Blackthorn is a 2011 revisionist western film directed by Mateo Gil, written by Miguel Barros, and starring Sam Shepard, Eduardo Noriega, and Stephen Rea.
In Bolivia, two decades after his mysterious disappearance in San Vicente in 1908, life has found Butch Cassidy exiled to a small Bolivian town. Only now the aged outlaw goes under the name James Blackthorn. Cassidy has been keeping to himself; breeding and selling horses in order save money to return to the United States. But an attempted ambush by a young Spaniard leaves him with no money as he watches his horse run off with his saddle bags full of cash. With the Spaniard held at gunpoint, Cassidy is told there is a hidden stash of money he will receive for helping the young man flee the mining families from which he stole the stash. Now it's up to Cassidy to revive his former self and save the two from meeting their death in the desert sands of Bolivia.
Tropes:
- Abandoned Mine: Eduardo begs Blackthorn to save him, and offers to share part of the $50,000 he stole from Simón Patiño, a powerful Bolivian industrialist and mine owner. The money is hidden in an abandoned mine, and he will compensate Blackthorn for his help.
- Death Faked for You: For years Mackinley claimed that the two bandits killed at San Vincente were not Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and when the doctor in Tupiza tells him he has treated Cassidy, he knows he will finally be proven correct.
- Determinator: Butch Cassidy, now living under the alias 'James Blackthorn', and Eduardo Apodaca find themselves pursued across Bolivia by a posse incredibly similar to the 'super-posse' that pursued him in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid.
- Dramatic Ammo Depletion: After killing one of the Posse on the Uyuni salt flats, Eduardo sees the man's partner approaching. He raises his pistol, sights and pulls the trigger, only for the hammer to fall on an empty chamber. He tries again only for the same thing thing to happen. He reaches for his gunbelt, only to find he is out of bullets. He then searches the body of the dead man, but discovers he too was out of ammo.
- The Ghost: Eduardo supposedly stole $50,000 from Simón Patiño, a powerful Bolivian industrialist and mine owner. The posse chasing Eduardo and Blackthorn is believed to have been sent by Patiño, but Patiño himself never appears. Eventually Mackinley tells Blackthorn the $50,000 Eduardo stole was not from the powerful mine owner, Patiño, but from the mining families who recently took control of the mines.
- Ghost Town: Eduardo hid the money he stole from Simón Patiño in the Abandoned Mine at an mine settlement that has been abandoned for 8 years.
- Heal It With Fire: Eduardo cauterizes the gunshot wound in Blackthorn's shoulder by pouring the gunpowder from a cartridge into it and then lighting it with a match.
- Historical Domain Character: Butch Cassidy, the Sundance Kid and Etta Place. Additionally, Simón Patiño—the powerful Bolivian industrialist and mine owner Eduardo supposedly stole from—was also a real person.
- It Works Better with Bullets: Eduardo has Blackthorn at gunpoint until Blackthorn holds up a handful of bullets. Subverted later when it's revealed that those were Blackthorn's bullets and Eduardo's gun was loaded the whole time.
- Mercy Kill: In flashbacks to those days when he and the Sundance Kid rode together, Butch Cassidy recalls how his partner, being wounded and near death, asks for Butch to "do it," and so Butch regretfully and lovingly takes the life of his best friend.
- One-Word Title
- Pinkerton Detective: Butch Cassiday remembers his old friendships with the Sundance Kid and Etta Place, and how they escaped from Pinkerton Detective Mackinley.
- Posse: In a Shout-Out to the 'super-posse' Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Blackthorn and Eduardo are pursued across half of Bolivia by a posse that just refuses to give up.
- Protagonist Title
- Retired Outlaw: Twenty years after his disappearance in 1908, an aged Butch Cassidy, living under the assumed name James Blackthorn in a secluded village in Bolivia, decides to end his long exile and return to the United States after learning of the death of Etta Place.
- Thirsty Desert: Blackthorn and Eduardo set out across the Uyuni salt flats, hoping to reach the coast where Blackthorn can find a boat to take him home. Halfway across, the posse catches up to them.
- Twilight of the Old West: Set in 1928, the Wild West has been dead for decades, and even in Bolivia where Butch Cassidy has been hiding for 20 years, times are changing.
- Villain Protagonist: The film is a fictional account of an aged Butch Cassidy living under the assumed name James Blackthorn in a secluded village in Bolivia 20 years after his disappearance in 1908.
