The town of La Belle, New Mexico has had it's share of bad luck. When a terrible mining accident takes the lives of eighty-three men, the women are left to pick up the pieces. Life only gets harder when a notorious outlaw comes to town seeking revenge against one of their own who turned traitor.
When it comes to entertainment, I have a few guilty pleasures. Westerns are one of them. Sadly, it is next to impossible to find a good feature film today, let alone a mini-series worth the time to view it. Godless does not disappoint.
Jeff Daniels stars as the villain, Frank Griffin, who is in search of Roy Goode, the man who betrayed him. Though I have never been a fan of Daniels' comedies, he does a remarkable job in this western. So much so, that even though I knew he was in this and I recognized his face and voice, I had to check the credits just to make sure it was really him.
After speaking with a number of viewers and reading a number of reviews, I found a similar complaint about the series that I have to admit I share. The initial advertising for the series played up the town of La Belle so much so that you were led to believe the story was about the women in the town. In reality, it was all about Roy and Frank and the sheriff who chased him. There were only two of the women that held a higher spotlight than the rest, yet it wasn't enough in my opinion. When the series ended, I was left wanting to know more about the town and the residents and the Buffalo soldiers, and less about Frank's travels to a pox ridden town, his never ending speeches, or the backstory of the crazy brothers who rode with him.
Regardless, Godless was filled with an amazing cast of characters that left me wanting to know more. It is this lack of knowledge that took away the full punch of the final episodes when the final confrontation occurred. Though I still found the series to be remarkable, I also found it lacking.