with the Devil--smart, handsome, tenderly awed by how individual lives get ambushed by history--is ripe for rediscovery.

The Civil War of battlefields and plantation houses is nowhere to be seen here. Instead we see the war as an improvised and largely blundering but very bloody feud among neighbors in the border state of Missouri. In this bucolic war zone--more than a little reminiscent of the Balkans in the late 1990s--the Taiwanese-born director Ang Lee (Sense and Sensibility) traces the destinies of several young Southern bushwhackers (guerrilla fighters) as they experience violence, the seasons, and different kinds of love. Skeet Ulrich draws the aristocratic glamour role (and top billing), but he's overshadowed by Tobey Maguire as a first-generation American, the magnificent Jeffrey Wright (a shameful oversight at Oscar time) as a freed slave fighting beside his former master, and singer Jewel in a very natural acting debut as the young widow who graces all their lives. The title The Birth of a Nation was already taken, but by the end of this movie you feel it would have applied here. -- Richard T. Jameson

Customer Reviews:

MORE PEOPLE NEED TO SEE THIS FILM.......2007-06-28

Mr. Lee's excellent depiction of the Border War on the Missouri/Kansas frontier provides a much-need context for that struggle that may help people of today to better understand what happened and why. The acting is uniformly impressive, the clothing is perfect, the film's location shots were filmed where the story actually took place for the most part, and most of all, the dialogue exactly captures the feel and flavour of the period. This is not a plot-driven film, it is carried along by the character developement and interaction. If you are looking for slam-bang action or set-piece Civil War battles, try another film. But if you want to explore causes, motivations and effects, check this film out. I'm glad that I did.

Ride with the Devil Student Review.......2007-06-12

Ride with the Devil is a thrilling movie about four rebels fighting for the south but were neither in the Union nor the Confederacy, they were individual rebels. They fight when they know they can win, although one time in the movie they are over powered and one of their friends is shot. Along with the fighting there is a romance theme in the movie when they meet a woman and the man who was shot fell in love with her but died. Unfortuanaly he got her pregnant, and his other friend becomes the father. Where he no longer is a rebel causing problems in the south.

This is a pro-south movie where the plot is changed to make the south look good, and the north look bad. Some of the events were changed to alter the plot and make the north look bad. These "individual rebels" were actually like the mafia of today. They would destroy houses, business, kill people, unless they got some type of payment for them not to do that, and the people would have to continue to pay these rebels for their "protection." They tried to stay out of the war, and work behind the scene causing trouble in towns, but everyone and a while they would need to fight off the army. In the very beginning of the movie, these rebels burn down a trading post and kill the owner, he did not pay for his protection, and to make matters worst, he was working with the Union. The movie does not portray it that way, but from a historical context that was what happened. There was also a point when a man on a horse gathers everyone together to ride up to Kansas and fight off the northerners, which could be a parallel to when Jefferson Davis had as many as seventy-five thousand men ride to Richmond, Virginia to fight off the Union. The historical context is there, but you need to know background information to recognize it, if you do not have any background information, you would believe that the south was virtually innocent and there never should have been a war.

~Tobey as a Cowboy~.......2007-05-10

This is an Amazing Film. Not only is Tobey Maguire in it. But the story is very interesting. The battle scenes were really good. Its one of those films that you would watch over and over again.

brilliant film.......2007-05-08

Set during the civil war in bleeding kansas and Missouri the film follows two young men who join 'Quantrills Raiders' and take revenge upon the union for its greivious acts against southerners. During the savage war an entire town, Lawrence, is massacred by these 'bushwackers'. However the group falls apart and Jack and hsi friend, who is a freed slave, end up living with a single pregnant woman in a small town untouched by the fighting. THe story follows as Jack falls in love with Sue, placyed by Tobey Meguire and Bjork respectively the cast is wonderful and the acting superb.

The movie however is inexoribly drawn towards a confrontation where an enemy from Jack's past and the Civil war may catch up with the love nest. The timidity and virginity of Jack is also a problem as are the conservative morals of the local menfolk. The interplay between the men in the film, the action, and the fact that it is modelled on real events that took place along the mason-dixon line, makes for a wonderful film.

Seth J. Frantzman

A Very Fine "Period Piece.".......2007-05-05

A very Fine "Period Piece."

It does it's Job very well. This movie has great Heart, great Dialog, and many suprising Performances.

It's a Keeper :-)

Average customer rating:

Hammer Great
Christopher Lee cast against type
One of the best that Hammer Horror has to offer...
candidate for digital
Hammer horror's finest hour?

The Devil Rides Out
Starring: Christopher Lee , Charles Gray , Nike Arrighi , Leon Greene , and Patrick Mower
Director: Terence Fisher
Manufacturer: Anchor Bay
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: 6305808163
Release Date: 2000-07-25

Amazon.com

Christopher Lee, long Hammer Studios' house villain, takes a rare heroic turn as scholar and occultist Duc de Richleau, the kind of role that Peter Cushing had made his métier. Lee plays Richleau with a dark elegance and intensity--he's a commanding figure with a trim goatee who discovers that the son of a war buddy has joined a satanic cult lorded over by the quietly malevolent Mocata (Charles Gray, best known as the narrator in The Rocky Horror Picture Show). Director Terence Fisher, working from a literate script by genre scribe Richard Matheson, creates a strikingly handsome period piece (set in 1920s rural England) dripping in dread as Richleau and Mocata battle for the souls of two young lovers on both physical and spiritual planes. The action scenes are well handled and the towering Lee cuts quite a figure leaping through hoards of robed devil worshippers to save a sacrificial victim, but the film peaks in an eerie supernatural battle in which Richleau and his skeptical party confronts Mocata's demons while protected in a giant pentagram. The effects are coarse and dated by today's standards, but the gorgeous period detail, vivid color, and unsettling imagery create a sinister ambiance, and Fisher's mix of psychodrama and swashbuckling action makes for an engrossing thriller, a life-and-death struggle between two masters of the forces of light and darkness. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews:

Hammer Great.......2007-09-01

This marvellous film is one of Hammers best ever. Really only Dracula and The Hound of the Baskervilles are in the same league.

Christopher Lee plays the Duc De Richeau with the same passion he plays normally plays bad guys. Charles Gray is excellent as Mocata, the leader of the devil worshipers. Other noteable British actors that you will know are Patrick Mower and Paul Eddington.

The director is Terence Fisher who consistently proved himself to be the best Hammer director. The film is gripping and if the special effects look very primitive now you should not let it detract from what is otherwise a great film.

This edition has a commentary by Christopher Lee and others which is quite fascinating and well worth getting. Even without the commentary this is still an essential purchase for Hammer and/or horror fans.

Christopher Lee cast against type.......2006-10-06

The Devil Rides Out is probably the best known book that Dennis Wheatley ever wrote. The Hammer film adaptation is pretty faithful to the book. The film version sees Christopher Lee (cast against type) as the heroic Duc de Richelieu fighting a coven of Satanists, led by Charles Gray's evil and sinister Mocata. The film is both eerie and frightening (the encounter with the Ab Human entity in the darkened house being a very good example) as the powers of Light and Darkness lock horns via their respective proxys...
Christopher Lee turns in a superlative performance as De Richelieu and Charles Gray is equally good as his Satanic nemesis - Mocata.
They receive sterling support from the rest of the cast who include Patrick Mower and Barbara Shelley.
Among occult movies, The Devil Rides Out stands out as one of the very best. It remains one of my all time faves and is highly recommended to anyone who has not seen it yet.

One of the best that Hammer Horror has to offer..........2005-10-12

One of the best in the Hammer Horror series. I put this one alongside "To the Devil...A Daughter" and "Satanic Rites of Dracula" as one of my favorites. It's well-written, well-acted, well-staged, and very creepy. An underrated, though no less true, success in the genre.

candidate for digital.......2005-06-04

What a marvelous film--and what a shame that an otherwise superb production in terms of casting, pace, storyline and atmosphere is cursed with second-rate effects that have dated so badly. Christopher Lee once said in an interview that he felt he was probably a little young for the excellent role of the Duc. You certainly won't get that impression though watching his authoritative performance.

Perhaps Steven Spielberg or George Lucas could be persuaded to buy the rights to the movie and remaster the film in digital with an entirely new sequence of special effects that would be worthy of the cast and the production design....

Hammer horror's finest hour?.......2004-12-04

Were I to identify Hammer's finest film, it would almost certainly be a close call between the 1958 Horror of Dracula and this impressive occult thriller from 1968.

In The Devil Rides Out, adapted by Richard Matheson from the book by Dennis Wheatley, the Duc de Richleau (Christopher Lee in perhaps one of his two or three greatest roles) finds himself in a battle with the forces of evil in the guise of satanic ringleader Mocata (a sinister Charles Gray). Terence Fisher directs a riveting and intense "fairy tale for adults" in which darkness and light collide, and God triumphs over the Devil. The suspense and fear are effectively conveyed through Fisher's sharp direction, James Bernard's macabre and sometimes frenetic musical score, and Arthur Grant's brilliant lighting and photography, which comes into its own in the justly famous library scenes in which our protagonist and his allies must defend themselves against a nightlong satanic assault.

Average customer rating:

MORE PEOPLE NEED TO SEE THIS FILM
Ride with the Devil Student Review
~Tobey as a Cowboy~
brilliant film
A Very Fine "Period Piece."

Ride with the Devil [Region 2]
Starring: Tobey Maguire , Jeremy W. Auman , Scott C. Sener , Skeet Ulrich , and Glenn Q. Pierce
Director: Ang Lee
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

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ASIN: B00004T8VQ

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

MORE PEOPLE NEED TO SEE THIS FILM.......2007-06-28

Ride with the Devil Student Review.......2007-06-12

~Tobey as a Cowboy~.......2007-05-10

This is an Amazing Film. Not only is Tobey Maguire in it. But the story is very interesting. The battle scenes were really good. Its one of those films that you would watch over and over again.

brilliant film.......2007-05-08

A Very Fine "Period Piece.".......2007-05-05

A very Fine "Period Piece."

It does it's Job very well. This movie has great Heart, great Dialog, and many suprising Performances.

It's a Keeper :-)

Average customer rating:

MORE PEOPLE NEED TO SEE THIS FILM
Ride with the Devil Student Review
~Tobey as a Cowboy~
brilliant film
A Very Fine "Period Piece."

Ride with the Devil [Region 2]
Starring: Tobey Maguire , Jeremy W. Auman , Scott C. Sener , Skeet Ulrich , and Glenn Q. Pierce
Director: Ang Lee
ProductGroup: DVD
Binding: DVD

General | Westerns | Genres | DVD | Video

( R ) | Titles | Features | DVD | Video
Similar Items:

ASIN: B00005T62F

Amazon.com

Customer Reviews:

MORE PEOPLE NEED TO SEE THIS FILM.......2007-06-28

Ride with the Devil Student Review.......2007-06-12

~Tobey as a Cowboy~.......2007-05-10

This is an Amazing Film. Not only is Tobey Maguire in it. But the story is very interesting. The battle scenes were really good. Its one of those films that you would watch over and over again.

brilliant film.......2007-05-08

A Very Fine "Period Piece.".......2007-05-05

A very Fine "Period Piece."

It does it's Job very well. This movie has great Heart, great Dialog, and many suprising Performances.

It's a Keeper :-)

DVD:

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