Ride With The Devil On DVD: Good Ol' Nubbin-Fingered Jake Roedel

Charles Taylor, one of my very favourite movie critics, has a pretty low opinion of Ang Lee and has written some fairly scathing reviews of his films. I agree with Taylor that the rapturous praise that greeted Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon was wildly overblown, coming mainly from film critics unfamiliar with the genre Lee was working in and mistakenly crediting him with stylistic innovations that were well-established conventions long before Lee came on the scene.

On the other hand, you've got to give Lee credit for movies like Ride With the Devil, which isn't quite like any other Civil War epic I can think of. Lee's "director's cut" of the film is coming out on DVD via Criterion on Tuesday, and hopefully that event will inspire a re-evaluation and rediscovery of this unusual film, which completely tanked at the box office when it was originally released in 1999. (Hey, maybe Jewel will even get some more acting work out of it.)

To whet your appetite, give a listen to my "Hidden Gem" DVD segment about the film for CBC Radio. Here's the link.