Ten years ago, Mangold took much of the influence he would bring to Logan <\/i>and applied it to a new adaptation of the Elmore Leonard short story \u201cThree-Ten To Yuma.\u201d The story had been adapted once before, in 1957, in a good film that features an acting-against-type Glenn Ford portraying the villainous Ben Wade. Mangold took a different approach to the material and, in the process, created one of the most enduring and underrated westerns of the 21<\/span>st<\/sup><\/span> century. <\/span><\/p>\n What\u2019s interesting watching the 1957 and 2007 3:10 to Yuma<\/i>s <\/i>back-to-back is how similarly they start. The first hour of Mangold\u2019s film features several scenes that directly recreate the original, which in turn are often lifted straight from Leonard\u2019s story. (Halsted Welles, who wrote the 1957 version and died in 1990, is co-credited for the 2007 screenplay.) Elmore Leonard was a distinctive writer whose work has been adapted often, in films like Get Shorty<\/i>, Jackie Brown<\/i>, and Out of Sight<\/i>, and on television in the FX series Justified<\/i>. His style is terse and quick and often very funny, and the original 3:10<\/i>, directed by Delmer Daves, captures Leonard\u2019s voice more effectively. <\/span><\/p>\n But Mangold and screenwriters Michael Brandt and Derek Haas dig deeper into the story. After that first hour of essentially being a brilliantly shot, well-acted recreation of the 1957 film, Mangold\u2019s blazes its own trail to become something else entirely. The story \u2014 a poor rancher has to escort an outlaw to a train bound for Yuma, where the outlaw will go to prison \u2014 is essentially the same. Everything else, though, from the character dynamics to the action to even the film\u2019s ending, has been changed. And almost every change is for the better.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Christian Bale is our hero, the rancher; Russell Crowe is our villain, the outlaw. Both deliver some of the best work of their careers, but particularly Crowe, who manages to ooze charm despite playing a thoroughly despicable character. He\u2019s so good it makes you kind of angry that Crowe isn\u2019t acting in an age when more Westerns are being produced (he is similarly great in Sam Raimi\u2019s 1995 film The Quick and the Dead<\/i>). In a way, his performance is similar to the original as an actor playing against type. The normally stoic, stiff Russell Crowe gets to chew the scenery a bit here, flirt with women, crack some jokes, etc.<\/span><\/p>\n One of Mangold\u2019s most inspired choices was to make the movie more of an ensemble picture. The relationship between Bale and Crowe does drive the film, but the group traveling with them \u2014 which consists of Dallas Roberts, Kevin Durand, Alan Tudyk, Peter Fonda, and later Logan Lerman (playing Bale\u2019s son) \u2014 provide some of the film\u2019s best moments and help to raise the stakes as members of the party are killed. In the meantime, Ben Foster is hanging out on the edges of the film as Crowe\u2019s number two, and he just runs away with the damn thing, showing early signs that he is one of the best actors of his generation. <\/span><\/p>\n Perhaps by necessity, Mangold\u2019s Yuma <\/i>is much more action-oriented than its predecessor, and the action is nothing short of spectacular. It\u2019s well-executed, intense, and unafraid to get a little ridiculous \u2014 at one point, a horse blows up. A horse! That\u2019s bonkers! But the action doesn\u2019t feel tacked on. Every scene serves the narrative, all building to a climax that vastly improves on the original film in just about every way. <\/span><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/crookedmarquee.com\/stage8\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/310-to-yuma-2007-1200-1200-675-675-crop-000000.jpg\")
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