It takes a lot of confidence for a director to pay homage to John Ford's "The Searchers" (1956), and in the case of Thomas Bidegain's "Les Cowboys" it is not altogether unwarranted.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jul 28, 2016

Bidegain and cinematographer Arnaud Potier speak multitudes with wide-angle, slow-panning shots that immerse us in a post-9/11 quagmire that's never less than utterly personal.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Jun 30, 2016

"Les Cowboys" keeps you off-kilter from the start.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 30, 2016

Remaking a classic John Ford western might sound like a good idea, but there's just one problem: You're not John Ford.

| Original Score: C | Jun 24, 2016

It proceeds with a hushed tone that wants to be taken for observant modesty, but eventually reveals itself as suffocating self-importance.

| Original Score: 1.5/4 | Jun 24, 2016

With all this working against it, Les Cowboys strikes a fresh chord.

| Original Score: B+ | Jun 24, 2016

This modern western hits hard and stays with you. It's an auspicious debut for Bidegain as a director. As to whether it can stand shoulder to shoulder with The Searchers, that'll be the day.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 23, 2016

Reaching across 15 years and multiple countries, "Les Cowboys" repurposes the narrative codes of the classic western to explore the complexities of a disrupted world.

| Jun 23, 2016

The Searchers, another story of an "abducted" child, is clearly meant to be a touchstone, but Bidegain cannily exploits and then subverts that connection, taking the story to unexpected places with twist after twist.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jun 23, 2016

Bidegain ... respects the simple, melodramatic appeal of his story, and the primal emotions lurking beneath this story of parents and children torn apart.

| Jun 23, 2016

The strange, ever-changing result is, at times, as original as loose remakes come, with Bidegain using his hallowed source material as a springboard for something rare: a "writer's movie" that loses nothing in the jump from script to screen.

| Jun 23, 2016

It's John Ford's "The Searchers," French style, but director Thomas Bidegain has given the premise a unique flavor, crafting a fine, timely screenplay that skips over some years of the story but allows us to fill in the blanks.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jun 22, 2016

As uneven as it is, Les Cowboys nevertheless shows promise for Bidegain as a filmmaker with complexities on his mind and big territories to explore.

| Jun 22, 2016

Bidegain can tell a sweeping story across several years and with multiple characters in very economical ways.

| Jun 20, 2016

Bidegain's approach respects his viewers' intelligence and rewards those willing to put in the work.

| Jun 20, 2016

While Bidegain's dialogue is sharp and the time-skipping construction sly, one wishes he would have found what he was looking for in Les Cowboys.

| May 3, 2016

It appears to pride itself on demonstrating both sides of a complex racial divide, only for its messaging to wind up flattering the whitest sensibility imaginable.

| Original Score: .5/4 | Sep 23, 2015