Blackthorn
Magnolia Pictures | Release Date: October 7, 2011 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
61
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 20 Critic Reviews
Positive:
11
Mixed:
7
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe WilliamsOct 21, 2011
In place of a rousing adventure, Blackthorn is a haunting ode. Read full review
75
San Francisco ChronicleMick LaSalleOct 13, 2011
Blackthorn imagines a scenario for Butch's later years and gives us a different kind of Western - somber, reflective and set in the elevated plains and salt flats of Bolivia. Read full review
75
Philadelphia InquirerSteven ReaOct 13, 2011
Watching Shepard work his pony down a snaking mountain pass, playing a mandolin and singing the blues, or seeing him sitting, stone-still, beneath a railroad water tank, waiting for something to happen - these are scenes to be cherished, from an actor who has found the soul of the character he's playing. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeTy BurrOct 13, 2011
Blackthorn is less interested in realism than in elegy, and in bringing this American folk hero in line with the Latin American places and people with whom he ended his days. Given a choice between the legend and the facts, Gil and Barros make up a new legend - and then gild it with light. Read full review
75
New York PostLou LumenickOct 7, 2011
With Paul Newman gone, you couldn't ask for a better senior-citizen representation of Butch Cassidy than Shepard. In his best performance since "The Right Stuff'' turned him into a reluctant movie star, Shepard makes Blackthorn worth seeing. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubTasha RobinsonOct 5, 2011
Blackthorn could use more depth and less of a sense of weary inevitability, but it never lacks for the arid, vista-prone beauty of a classic Western, or for a sense of lived-in wear and tear that remains convincing even though it's more stylized than realistic. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesBetsy SharkeyOct 7, 2011
There is that allure of the Old West that is hard to resist, and there's plenty of grist in the story worth milling and mulling. Read full review
70
Village VoiceMark HolcombOct 4, 2011
This modest oater should tickle western fans. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterFrank ScheckOct 2, 2011
The actor (Shepard) delivers a beautifully understated, world-weary turn that largely makes up for the slow-paced film's longueurs, and which in a better film could be described as iconic. Read full review
70
VarietyRonnie ScheibOct 2, 2011
Shepard delivers in spades, his character weary but just crackpot enough to survive. Read full review
67
Austin ChronicleMarc SavlovOct 19, 2011
The film has a Leone eye (courtesy of cinematographer Juan Ruiz Anchía) coupled with a drowsy, doomy pace which, emboldened by the salt-licked Bolivian settings and the finely calibrated acting from all, makes for a phantasmagoric trip down a strangely different memory lane. Read full review
60
Chicago ReaderJ.R. JonesOct 13, 2011
Shepard is the whole show here, as weathered and elemental as the harsh Bolivian locations; the movie's best scenes are those that pit him against Stephen Rea as a former Pinkerton man who tracked the outlaws for years and can't believe Cassidy is still drawing breath. Read full review
60
Boxoffice MagazineSara Maria VizcarrondoOct 9, 2011
It's a trenchant modern western and fans of the genre should embrace it for more reasons than just the presence of the epic Sam Shepard who, by the way, owns this Butch Cassidy. Read full review
60
New York Daily NewsJoe NeumaierOct 7, 2011
Director Mateo Gill's autumnal movie has elements of other late-era Westerns in its blood, but it isn't easily pigeonholed. There are shootouts and standoffs, as well as great scenes like one between the grizzled, perfectly cast Shepard and Rea discussing the cost of criminality and the changing morals of old men. Read full review
60
Time OutEric HynesOct 4, 2011
Gil's alternative history gets one thing bang-on right: If Butch were to live into his senior days, he'd absolutely have to be played by Shepard. Wrinkled, leathery and densely carpeted in a salt-and-pepper beard, the 67-year-old playwright and actor still exudes intellectual mischief and hard-stare sex appeal; his self-styled ruggedness is a perfect match for an infamous gringo living incognito. Read full review
58
Portland OregonianShawn LevyNov 19, 2011
The result is a handsome but deeply fractured tale. Read full review
50
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger EbertOct 12, 2011
The first-time director is Mateo Gil, known for the screenplays of "Open Your Eyes," "The Sea Inside" and "Agora." Ironic, that the film's weakness is its screenplay. Read full review
50
The New York TimesRachel SaltzOct 6, 2011
The movie plods along self-consciously, and when the big twist occurs (you'll most likely see it coming), it complicates the plot, but not Butch, who remains a paragon. That's the problem with Blackthorn: it goes all mushy when contemplating its grizzled, out-of-time hero. Read full review
38
Washington PostMichael O'SullivanOct 13, 2011
Blackthorn feels less like a proper sequel to "Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid," which it purports to be, than a coattail rider. Read full review
38
Slant MagazineNick SchagerOct 2, 2011
Blackthorn's last-man-standing circumstances, far from a cautionary tale about the cost of the gunslinger life, are glorified as the height of macho nobility. Read full review
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