When a promised job for Texan Michael fails to materialise in Wyoming, Mike is mistaken by Wayne to be the hit-man he hired to kill his unfaithful wife, Suzanne. Mike takes full advantage of the situation, collects the money and runs. During his getaway, things go wrong, and soon get worse when he runs into the real hit-man, Lyle. Red Rock West really surprised the hell out of me and Nicolas Cage was really great the same goes for J.T. Walsh, Lara Flynn Boyle and Dennis Hopper who i believe did a great job just like he did with Speed and as the film went on we got more character development and more twists and turns now it does have some small issues with a bit of the start it took some time to get into a certain point where we could care about the characters but also the 3rd act became kinda over the top at times but overall great film starring Cage who really stole the show for me.

The plot is so complicated that it becomes simple after a while since everyone is crooked and all are twisted and there is no straight criminal in this film, no honest citizen either. Everyone is trying to take the others unawares and fool them around and get out of the trap with the money and apart form the only one who was not a criminal at the start, no one will get anything out of this case: all the money will end up in the bushes or in the sheriff's office, once the sheriff has been taken care of. So just follow the ranting story and try not to rave into some nightmare during the night. It is just entertainment and just silly mushy mucky thieving business with all the thieves trying to rob all the others of their shares. But it is true the plot is so tricky it will bring surprises all the time. But be careful there might be a con man or a hit man behind every single tree of this treeless waste land in Wyoming whose only way out is the train.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU

Red Rock West is a clever and entertaining movie about four people, Michael, Lyle, Suzanne and Wayne (the latter two are married) and $500,000 in cash, hidden somewhere. Michael is a drifter; Suzanne and Wayne have taken out contracts on each other, and Lyle is a cold-blooded assassin. The story is somber, at times chilling and always suspenseful. Michael gets involved purely on a whim, driven by the need to get some money, fast. That immediately lands him in trouble. It is revealed that Wayne, who is thoroughly detestable not because he is so obnoxious (he is polite and civil) but because he is such a dolt, is an office worker for a large firm who embezzled $1,900,000. To avoid the law and provide himself cover, he becomes the law, getting himself elected sheriff of a small out of the way town, Red Rock. Suzanne, of course, is aware of Wayne's secret, which, of course, sows the seeds of distrust, which then transforms into treachery. Once Lyle enters the scene, the formula for catastrophe can only explode into open violence. Lyle is the catalyst for the violence. He also is charming and detestable, but unlike the other three, is far more despicable. Unlike Suzanne, who is implicated in having murdered someone, and Wayne, who is willing to kill to protect his secret, and Michael who is not vicious, Lyle is a predator. Unsurprisingly, once Lyle, played by Dennis Hopper, enters the story, he subsequently dominates the movie.The only problem with the movie is its ending. It's not a major problem, but maybe it could have been reworked. Michael and Suzanne are on a train leaving town, with the money. Lyle is dead and grumpy Wayne has been shot. Michael and Suzanne have already been intimate and Michael obviously cares about her. The caring feeling, however, is not mutual, and in reaction, Michael tosses Suzanne and the most of the money out of the train. This tests the limits of plausibility. A man, strapped for cash, on a train with a young, sexy woman in possession of a huge amount of cash, and whose life he has saved, throwing both her and the money out? True, she points a gun at him, but he knows it's not loaded, so there is no harm. So why toss her and the money out? They deserve each other, and the presence of $500,000 in cash could smooth over a lot of ruffled feathers.

Red Rock West is a beautiful film. It is a film made by movie lovers, for movie lovers, with clearly lots of fun and enthusiasm. It is as much a film-noir as it is a western, a thriller or perhaps a black comedy. Set in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming the film starts with the masculine ex-marine Michael Williams (Cage), with his muscle car on the side of the road. He has almost no gas, only some peanuts as food, and little money.He is on his way to apply for a job at an oilfield. Seemingly a friend told him this job would be a definitive. Williams, however, doesn't get hired due to a war injury. Williams hits the road again, searching for a job in another place. He stops at a local gas station, where he wants to fill his tank and ask for advice. The gas station seems abandoned and at the cash register some cash is exposed… This is one of the first in many moments where William's moral stance is put to the test. Steal the much needed money or leave it alone and stay broke? Luckily, Williams doesn't have to make a choice; the owner unexpectedly appears. Williams asks for gas and a place where he can find a job. "You can try Red Rock" says the man, while he fills the tank for five dollars –the last of William's money."Welcome to Red Rock" reads a –somewhat unsettling- metal sign on the side of the road when Williams enters the town. It is a sign that he will encounter many more times, for it seems that leaving Red Rock isn't as easy as entering it. It is here where it all goes downhill He asks for a job in the local bar, which results in a strange twist of fate. The bartender (J.T. Marsh) thinks Williams is the killer he had hired to murder his cheating wife! The pay for it is big and Williams can't resist the temptation; he accepts the offer. Instead of killing the bartender's wife though, he explains her the whole situation, She, however doesn't seem impressed. She actually wants him to do the reverse and kill her husband for double the money! Williams, now full on cash, tries to avoid problems and take a leave from Red Rock, but by bad luck (or fate?), he keeps finding his way back to the diabolical town. When the real killer (a brilliant Dennis Hopper) shows up and the existence of even more money is discovered, Williams' search for money turns into a rat race, where lust, greed, obsession and violence are no exceptions.As you can read, Red Rock West is a dark film. Every character has its own secret agenda and even Williams'' moral is sometimes quite ambiguous. Although the film is quite funny sometimes, with enough irony and black humor, it is still one of the more serious films starring Nicolas Cage. Cage plays his character quite natural and even has few of his famous freak-outs.The atmosphere of this film is just brilliant. The film is well shot, the music is amazing (too bad I couldn't find it anywhere on the internet), the cast is great, the pace is fast and the plot is gripping. It has many great and exciting scenes and the way the thriller and western genres are combined is very entertaining. Still, somehow, the film never really delivers a form of profoundness, which more memorable and canonical films do provide. It is as if something is missing.Nonetheless, I think Red Rock West is an extremely underrated and overslept film. Don't expect a full blown masterpiece here. Rather expect a very good and entertaining thriller/western with a great role for Nicolas Cage.As Roger Ebert fittingly concluded his review of the film: "In a sense, we've been in Red Rock many times before: It's a town where plots lie in wait for unsuspecting visitors, where hatred runs deep, where love is never enough of a motive for doing anything when cash is available." And we love it there.