Ten years too late, or too early.

Having watched Heaven's Gate at a BFI screening on Friday (the next day I went to a screening of Shoah in its entirety; it was a weekend of long films), I realised that though it is flawed, if it was released ten years earlier, when "New Hollywood" was coming to the fore, critics would have loved it, instead of it sounding the death knell for that movement. If it had been released ten years later (when another epic western was receiving awards galore), it also may have fared better.

I do wonder what sort of reception it would've got had it been released a few years ago, in the wake of the likes of There Will Be Blood and The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. It'd be interesting to see what the directors of those films think of it.

The film isn't perfect, but it also missed its moment.