The Harder They Fall

Year: 2021

Actors: Jonathan Majors, Keith Stanfield, Zazie Beetz, Idris Elba

Duration: 139 min

Nat Love eats dinner with his parents when Rufus Buck and his gang comes to their house, guns down Nat's parents and carves a cross into Nat's forehead. Some years later, a grown Love, now an outlaw, kills one of Buck's former gang members. Meanwhile, his partners, sharpshooter Bill Pickett and quick-draw Jim Beckwourth, ambush another gang and steal their haul from a recent bank robbery. The lone survivor tells them that the $25,000 they have stolen belongs to Buck. Love travels to meet his former lover Mary Fields who runs a chain of saloons. Pickett brings news of the heist to Love. Buck's gang, led by Trudy Smith and quick-draw Cherokee Bill ambush a train on which Buck is being transported by a group of corrupt soldiers. The soldiers reluctantly release Buck, who orders all of them killed save for the youngest. Buck and his gang return to their home of Redwood, where Trudy has a saloon. The town is now run by Buck's former associate Wiley Escoe. Although left in charge by Buck, Esco has used the position for profit at the expense of the town. Buck beats him and orders him to leave town. Buck gathers the townspeople and tells them they will need $50,000 to save the town and proposes a tax to raise that money. He kills a man who objects, but accepts that the townsfolk cannot raise the full amount he needs. In Field's saloon, Marshal Bass Reeves arrives to arrest Love and removes him in handcuffs. The arrest was staged by Reeves and Love in order to hunt down Buck without involving Love's gang: Reeves is angry because Buck has been pardoned, and he knows Love wants revenge. Love's gang, however, accompanied by Fields and her friend Cuffee, suspecting a ruse, follow Love and Reeves and insist on joining. They encounter Escoe, who tells them that Buck has returned to Redwood. Fields volunteers to scout Redwood under the cover of offering to buy Smith's saloon. The night before she leaves, Love proposes to her, but she turns him down. When Fields arrives in Redwood, Smith takes her prisoner and beats her, then says she will hold Fields hostage for a day and then kill her unless someone comes to fetch her. Love's gang arrives the same night, but Smith insists that Love join Fields in captivity, which he does. Smith has Love beaten, then Buck tells him that in order to release Fields, Love will need to rob a bank in Marysville, a White town and give Buck the money. Love and Cuffee rob the bank without killing anyone, and escape with the money. Reeves and Love agree that Buck will not release Mary even if they hand over the money. Escoe supplies them with a cart full of guns and dynamite. They take the money into Redwood, in two cars, one of which is a dummy, both primed with dynamite. After the dummy wagon is destroyed, killing some of Buck's henchmen, Love hands over the money, but is stopped from leaving by Cherokee Bill. Beckwourth challenges Bill to a quick-draw contest, but is shot and killed by Bill while counting down. A gunfight erupts during which Pickett, Cuffee, Reeves and Love kill most of Buck's gang, and the money is destroyed in another explosion. Escoe infiltrates Buck's house with more dynamite, but is killed by Buck, while Pickett and Love are wounded. Fields is freed by Cuffee, and pursues Smith, who she defeats in a hand-to-hand fight. During a lull, Pickett is shot in the back by Bill, who is subsequently killed by Cuffee. Love enters Buck's house, but finds Buck unwilling to defend himself. Instead, Buck tells him about his own parents: his outlaw father killed his mother after a long period of abuse, and then abandoned Buck when he was ten years old. Buck subsequently hunted his father down, finding he changed his ways and name, and reveals that his father was also Love's. While he killed his father in revenge, he says the real revenge was driving Love into an outlaw, and that he scarred Love's face so that he would recognize him when he saw him again. Love then shoots Buck dead. Love and his companions bury Pickett and Beckwourth alongside another grave marked "Nat Love." Reeves will report Love as dead and Cuffee joins Reeves in law enforcement. Fields and Love ride off, as Smith looks on from a distance.

Genre: Action   Drama   Western