Heavenly ‘Gate’
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Why is it that whenever I read about the death and revival of the Western film (“Why We So Love Those Oaters,” by Jane and Michael Stern, Dec. 5), the article always begins with the failure of “Heaven’s Gate” and the success of “Dances With Wolves”?
Has anyone really seen the original, uncut version of “Heaven’s Gate”? It’s not the disaster everyone thinks it is. In fact, film critic and historian Robin Wood, in his book “Hollywood: From Vietnam to Reagan,” compared “Heaven’s Gate” to “Birth of a Nation” and called it “one of the supreme achievements of the Hollywood cinema.”
Maybe with the passage of time “Dances With Wolves” will be seen as the overrated, simplistic fairy tale it was and “Heaven’s Gate” will be looked on as probably the best example yet of how critical overreaction and studio cowardice can kill a great film even before the moviegoing public has a chance to see it.
STEVE BARR
Culver City
Only good movies
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