The nightmarish shoot for Michael Cimino's follow-up to the Oscar-winning behemoth that was The Deer Hunter is famous for the fact that it brought an entire movie studio - United Artists - down to its knees, forcing closure. So on Heaven's Gate, a slow, picturesque western concerning land barons and European immigrants at the turn of the 20th century, the production was littered with bad press, budget inflation (it swelled to four times its original cost), unrelenting conflict - most of which stemmed from Michael Cimino's strive for perfectionism and refusal to give in. At the time of its release, Heaven's Gate was destroyed by the critics - Roger Ebert famously branded it as "the most scandalous cinematic waste ever seen." At a cost of $44 million, it grossed a mere $3 million, and for many years was hailed as the greatest catastrophe to have occurred in Hollywood history. Somewhere in the mid to late '90s, however, Cimino's picture was subjected to an unexpected reassessment; beneath the lavish runtime people suddenly saw a movie of great beauty, intelligence and - would you believe it? - downright genius . Michael Cinimo's notorious box office bomb isn't the worst film ever made, nor does it come close. In fact, there's enough ground here to argue that Heaven's Gate - despite its flaws - is a more accomplished picture than The Deer Hunter: there are wonderful performances; scenes of exquisite beauty and sadness; the cinematography is haunting. And Cimino crafts his movie like a great painter - with careful brushstrokes, each one clearly studied and yet natural in composition. It's probably true, then, that that initial negative press influenced the original critical reviews to a fair degree - what we have here is a box office bomb that also happens to be a masterpiece. Like this article? Agree or disagree? Let us know in the comments section below.
