A better modern western has yet to be made.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jul 12, 2024

It is arguably his [Eastwood] finest achievement, it is certainly his apex as an actor.

| Dec 7, 2022

[Eastwood's] best Western -- the most distinguised film he has appeared in and directed -- since The Outlaw Josey Wales.

| Feb 6, 2020

Clint Eastwood's brilliant and harrowing Unforgiven packs all the punch of a good Western without indulging in the plot cliches and moral certitudes so often inherent in the genre.

| Feb 5, 2020

Apart from giving the Western genre a powerful boost Unforgiven does wonders for Eastwood's own profile.

| Feb 5, 2020

Unforgiven gives us something to think about -- and something to answer for -- and Eastwood was just the man to make it.

| Apr 26, 2018

No thrill comes cheap in Unforgiven. The West that it shows is Wild all right, but more like a dog than a party. That doesn't mean we can't enjoy being dragged along for the ride; the rougher the better, in fact, as every action zings with ricochets.

| Jan 4, 2018

That's the truly subversive act at the heart of 'Unforgiven': Clint Eastwood is puncturing a Western mythology he helped create.

| Aug 12, 2017

While not a pretty picture... Unforgiven is a magnificently realized work. In addition to Eastwood's fine, rough performance, Hackman and Freeman stand out.

| Aug 3, 2017

Unforgiven is a stark western in slow motion, obsessed with reflection, not action.

| Aug 2, 2017

Unforgiven brought the revisionist revenge film into the 1990s and, by extension, the 21st century.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Aug 1, 2017

A sombre, insightful, genre-reinventing western, directed by a filmmaker acutely aware of the western's history, its limitations and the dubious truths of its legends.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Feb 16, 2016

"Unforgiven" is a high-caliber movie, a gripping and haunting work of art that should finally establish Eastwood as one of America's best directors.

| Feb 17, 2015

[Unforgiven] belongs to a tradition that includes such giants of the genre as Mann, Boetticher, Peckinpah and Hawks.

| Aug 2, 2013

It shouldn't be missed by anyone with a taste for Eastwood's typically slanted morality. It's the actor/director's best movie -- and the best Western by anybody -- in over 20 years.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Aug 2, 2013

Unforgiven ain't nuthin' new, y'unnerstan', but it's a good, old-fashioned western-type pitcher with plenty o' rootin' tootin' action 'n' big ol' horses 'n' 10-gallon hats 'n' sech.

| Aug 2, 2013

Eastwood deliberately upends the conventions of the western, subverting his own image in the process.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Aug 2, 2013

The Western is back. With a vengeance. Saddle up or get out of the way.

| Aug 2, 2013

This is the finest set of performances ever to grace a Clint Eastwood movie, and this time Eastwood even does a good job directing Eastwood. Every bullet in this movie matters.

Full Review | Feb 20, 2013

This dark, melancholic film is a reminder-never more necessary than now-of what the American cinema is capable of, in the way of expressing a mature, morally complex and challenging view of the world.

| Original Score: 4/4 | Feb 20, 2013