Regina King and Idris Elba serve up sweet revenge in The Harder They Fall trailer
The new Netflix original film also stars Lakeith Stanfield, Jonathan Majors, Delroy Lindo, and more.
Film News The Harder They Fall
A new revenge-seeking Western film starring Regina King, Lakeith Stanfield, Idris Elba, Jonathan Majors, Delroy Lindo, and Zazie Beetz? We need ten of these, thank you. King takes the spotlight in the trailer for The Harder They Fall, looking cold as ice and quick to shoot from the hip as she takes over a train to release Elba’s character from prison holding. She’s calling all of the shots. The first trailer promises dry humor with lots of wicked gun showdowns—all to the tune of Fela Kuti.
The official logline for the film reads:
When outlaw Nat Love (Majors) discovers that his enemy Rufus Buck (Elba) is being released from prison he rounds up his gang to track Rufus down and seek revenge. Those riding with him in this assured, righteously new school Western include his former love Stagecoach Mary (Beetz), his right and left hand men—hot-tempered Bill Pickett (Edi Gathegi) and fast drawing Jim Beckwourth (R.J. Cyler)—and a surprising adversary-turned-ally. Rufus Buck has his own fearsome crew, including “Treacherous” Trudy Smith (King) and Cherokee Bill (Stanfield), and they are not a group that knows how to lose.
The upcoming Netflix original film is directed by Jeymes Samuel, who made his directorial debut in 2013 with They Die By Dawn, another Western film starring Rosario Dawson and Giancarlo Esposito. Samuel is mainly known for his work as as a musician and producer, serving as the executive music consultant for The Great Gatsby (2013), so we know the soundtrack is going to ooze perfection. Boaz Yakin (Remember The Titans, Fresh) wrote The Harder They Fall with Samuel, with Shawn Carter, James Lassiter, and Lawrence Bender on as producers. With an absolutely stacked cast–boy howdy this film looks like a riotous delight.
The Harder They Fall will premiere on Netflix sometime this fall.
69 Comments
This looks fun! Can’t lose with this cast.
Netflix has accepted your challenge
The ninjas will turn up by Episode 3.
Right? Amazing cast, and two, King and Majors from two of our favorite series from the last couple of years (Watchmen, Lovecraft Country). Funny, we __just__ caught up on Luther (excellent thriller/procedural with Elba), and were like, OK, umm, we need you in something else soon. I was hoping when I saw the headline this was going to be a series, but that’s probably too much talent in one place to commit to more than a single film.
Zazie Beets and Lakeith Stanfield are also on Atlanta, which is one of the best shows in recent history.
Oh, totally agree, I was thinking more semi-recent stuff since it’s been like 3 years[?] since the last Atlanta episode. Zazie Beets just supplied the voice work for Amber in Invincible which is another series I’d highly recommend with the caveat it’s about superheroes, it’s animated, it’s extremely violent, so it might not be in everyone’s wheelhouse …
Yeah, I’ll watch it on the strength of the cast alone… and now I want to revisit the (completely different) 1956 movie with the same title, in part for the same reasons.
I googled the 1956 movie and now I want to watch it too. It’s a bummer that it’s not on hbomax or kanopy.
I am thankful that we seem to be ramping up to a Delroy Lindo renaissance.
I’m convinced that the reason none of my screenplays have been picked up is that I cannot bring myself to name the protagonists properly. Like… Rufus Buck! Boom! There you have it! He’s a bit rough, he likes a ruckus and, I guess, money. He probably owns a dog…
Like I told you after I read your latest draft, insisting on casting Donald Trump, Jr. in the lead role is going to severely limit your casting choices.
I think he should stick to his guns, it’s the story of a sentient rat’s anus after all.
Ah, you guys read Ratatwoille? For the rest of you, the rat’s anus is somewhat hapless which is why it is controlled by a tiny Vladimir Putin.
I liked Build-The-WALL-E better.
I always forget how excited Fela’s music makes meThis looks like a riot, I just hope it isn’t as algorithm-generated as most Netflix stuff has been lately
I’ll settle for proper audio mixing. Maybe my speakers just suck, but it’s as if Netflix wants to condition their viewers to require subtitles being always on.
that’s more the algo-rhythm
Here’s your star.There’s the door.
:D[shows self out]
This. The thing I’ve missed most about theaters is the sound actually being good. No amount of optimization on the laptop is going to do it justice; The streaming services seem to view it as a cost to be cut down, imho.
I guess I should be surprised that Hamologist and HamiltonIsTrash agreesince I’ve been back in the theaters the sound has been REALLY LOUD like it’s set up for a full theater of people to absorb the sound and they aren’t there. I mean like “nearly have to leave it’s so loud” loud.
tbh, cinemas have been too loud for me for a while. first time i really noticed it was around 2013.
good thing i’m not into blockbuster-type movies; i can’t even imagine that kind of cacophony.
i have no idea who that is
I didn’t think you two went to each others’ bar mitzvahs, he replied to your comment or you replied to his
i replied to your comment too…are we friends? i got you a shirt
Honestly, I’ve taken to watching a lot of stuff on my PC simply because my sound card has volume normalisation.
Oh, it’s because we’re all supposed to have proper home theatre systems, in dedicated home theatres, with fuckin’ Krix speakers and shit. Dialogue gets easier to hear because in a 5.1 system (or whatever number of speakers Dolby is trying to flog you these days) the centre channel is dedicated to dialogue. Splitting it out from the surrounds makes it a lot clearer to hear.And, anyway, on a 5.1 system, you can easily boost the centre channel yourself. And the TV manufacturers don’t help, either, because they could easily, easily fix this shit as well: volume normalisation and is a piece of piss to implement, but no maker does this as far as I know. They could easily put an end to these dynamic-range shenanigans. Netflix, too, could fix this: simply have two mixes. The Full-Fat Home Theatre Mix, with the huge Dynamic Ranges, and a TV Speaker mix with a bit more compression, bit less dynamic range, clearer dialogue. Select it the same as you would with any audio track.
I sort of understand if it’s an outside studio sending Netflix a 5.1 theater mix, but even their original programming suffers from this issue. You’d think a streaming service would consider that a good chunk of the devices running it are going to be laptops and phones or tablets with shitty speakers and two-channel stereo.Shit, they already have camera resolution requirements for their originals, so I don’t see why they couldn’t also toss in another quality stipulation and have the filmmakers deliver two mixes.
Yeah, it’s not like they couldn’t specify that:“Must supply 2.0 audio mix with no more than +/- xdB dynamic range along with surround sound in the format of…” actually, that’s another thing: what DO they mix their audio in, anyway? Dolby? Dolby Atmos? DTS? DTS:X?Just pull up the menu, and select a different audio track, like you can when choosing between native voice and dubbing. As an audio nut, people’s general disregard, bordering on contempt, for audio really does annoy me. No, I’m not amp stone idiot, but there’s a broad middle ground between buying Cable Elevators and the neckbeard’s “LOL ALL SOUND STUFF IS BULLSHIT.”Hell, at this stage, you could probably package it as an Accessibility thing, for people with poor hearing. Oh, and for those looking for a great example of what happens when you just jam your 5.1 mix into stereo, have a listen to this early Top Gear video from the BBC’s official Top Gear channel:I’ve jumped to a point where the VO actually disappears in the damn mix.Clarkson’s voice in the field has been mixed with the LR channels, while his studio voiceover narration was mixed to the centre channel. Of course, they had to boost his field mic to compete with the engines (and it’s likely they only had stereo for the field mix, too). Shame. Considering the BBC is the organisation who practically invented proper audio mixing. A. Neville Thiele would be rolling in his grave.
In surround sound the majority of dialog is sent to the middle speaker. L&R mains are maybe 20% dialog and 80% effects. So if you have a 2.0 system (i.e. stereo) you end up having to blast the volume just to hear the dialog and getting blown out by the effects. I’m way more of an audio guy and don’t have a surround system and this is a constant annoyance to me.
Aye. This is what happens when you fuck up your downmixing:
I’ll be in the car.
But is there a giant steampunk spider robot?This looks fun and entertainingly stylized and normally I’m not the biggest Western fan. Plus the cast is great
REGINA KING is enough reason for me.
It’s a big ask to expect me to root against the triumvirate of Elba/King/Stanfield, but it appears that this is exactly what Netflix is asking me to do. I think I’m gonna be rooting for the bad guys, and I’m at peace with that.
You know what, I love a cool, modern Western and don’t think there’s enough of them. Too much ‘let’s do it realistic and serious’. There so much mytholgoy and scope for fun. The Quick and the Dead, Young Guns, The Good the Bad and the Weird. Great films.
I’ve gotta add Silverado to that list. Just a fun film, and talk about an amazing cast – Kevin Kline, Scott Glenn, Jeff Goldblum, Rosanna Arquette, Kevin Costner, Danny Glover, Brian Dennehy, John Cleese
Seems like everything Netflix produces other than with name-brand directors always looks horribly flat and ugly and this is no exception.
Regina King should just wear the outfit in the header photo all the time because she looks like an absolute boss in it.But yeah, I’ll take a good revenge western with an amazing cast any day, thanks Netflix!
Holy shit this is going to be such a bomb.
Amazing cast + Western + revenge story? Hell yeah, I’m so in.Also, Regina King can pull off the whole long coat style like no one else. Between the above header photo and the Sister Night costume, she just looks badass in these outfits.
Call me cautiously optimistic, only because it’s Netflix. If it were pretty much any other production company, that trailer (and that music; and that cast) would have bought my ticket already. Still, definitely plan on checking this out.
What is with all the shell casings hitting the floor on the train ? The gang is using revolvers !
This cast? Horses and guns and trains? I’m going to watch the holy hell out of this one…
This Cast Shoots Horses, Don’t They?
Time Haters, The Movie
They couldn’t stick with his dime novel name Deadwood Dick which works better with Stagecoach Mary and Treacherous Tracy than Nat Love does.
Written by the guy who wrote Fresh is all the persuasion I need.
This looks like it should be fun. I like when people remember that not everything in the Old West was shades of sepia/covered in mud.
This looks amazing. But, the one issue I have with the trailer made it look like the King and Elba are the protagonists (whereas the press release makes it seem like they’re the villains being hunted down). When watching the trailer, I couldn’t quite understand why the protagonists were seeming to murder everyone in cold blood—it seemed a little much. Makes more sense to then read the release and learn that they’re being hunted down by another crew. So maybe they’re not the protagonists. Or, maybe they are? Or, maybe those people had it coming to them? IDK. But, it looks cool and hopefully it has some moral code in there somewhere as well.
How had I not heard this was coming?!?! It’s like Christmas!
They Die By Dawn is so bad it’s not even listed on Rotten Tomatoes.
I’m a bit confused by the headline as both in the trailer and in the press release it seems like people are seeking vengeance against Elba and King.
So this isn’t a sequel to The Harder They Come?Looks good though.
Many of my favorite black actors in a big budget action movie that combines the style and tone of blaxploitation films and spaghetti westerns? The gods are kind!
Wait a minute, wait a minute—Shawn Carter, like, as in Jay-Z?
The whole cast is great but whenever I see Lakeith Stanfield in something I’m always excited. He is a pure delight.
just uhhh be wary of his radio appearances or podcasts or whatever, yikes
“There Will Be Dusters”
That look like a ridiculous amount of fun. Regardless of its Tarantino longings
This looks like the gunslinger film that Elba should have gotten, instead of, say, The Dark Tower.
Somewhere, Jimmy Cliff is giving side eye
Okay, I’m all in for this. Ms. King is an amazing talent.
Over-under on how many white dudes get murdered? This looks like the Inglorious Bastards of Westerns.
Worked on this one in the Construction department. We got that beautiful town ready for shooting, the first day was supposed to be March 16th 2020. It was heartbreaking when it seemed like covid might keep this movie from being made. I remember cast members crying and praying together after we got the news. But then 5 months later we were back with masks on, ready to shoot. A true labor of love.
i just got unseemingly excited by that trailer, looks like great craic.
Not gonna lie, this looks fantastic..hope it delivers.
I may check this out in a theater if it’s playing near me in limited release. Just seems like it would be fun on a wide screen. Several black Western legends in the same movie. don’t think it’s ever been done before. Nice.
I watch a lot of tv and this cast is like they took the best parts of a half dozen different shows and put them all together to look cool. My bisexual heart is very full today.