Ceticultsot Beautiful, moving film.

Donald Seymour This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

Tobias Burrows It's easily one of the freshest, sharpest and most enjoyable films of this year.

Matho The biggest problem with this movie is it’s a little better than you think it might be, which somehow makes it worse. As in, it takes itself a bit too seriously, which makes most of the movie feel kind of dull.

mattkratz This was a decent adaptation of the Larry McMurtry novel, as it was a prequel to Lonesome Dove. It was OK, not great, but it had a great cast, which made it worth it. It was a prequel to Lonesome Dove, following the adventures of Texas Rangers McCrae and Call. It was similar to Dances With Wolves in that it featured interactions with Indians and them speaking in their native languages. I liked the cast, the war scenes, the lovely scenarios, and the authentic western scenarios and loyal adaptations as well as the colorful characters. If you are familiar with the Lonesome Dove saga, you might want to check this out.** 1/2 out of ****

star_in_the_zenith_79 Comanche Moon may have been one of the most anticipated films ever for me, as well as the most anticipated stories. When you think about it, this novel and movie should have been amazing. Call, Augustus, Deets, Jake, and Pea Eye all in their prime, the West still even more wild than Lonesome Dove, young Blue Duck, not to mention the great warriors Buffalo Hump and Kicking Wolf whose characters were built up greatly in Dead Man's Walk. With a setting like this how could it miss? If this had been done right it could have easily outshone even the original Lonesome Dove, the setup was just that good.But it was mostly a disappointment. It was way to rushed, did not truly recapture the characters we came to love so much in Lonesome Dove, was inconsistent in many ways from the history outlined in Lonesome Dove, and strayed away from the original characters to much. It was almost like an unfeeling and unemotional documentary of the lives of Gus and Call prior to Lonesome Dove, and an inconsistent one at that. I'm not going to go into to much detail about how it failed to truly establish and develop the characters to being what we knew and loved in Lonesome Dove, but it will be obvious as you watch it. Overall, Zahn and Urban probably did the best jobs of playing Call and McCrae since Duvall and Jones, but the problem was far more with the source material. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't terrible, but it fell well short of what it could been. You almost get the sense McMurtry was trying to just get this over with, and as a result did a great story a terrible injustice.

buiger This was a large production which certainly cost a lot of money, money I unfortunately have to say could have been much better spent elsewhere...The main problem in the movie is the screenplay. The adaptation of the book to a script for the screen was a total flop, resulting in a mini series which is essentially a patchwork of sketches, an incoherent blur of a movie that makes very little sense. It's a pity, because there certainly was potential here; some of the aspects of the film where rather good, especially the costumes and the make up which gave it a very realistic feel. The acting was not that bad either (with the exception of Karl Urban who is so stiff it is ridiculous, and Elizabeth Banks who plays the town hooker as if she was the Virgin Mary), but after all is said and done, everything comes back to the mindless screenplay. And there all else fails.

Hunter_1957 "Comanche Moon" had everything going for it. For starters, Simon Wincer's back, a man who's name is synonymous with high-quality TV westerns. Unfortunately, the problems with "Moon" are something even the most talented director couldn't solve: A poor script based on a lackluster novel.Forget historical accuracies -- as any reader of the novels can tell you, the biggest travesty in "Moon" is that it's not even consistent with information from the original "Lonesome Dove" masterpiece. So many wonderful, rich moments in the miniseries and, to an even greater degree, the book, are completely missing in "Moon." Considering the fact that most viewers of "Moon" are probably coming with at least some sort of "Dove" background, the lack of character-driven and emotional backstory is downright painful. That said, "Moon" is one instance where the adapted version could and should have been altered to make it more suitable for the screen. For example, the novel "Moon" focuses largely on the Comanches themselves. To its credit, the miniseries tries to service the Comanches, but in the end it gives them just enough that the viewer just gets a sense they're missing out on some important part of the story. Similarly, Val Kilmer's Scull loses out here too -- the role should have either been expanded so Kilmer (and Rachel Griffiths, for that matter) actually had something to do, or the roles should have just been reduced to smaller, supporting parts. Instead, Kilmer gets top billing for a character that just leaves you scratching your head after his appearance in the completely bizarre final act. There's strange moments throughout the film that just make no sense to those who haven't read the book (a killer parrot? what?) -- further, there isn't a single scene that shows us that Call and McCrae are anything near the amazing Texas rangers they claim to be. Not a single one of their expeditions in Moon (or "Dead Man's Walk," for that matter) ends successfully, and Call and McCrae just seem to blunder their way through one pointless mission after another.Frankly, Larry McMurtry should never have been given the job of writing the script, and only did so because of the praise surrounding that other cowboy movie, Brokeback Mountain. McMurtry can write good novels (although there's some dissension over the consistency of that statement), but he's never exactly established himself as a scriptwriter. This production would have benefited from not only bringing back director Wincer, but original screenwriter Bill Wittcliff to adapt the novel to screen. Witcliff doesn't exactly have a mountainload of material to his screen writing credit, but no one can deny he did a fantastic job at whittling down the original "Lonesome Dove." With all this said, "Comanche Moon" is almost a brilliant production, aided by a terrific cast that unfortunately just aren't given enough to do. Steve Zahn's portrayal of Gus McCrae -- or rather, his portrayal of Robert Duvall as Gus McCrae -- is dead-on. And while some have criticized Karl Urban as Woodrow Call, saying his performance doesn't imitate the quiet, stoic Woodrow of the original movie, all I can say is: blame McMurtry, because McMurtry is the one who -- both in the "Moon" novel and now the miniseries -- turned Woodrow from socially inept, awkward, but natural leader, into some emotionless character whose lines are just dull and whose character motivations are only clear if you've seen them portrayed far more adequately in the "sequel".Still, it's the cast that sparkles in "Moon," to the degree that I left the miniseries with that same feeling of melancholy I felt watching the original "Lonesome Dove" -- this time because I realized it's probably the last time we'll see these characters appear on screen for a long, long time to come -- and quite honestly, this cast could have done so well in a well-nurtured, full-blown network TV series.All in all, aside from wasted opportunities with the cast, the biggest travesty is that the original Lonesome Dove novel contained so much rich backstory for the characters that would have been fascinating, utterly fascinating, to see translated on screen. Unfortunately, all that has been tossed aside in favor of McMurtry's tedious, inconsistent and ultimately irrelevant, prequel.