Kurt Russell refuses to accept thatBone Tomahawkis a typical “Horror Western,” and, yet, he has compared it with his own classic 85% RT horror flick.Bone Tomahawkholds a Rotten Tomatoes critics score of 91%, suggesting that critics have almost unanimously praised the film for the chills and thrills it instills in viewers. The film’s audience score of 74% highlights that even though most viewers gave it a high rating, not many found it good enough. However, since most of its reviews have been positive, it would be fair to say it is a universally loved Western movie.
Another universal opinion about the film is that it deserves to be classified as a “Horror Western.” The reason being that it seamlessly blends traditional elements of Western cinema with the heart-pounding terrors of battling the unknown. Interestingly, however, even though the film unfolds a nightmarish narrative in the backdrop of a rugged frontier setting, Kurt Russell, who plays one of themain characters inBone Tomahawk, does not want to categorize it as a “Horror Western.”
Kurt Russell’s Comments On Bone Tomahawk Being A “Horror Western” Explained
The Actor Refuses To Call It A Typical Horror Western
In an interview (viaCollider), Kurt Russell opened up about how he seesBone Tomahawkas its own category. “It’s not just a straight western, I’ve heard it referred to as a horror western, it’s not that, that’s kind of a bad call on it, I think,” he said, highlighting how he disagrees with the common categorization it gets from most viewers.He added that he would simply call it “a graphic western"as that would be a fairer description of its category. While it is understandable where Kurt Russell is coming from, it is still hard not to seeBone Tomahawkas a Horror Western.
Bone Tomahawk Ending Explained
2015’s critically acclaimed 2015 Western horror Bone Tomahawk features a shocking, grisly ending that leaves a whole host of questions unanswered.
AlthoughBone Tomahawkunfolds its most gruesome death scenestowards the end of its runtime, it is thematically no different from survival horror flicks likeThe Hills Have EyesandLet the Corpses Tan. Its most disturbing killing scene, in which the central troglodytes brutally mutilate a man, is also what one would expect to see in abody horror movie.Bone Tomahawkarguably also has Lovecraftian elements, given how many H.P. Lovecraft quotes perfectly capture the terrors experienced by its characters. Case in point:
Bone Tomahawk Has Similarities To The Thing, Despite Not Being A “Horror”
The Similarities Prove It Is Fair To Categorize It As A Survival Horror Thriller
Speaking of Lovecraftian horror, Kurt Russell also comparedBone TomahawkwithJohn Carpenter’sThe Thing, saying that the troglodytes “are like The Thing.” He explained that he gets the comparison between the two movies because,just like the creature from theJohn Carpenter movie, even the troglodytes were only trying to survive. What Kurt Russell describes as a similarity betweenThe ThingandBone Tomahawkseems to be the premise of nearly every survival horror movie.
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Even insurvival horror thrillers likeBarbarianandPrey, the main characters find themselves thrust into nightmarish situations, forced to face adversaries driven purely by their primal instincts.Bone Tomahawkonly places this familiar narrative in a Western setting, making it a mishmash of two genres: Horror and Western. While it can still be called a genre-bending flick that does not fall into any particular category, it seems fair to label it as a “Horror Western.”
Bone Tomahawk
Bone Tomahawk is a Western film that follows Sheriff Franklin Hunt, who gathers together a group of fighters to save three kidnapped victims from a clan of cannibals. After the town’s doctor is kidnapped along with two others, forcing the sheriff to partner with the town’s Native American professor and find the tribe before it’s too late.
