Plot so thin, it passes unnoticed.

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Exactly the movie you think it is, but not the movie you want it to be.

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

It plays like a TV Western miniseries: slow, deliberate, lots of characters. But the script is a mess. The inciting incident doesn't occur until twenty minutes into the film. The protagonist disappears in major segments. Characters are miserable, poorly defined, loud-mouthed, and annoyingly angry. There's a lack of plot flow that makes the film hard to follow. For example, characters in early scenes disappear to be replaced by new characters that then disappear. Some plot elements seem unrelated to the underlying story. The entire plot is chaotic and disorganized.The film attempts to tell the story of Val Casey (Dwight Yoakam), lawman in a desolate town called Los Tragos, Arizona Territory; the year is 1907. But something happens and Val morphs into a different occupation; I'm not sure what. We meet a variety of people in this film, most of them unlikable. There's lots of gunfire and violence.As bad as the script is, the visuals are fine. All that dust, the dim indoor lighting at night, wooden exteriors, and the vast expanse of empty land combine to make for a visually pleasing, and realistic experience. And the sound of the wind adds to the tone of forlorn desolation.Threadbare costumes and interior decor seem realistic for the period. But I didn't like the highly repetitious score.At over two hours in duration, "South Of Heaven, West Of Hell" is something of a chore to get through, aside from the interesting visuals. It's as if we are watching a downsized Western epic. Dwight, stick to songwriting and singing. That's where your talents lie.

The movie starts off great with random scenes like a burning weed or a guy shooting a guy on the projector screen. This all goes with the story later on. The music consist of words and moaning along with a depressing violin and a piano. The plot is about Valentine Casey (Dwight Yoakam) a guy who has a girlfriend and lives in a town that feels empty. Then his step brother or old friend (Vince Vahn) or whatever and some other guys (Mr. Noodle) and (PeeWee Herman) come and kill his girlfriend because they're mad at Valentine for something. Then the movie goes to a fat guy who comes to some outlaw Mexican guy in a wooden box who at the time is licking a boob through a hole. Then they kill the fat guy. Then it goes back to Casey who gets with another lady (Jane Fonda). Who later on gets raped by Mr. Noodle and Peewee Herman but gets away by smashing Mr. Noodles balls with a lamp. Then it goes to some blonde guy wearing a hat(Billy Bob Thorton)and some other guy (James Fonda) who both get killed by Vince Vahn because he doesn't like them? Finally Valentine has a gunfight with his old friend or something Vince Vahn. And after a couple dumb scenes Valetine puts dynamite on Vince Vahn whose riding a horse and blows up. The End.

I've heard it said that Vince Vaughn described this as the "punk rock of Westerns" or some such. If by that he meant the bad punk rock that's just mindless incoherent noise, well, he's spot on.The way I envision this falling together, Yoakam and some of his wacky buddies were sitting around, under the influence of a foreign substance, realized they all had a coupla days to kill and decided to shoot a movie. He decided that he'd always wanted to make out with Bridget Fonda, so took a chance and wrote her totally pointless character into the script. Since she's not exactly had a full plate the last decade or so, she jumped at the chance for a paycheck even if it meant, you know, kissing someone who looks like Dwight Yoakam. They gathered up a bunch more weirdos to round out the cast, a cinematographer who's not half bad, and made themselves a movie. A terrible, terrible movie.IMDb readers, please believe me. The 10-star reviews here are just "jokers" who are trying to trick you into seeing this film for their own perverse pleasure. The people ascribing a deep inner meaning are like the art snobs who enjoy telling you why a painting done to look exactly like one your 3-year-old would do is ACTUALLY much more important and valuable than a painting done by your 3-year-old. Don't let them win. There's NOTHING worth seeing here (other than the always lovely Bridget Fonda. But seriously, just go to her entry and look at some of the photos. The acting is comperable.) This isn't a "so bad it's good campy fun" sorta flick. It's JUST PLAIN BAD.

I got this particular movie on DVD for $2 (which should have been warning enough for me). I had heard that Warren Zevon was in this pic (his only appearance outside of documentaries, as far as I know) but was disappointed he had a fairly bit part as Babcock.I am a fan of Zevon's work (in fact, here in London, Ontario, Canada our baseball team is The Werewolves and their mascot is Warren Z. Von, which is a great source of pride to me) but, quite frankly, I didn't really pay attention to this movie. I found the plot to be very plodding, the characters to be very shallow, and the dialogue very monotonous. In the end, the only thing that kept this movie from getting a 1 from me was that Zevon was in it.I'm not saying don't watch this movie just because I didn't like it, but I will say that if you are looking for a more traditional western, with gunfights and standoffs, then you will probably be disappointed.