History Film / TheQuickAndTheDead

* GentlemanAdventurer: Sergeant Cantrell, or so he claims. [[spoiler:He's really a hired gun the townspeople hired to kill Herod.]]

* ReluctantWarrior: Cort is forced to participate in the contest.

** Justified in that Herod was a major outlaw and the money most likely is his accumulated loot. When announcing the prize, the saloon keeper says it's courtesy of Mr. Herod and Wells Fargo Bank, implying that at least some of it is proceeds of a robbery. The whole point of the competition seems to be that Herod counts on winning every year, and so is willing to put both his life and his fortune on the line.

* GunPorn: One scene in particular, in the Kid's gun shop, where he shows off custom models of the Colt Single Action Army, the Remington 1875, and the Smith & Wesson Model 3. [[http://www.imfdb.org/wiki/Quick_and_the_Dead,_The_%281995%29 More info on the IMFDB]] Before the first duel of the contest, between the Kid and Gutzon, there is about a minute of lovingly composed closeups while they each load their guns.

* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: Justified; Lady has never killed anyone before, and is afraid of Herod. This makes her balk at shooting him on several occasions. [[spoiler:It turns out she has killed someone-- her own father, further explaining her reluctance.]]

** Cort tries to attack Herod after he's forced to shoot Lady. [[Subverted - it's actually a ploy to distract his men from her NotQuiteDead body.]]

* SacrificialLion: The Kid gets a lot of face time, but in the end he's [[spoiler:gut-shot and left to die in the street]], simply to show that Herod's so evil he would do anything to finish a gunfight [[spoiler:including kill his own son.]]

There's [[TheAce "Ace"]] Hanlon (Creator/LanceHenriksen), "The Terror of Tucson," renowned both for his trick-shooting skill and long body count.

* NotSoDifferent: Both played straight and inverted. Herod is dead-set on convincing Cort that [[TheAtoner his mission to make up for his past sins]] is pointless because they're cut from the same cloth, and he's always going to be a killer. Inverted with The Kid, who Herod is also dead-set on convincing that they're nothing alike, possibly because he's loathe to acknowledge that he's The Kid's father.

-->'''Herod:''' You're looking at me and thinking: we have nothing in common. But we do. We're both winners.

* {{Homage}}:
** Scars was designed to resemble [[Film/TheThreeStooges Curly Howard]].
** Lady's vendetta with Herod and TroubledBackstoryFlashback are lifted from ''Film/OnceUponATimeInTheWest'' and ''Film/HighPlainsDrifter''.

On Dia de los Muertas, a mysterious Lady (Creator/SharonStone) rides into the small town of Redemption, Arizona. Redemption languishes under the iron fist of its mayor, John Herod (Creator/GeneHackman), an outlaw turned gangster, and his cadre of thugs.

* ArtisticLicenseGunSafety: Ace Hanlon does a trick shot where he flips off his horse and fires underneath its belly, putting a bullet through the Ace of Spades held by a little girl. Herod hangs a Main/Lampshade on it:

* BulletDancing: Herod briefly makes [[spoiler:'Ace' Hanlon]] do this before killing him, as a means of showing his contempt for the MilesGloriosus.

* DuelToTheDeath: When Herod changes the rules of the competition, to weed out the gunfighter the townsfolk hired to take him down.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Herod changes the rules after the second round to make each contest a DuelToTheDeath, but he abides by the rule himself once it's declared.[[spoiler: It doesn't stop him from telling his men to kill Cort if he's the winner of their duel.]] He warns the Kid multiple times to back out with no strings attached. Herod also hates liars and cowards, and despite [[spoiler:killing the Kid with only a little remorse when he won't back down]], he's at least relatively quick and efficient about it instead of humiliating and making him suffer like he does his other opponents.

* NotJustATournament: The gunfighting tournament is primarily a way for the BigBad to eliminate any threats to himself and intimidate any of the locals who might try to oppose him. He knows that there is an assassin gunning for him and that the Kid is itching to take him on. The tournament is a trap for them to face him in the open where he can gun them down in a duel. It is implied that if anyone proves too much of a threat, his Mooks will gun that person down.

** Ace Hanlon constantly boasts about being TheFastestGunInTheWest. While he's a good trick shot, Herod sees right through him when he takes credit for one of his kills and publically humiliates him before killing him.

* TheSmurfettePrinciple: Lady is the only girl competing in the contest.

** Subverted; [[spoiler:it turns out Lady accidentally killed her own father, when Herod gave her a SadisticChoice as a child to either ShootTheRope or be ForcedToWatch her father hung. Unfamiliar with firearms at the time, she puts a bullet in daddy's head.]]

* BoringButPractical: After seeing several {{Cool Gun}}s, Cort admits he doesn't have any money, so Herod buys him the cheapest gun in the shop. As Cort is leaving, the Kid says, "That gun shoots straight. I wouldn't sell it if it didn't."

* ArtisticLicenseGunSafety: Ace Hanlon does a trick shot where he flips off his horse and fires underneath its belly, putting a bullet through the Ace of Spades held by a little girl. Herod hangs a Main\Lampshade on it:

* ArtisticLicenseGunSafety: Ace Hanlon does a trick shot where he flips off his horse and fires underneath its belly, putting a bullet through the Ace of Spades held by a little girl.
-->'''Herod''': That's a neat trick. I heard you blew a kid's thumb off in Reno doing that.

* AudibleSharpness: Lady's father's badge, when she throws it, makes the trademark "shing" sound.

-->'''Lady:''' Yeah: you.

** [[spoiler:Cort tries to attack Herod after he's forced to shoot Lady; subverted when we realise this was meant to distract his men from her NotQuiteDead body.]]

** When Cort is first brought to him Herod asks if he's still as fast as he used to be. Cort doesn't respond.

* SheCleansUpNicely: When Herod invites Lady to dinner after surviving her first duel she wears a PimpedOutDress. She also cleans herself up when she finally decides to challenge Herod.
* ShipTease: Between Lady and The Kid, the Kid makes no secret to his crush on her and she ends up kissing him at one point. Technically, they even sleep together, although it's literally just "sleeping": they got drunk and shared a bed, but Lady was sober enough to remember The Kid passing out before she did.

** Before Gutzon and The Kid fight, there's an extended sequence that shows them each loading their weapons. Much to vintage gun enthusiasts' surprise, Raimi has Gutzon sealing the chambers of his pistol with beeswax, something that was done as a matter of course on that model (1861 [=LeMat=] cap-and-ball) to prevent the possibility of a chain fire (one charge going off igniting the others).
** The overall selection of firearms is also quite interesting and in some sense realistic. Even though almost everything in the film is inflated and fairy-tale-Wild-West, many of the shooters actually use revolvers that were cheaply converted from cap to cartridge - a stark reality of the (supposed) timeframe. These earlier cap revolvers had to be loaded chamber by chamber with powder, then wad, then bullet, then pressed with a rod, then sealed with wax, then primed with little percussion caps - and they were the go-to weapons... until brass cartridge revolvers made them obsolete almost overnight. So the Kid in the film uses an expensive (about $15 before engraving) Colt SAA cartridge revolver that he loads with ammo familiar to us, but many others use former cap "[=FrankenGuns=]" that were converted to load familiar brass cartridges by the manufacturer or even local tinkerers. In the case of Cort's gun, you can plainly see the empty space where a crudely removed loading lever once was (this lever was used to press the round bullet into the chamber and compress the powder and wad inside).
** Audiences at the time scoffed a bit at Sgt. Cantrell [[AluminumChristmasTrees because he was a black gunslinger]], but the filmmakers clearly showed their work when creating the character; he's established to be a former Buffalo Soldier, an all-black cavalry founded after the Civil War. Also, as many as a quarter of actual gunslingers on the frontier were black since they encountered less racism than in the Deep South and almost always were paid equal wages to white people even if they did.

* SimpleYetAwesome: Herod doesn't organize the annual duel tournament for fun (a statement [[ForTheEvulz contradicted by his immense pleasure watching opponents die]]), but even he appreciates the town ''has gone to hell'' since he took over, and its [[HumansAreBastards people will kill you for your bootlaces]]. He participates so he can face his enemies one-on-one, without fear of them shooting him in the back when he's vulnerable or off-guard.

* SmoochOfVictory: The Lady is so glad to live through her first duel she kisses the Kid, whose affections she's rejected before then.

* StagedShooting: Cort shoots Lady in a duel arranged by Herod. Later, she turns out to be alive - they faked her death.

* TorsoWithAView: During the climax, [[spoiler:Herod]] doesn't think he's been shot until he sees the hole in his shadow. In a variation on this, [[spoiler:Cantrell]] recieves a ''forehead'' with a view

* UnorthodoxHolstering: As the film centres around a quick draw competition, a variety of different methods of holstering are shown. Sergeant Cantrell goes for a pistol mounted on a swivel on his gunbelt; allowing him to shoot from the hip without having to draw his gun.

* WallBangHer: Lady and Cord's sex scene is done this way to show its frantic nature. The position has an additional advantage of showing off her hot leather pants when he grabs her ass.
* WantedPoster: During the scene where the gunfighters are signing up for the Quick Draw Competition in the saloon, The Lady is sitting under a wanted poster listing "Rape" and "Murder." A few moments later when the camera angle shifts you can see the drawing on the poster and the name of the wanted man: It's Virgil Sparks, one of the shooters who has just joined the competition.
* WellDoneSonGuy: The Kid to Herod, because Herod suspects him of being the bastard son of his unfaithful wife. Cort also reveals that [[spoiler:Herod recruited him as a kid and he wanted to be just like him; until Herod forced him to cross a MoralEventHorizon by killing a priest who nursed them back to health.]]
* WhatDidIDoLastNight: The Lady wakes up on a bed in the Kid's gunshop and the Kid says he won her in a poker game. The Lady isn't fooled, saying the last thing she remembers is the Kid passing out from too much booze.
* WorthyOpponent: How Herod views Cort when they first met. Time doesn't sweeten it, as it develops into TheOnlyOneAllowedToDefeatYou personal goal for him.

** Gutzon tells the Kid he will only wound him. The Kid replies, "You're a kind man" and obliges him by doing the same.

* WhyDontYouJustShootHim: Justified; Lady has never killed anyone before, and is afraid of Herod. This makes her balk at shooting him on several occasions. [[spoiler:It turns out she has killed someone -- her own father, further explaining her reluctance.]]

* YourHeadASplode: Sgt. Cantrell's head doesn't exactly a splode, but what's left can't be structurally sound.

* BadassInANiceSuit: Herod always looks very dapper whether he's walking about town, entertaining guests, squeezing his iron fist around the people of Redemption, or when he's gunning someone down.

** Then Herod is on the receiving end when [[spoiler:he hits Lady, only to realize from his shadow there's a neat hole in his chest.]]

* BlastingItOutOfTheirHands: {{Subverted}}, in that it's done as a KickTheDog instead of a non-lethal means of ending the duel. "Ace" Hanlon boasts that he can kill a man with either hand, and did so while killing the notorious Terrence Brothers. Unfortunately Herod, the man he's about to duel, was the one who actually killed them, so he shows his contempt by shooting Hanlon in his gun hand, then inviting him to draw with the other hand, which promptly gets a bullethole through it as well.

* BloodlessCarnage: [[spoiler:Herod]] thinks he won a gunfight with The Lady but looks down to see a neat hole through his chest, with light coming from his back and wind whistling through this gunshot wound that looks more like a clean bloodless tunnel.

* BoisterousWeakling: Gutzen and Ace Hanlon both brag about their prowess. Neither of them are taken seriously and are quickly eliminated.

* BraidsOfAction: Lady puts her MessyHair into a neat single braid when she [[LetsGetDangerous makes the decision to take on Herod in a duel]]. She goes back to MessyHair for the final shootout though.

* ButForMeItWasTuesday: Lady's entire motivation in entering the competition is to kill Herod, but Herod has no idea who she is despite her obvious discomfort--and later, loathing. His telling response to an outright death threat from her: "Do you have some particular problem with me?" Subverted when [[spoiler: Lady throws her father's badge into the dirt before the final battle, and Herod instantly recognizes it.]]
* ButNowIMustGo: [[spoiler:Once Lady has killed Herod she doesn't hang around for an encore; she just tosses her father's badge to Cort, gets on her horse and gallops off.]]

* CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Cort starts out this way, a somewhat awkward, hapless preacher who initially seems to be way in over his head when he's forcibly entered into the quick draw competition. He refuses to participate and repeats over and over again that he won't draw...until the clock strikes the hour and he's shot his opponent without even seeming to realise it.
* CuffsOffRubWrists: Cort is kept shackled between duels. Before his second round fight he can be seen ripping the cuffs of his shirt out of the bloody welts left on his wrists by the shackles.
* TheDandy: Hanlon; subverted when after he dies, the other contestants strip his corpse of all his fine clothes.

* DeathSeeker: Cort would rather have been hanged than be forced to return to his violent ways. When Lady says she's too scared to take on Herod, the doctor replies she's more afraid of living than dying.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Herod changes the rules after the second round to make each contest a DuelToTheDeath, but he abides by the rule himself once it's declared.[[spoiler: It doesn't stop him from telling his men to kill Cort if he's the winner of their duel.]] He warns the Kid multiple times to back out with no strings attached. Herod also hates liars and cowards and despite [[spoiler:killing the Kid with only a little remorse when he won't back down]] he's at least relatively quick and efficient about it instead of humiliating and making him suffer like he does his other opponents.

* EvilCannotComprehendGood: Herod orders Cort to shoot the kind priest who nursed them both back to health. The way he sees it, the state troopers are still hot on their trail, [[PragmaticVillainy by killing 'witnesses' they are tying up loose ends]]. Its not like the priest was doing it out of the goodness of his own heart or anything.

* FakingTheDead: The Lady, Cort, the doctor and the blind kid concoct a scheme whereby [[spoiler:Cort appears to kill the Lady in their contest, meaning Cort will face Herod in the final round, and the Lady can a dramatic and unexpected return]].

* GloveSlap: Herod informs Lady that she's going to duel Cort, and if she refuses she'll be killed. He then slaps her with the back of his hand (he's holding gloves in it). Lady tries to hit him back only to be stopped by a DramaticGunCock from Herod's bodyguards. Herod just smirks and walks off.

* TheGunslinger: The entire movie centres around a quick draw competition, so the entire cast is filled with gunslinger. While most are {{Quick Draw}}s, Cort and Ace are also Trick Shots.

* GunTwirling: In a rather nice touch, the main actors were all taught to do it themselves--which was probably easier to film, considering the ''massive'' amount of gunfights shown. Herod's minions do this with ''rifles'' quite a lot, in a way that should really eject an unused bullet every time.

* HesDeadJim: Spotted Horse boasts that he's ImmuneToBullets and has the scars to prove it. Cort takes him down with a single bullet (he's only allowed one) during their QuickDraw competition. The doctor without even approaching the body says casually, "He's dead." Cort turns to walk away...
-->'''Spotted Horse:''' Spotted Horse...cannot...be killed... ''(staggers to his feet)'' ...by a bullet...!

** The Kid [[spoiler: is the only kill]] Herod expresses real regret for and despite giving a half-hearted [[IHaveNoSon confession that he wasn't certain if he actually was The Kid's father]], his expression and quiet departure from the street after the fight (dropping his hat AND handgun AND wound dressing on the ground, no less) indicates that he did see him that way.

* ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne: Herod is more offended at Cort telling the Lady to back out of the tournament -- rather than how, immediately after that, they argue over [[spoiler:which one of them will kill him]].

** Herod says that if anyone cheats they'll be eliminated from the competition. Cue DramaticGunCock by his mooks.

* InvoluntaryBattleToTheDeath: Almost played straight, but they wind up taking a [[TakeAThirdOption third option]]. Forced into a shootoff. Cort is forced into practically every shootoff, but especially the one with Lady. Neither wants to shoot the other. Both want to shoot Herod, though.

'''Herod:''' One! [''[[spoiler:Cort finally shoots and down goes the Lady]]'']\\

Fortunately, [[spoiler:he missed on purpose and she just pretended to die. The doctor and the blind kid were in on it. Then Cort basically blows up the town with dynamite set up practically everywhere and the Lady gets to have her awesome moment. ]]

-->"A gunfight is in the head. Not the hands. The only reason that he's invincible is because you all'' think ''he is. Now, he might have been the best five years ago, but time catches up with every man. He's just a little bit slower than he used to be. And as for me... would you believe it? I just reached my peak."

* LostHimInACardGame: When the Lady wakes up in the Kid's shop with no memory of how she got there, the Kid claims he won her in a game of poker. As the last thing she remembers if him puking and passing out behind the saloon, she is pretty sure he is lying.

** The big prize of the Quick Draw championship (that is held annually, no less) is $123,000. In 2017 dollars, this would equate to about $3 million - a ridiculous amount for a tiny non-mining town, no matter how rampant the corruption there is. Bonus points for storing this fortune in a single, prominent, unlocked chest, positioned on the table in the town's dirty, lowbrow saloon. (On that note, gun prices are also inflated: the Kid only shows his client a few rare and heavily customized pistols that cost up to $120... while a brand new factory revolver of the kind he himself uses would cost only three times as much as the "ridiculously" priced beat-up gun he offers Cort - just $15.)

* MadeOfIron: Spotted Horse, who claims that he cannot be killed by a bullet and almost lives up to the boast.

** Virgil Sparks, the self-proclaimed "Pride of Texas", is another example, who doesn't get past the first round of the tournament.

* NiceHat: Several of the main characters have impressive cowboy hats. This ''is'' an old western movie.

** "Spotted Horse...cannot...be killed...by a bullet!"

* OOCIsSeriousBusiness: When Lady challenges Herod, he just mutters at her to go away. "I've already been challenged." The Kid then struts out to duel Herod, showing why he's not happy. Herod quickly regains his SmugSnake evilness however.
* OnceIsNotEnough: Happens with Spotted Horse. Up until that point, Cort been able to win all his quick draw matches with only one bullet (he's a priest and refuses to kill them) until his next opponent makes a BadassBoast about how a bullet wouldn't put him down; he's right, it takes two.

* OneManArmy: Herod constantly sings Cort praises on his abilities as a killer, to the point where he only gives him a single bullet per duel out of concern that he might just shoot his way out of town. [[spoiler: Herod is proven right when Cort almost singlehandedly takes out his entire gang, allowing Lady to have a fair duel.]]

* OutlawTown: Herod runs Redemption as his own personal fiefdom and provides safe haven for outlaws; taking 50 cents on every dollar spent in the town.

* OverzealousUnderling: When the QuickDraw tournament is down to [[BigBad Herod]] and [[HeelFaithTurn Cort]], the night before the final match Herod has his follower Ratsy work Cort over, since Cort attempted to attack Herod earlier in the day. During the course of this, Ratsy [[CripplingTheCompetition breaks Cort's right hand]] (both because of his orders and as payback for Cort breaking his nose twice). Herod, who claims that he's wanted to have a proper gunfight with Cort even back when the two were bandits together, so they can find out who really is the FastestGunInTheWest, is ''[[YouHaveFailedMe pissed]]'' when he sees what Ratsy did.
* PapaWolf: Averted; after Eugene Dred rapes his daughter, the saloon keeper reaches for Dred's gunbelt which is slung over his shoulder, a pistol in tempting reach. Dred waits...but the man just turns and staggers off. Fortunately Lady is a more than willing MamaBear.

** Ace Hanlon constantly boasts about being TheFastestGunInTheWest. While he's a good trick shot, Herod sees right through him when he takes credit for one of his kills and pubicly humiliates him before killing him.

* PocketProtector: [[spoiler:The Lady keeps her father's badge on her chest, which--along with a bottle of red ink for fake blood--keeps her from dying when Cort shoots her in their duel.]]

* PreClimaxClimax: After deciding to return to Redemption to take on Herod, Lady barges into the brothel where Cort is held prisoner, drags him away from his guards at gunpoint into another room where she proceeds to rip off his clothes and [[WallBangHer Wall Bang Him]].

* ProfessionalKiller: Sgt. Cantrell is a professional gunfighter hire by the townspeople to kill Herod. He doesn't take any pleasure in killing, to him it's strictly business.

* BadassBoast: Ace is fond of these. [[spoiler:Too bad he can't back any of them up.]] So is the Kid [[spoiler:who for the most part, can]]. [[MadeOfIron Spotted]] [[BadassNative Horse]] stands up on a table in the saloon and shows off the many scars from gunshots he has taken over the years. He's able to back it up too, as Cort isn't able to kill him with the first shot.

* AwesomeButImpractical: The S&W New Model No. 3 that the Kid shows off is deemed the best gun in the world and had it's trigger guard removed to decrease drawing time, but at the expense of likely to shoot yourself in the foot if worn outside of a duel.

* AnimalMotifs: Herod's guns have rattlesnakes emblazened on the handles.

* ApatheticCitizens: When they're not throwing rocks at a priest, they're pretending not to notice when a young girl gets raped. The fact that they're under the heel of a local warlord probably doesn't help their empathy.

* ChekhovsGunman: The Lady is about to challenge Herod while he's drinking at the bar when a hand falls on her shoulder. She turns and sees Dog Kelly, the prospector she left chained to a wagon wheel in the prologue, glaring at her.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Herod changes the rules after the second round to make each contest a DuelToTheDeath, but he abides by the rule himself once it's declared.[[spoiler: It doesn't stop him from telling his men to kill Cort if he's the winner of their duel.]] He warns the Kid multiple times to back out with no strings attached. Herod also hates liars and cowards. And despite [[spoiler:killing the Kid with only a little remorse when he won't back down]] he's at least relatively quick and efficient about it instead of humiliating and making him suffer like he does his other opponents.

* EvilWearsBlack: Subverted with Ace Hanlon, who shows up decked out like [[Music/FieldsOfTheNephilim Carl McCoy]], but [[PaperTiger ultimately proves to be more flash than substance]]. Played straight with Herod, who wears sharp black suits.

** Cort does this on his first opponent, who doesn't listen, and [[LetsYouAndHimFight Lady]], [[spoiler: who ''does'', [[TakeAThirdOption sort of]]]].