Revenge, reclamation, and resurrection fuel Guns of Redemption, a sharply focused post-Civil War tale about a weary soldier hoping for solace yet destined for struggle. Director Brian Skiba’s (The Gunslinger) intentionally straightforward storytelling hones in on four key characters, reigning in any excess. Between its solid cast, gritty action sequences, and alluring American West backdrop, the film intrigues but is several bullets short of being an epic Western.
The film centers around a Civil War veteran named Luke (Casper Van Dien of Starship Troopers and Sleepy Hollow) who hopes to fade away in a small town. Fate has other plans as he’s soon drawn back into chaos when he tries to rescue two women (Kaitlyn Kemp, Siena Bjornerud) from a traveling brothel run by a sinister fellow named General Bork (Jeff Fahey). That doesn’t end well, and the aftermath becomes the main focus of the film, along with Luke’s determination to get revenge.
Based on a story by Kieth Merrill (The Great American Cowboy, Amazon) and Jamie R. Thompson (Old Henry, 97 Minutes), the film also stars Sean Astin (The Lord of the Rings, Stranger Things) playing a preacher trying to rebuild the town’s church. Perfectly cast and successful in how it establishes a distinct Civil War-era tone, fans of Westerns and revenge stories will appreciate the film’s sharp pivot early on and how the plot builds toward traditional Western tropes toward the end. In between, Guns of Redemption trips over choppy editing and a thin screenplay.
Pistol-Packing Westerners on All Fronts
Guns of Redemption
2.5
/5
Searching for redemption, a mysterious gunslinger with a violent past tries to save a young woman from vicious men who run a travelling brothel.
- Release Date
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March 7, 2025
- Genres
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Drama, Thriller, Western
- Runtime
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94 Minutes
- Cast
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Kaitlyn Kemp, Celeste Blandon, Francis Cronin, Myrom Kingery, James Logan, Jesse Gallegos, Michael Arata, Sean-Michael Argo, Kim DeLonghi, Sean Astin, Jeff Fahey, Casper Van Dien
- Director
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Brian Skiba
- Writers
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Kieth Merrill, Jamie R. Thompson
- Distributor(s)
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Shout! Studios
- A great cast enlivens an otherwise basic script.
- Ticks off everything you’d want from a typical Western, from the great scenery to the gunslinging.
- The editing is choppy and sometimes confusing, and the action scenes aren’t always well-directed.
Guns of Redemption begins on a sweet note. Preacher Parson Dyer (Astin) welcomes in Luke (Van Dien), a reserved stranger who eventually agrees to help him rebuild a church. Praise be. Luke has endured enough hardship and has the scars to prove it. He desperately wants to leave his harsh past behind. That proves to be challenging when General Bork (Fahey) rolls into town with his mobile stage-coaching brothel, dragging along two unwilling sisters, Charlotte and Anna.
Luke can’t sit back, you see. He wants to help the women, but the confrontation turns bloody and Luke is horribly wounded. Bork and his men leave the man for dead and off the mobile brothel goes. It may require taking a leap of faith to make the rest of the film seem plausible, but fear not, you’ll tend to forgive some of the plot devices here once Luke — surprise — manages to spring back to life and embark on a full-out revenge mission.
4:05
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Luke’s determination may drive the second half of the film, but even with Casper Van Dien in the role, a fine actor to be sure, the character never truly grabs us. Two other characters do. The first is General Bork, and as embodied by Jeff Fahey, we are given a true Western villain we easily love to despise. As steely as he is cold-blooded, Bork is a formidable foe. Fahey is pitch-perfect in the role. Meanwhile, Kaitlyn Kemp, as Charlotte, emerges as the character to truly root for.
A Great Cast & Scenice Locale Makes Up for Narrative Flaws
We’re living in a Western renaissance right now with the huge successes of Yellowstone, 1923, 1883, Landman, and indie Westerns like Calamity Jane, The Outlaws, The Thicket, and The Dead Don’t Hurt. We’d like to see Guns of Redemption get some love, too. This may not be the most effectively executed Western, but the cast sets a winning tone.
It’s nice to see Sean Astin here, leaning into another role cut from similar creative clothes — earnest, trustworthy, middle-aged (see also The Conners, Stranger Things, Holiday Twist, and The Invisible Raptor). Astin is a likable actor, and he makes the film’s preacher believable if not somebody we all seem to know somewhere in our own lives. He’s solid to the core. The chemistry between Van Dien and Astin works, too, making Luke’s fierce drive to find Bork all the more engaging overall. And those sparks between Van Dien and Kemp perfectly hit the mark.
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In the meantime, the film’s scenic nature checks off all the visual boxes on the Westerns list — dusty towns, big skies, rocky landscapes, broad vistas. The gunslinging fits the bill, too. You may be jarred by some of the overt violence featured here, but if you’re a Western fan going into this film, you’re already used to such gritty and bloody scenes. The filmmaker may teeter a bit at how these important moments are executed, but if you can surrender to the almost sleepy tone of the movie, you will feel suspended in time with it and enjoy that time with its characters. Bottom line: the stellar cast elevates this tale, making Guns of Redemption a Western you can ultimately appreciate. Guns of Redemption is in theaters and on demand beginning March 7, 2025.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
