Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #64619 in VHS
• Released on: 1997-06-20
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, EP, NTSC
• Number of tapes: 1
• Running time: 106 minutes

Amazon.com
The story of Jesse and Frank James, the real-life robbers whose exploits earned them a Robin Hood reputation, has been portrayed in dozens of films more faithful to the myth than the history. Only in the revisionist 1970s did the romantic shadings come off in a few genre-busting examples (notably The Great Northfield Minnesota Raid and The Long Riders). Oddly enough, this 1996 feature takes more than a few factual liberties to restore the romantic portrait of the bank-robbing brothers. Four years after the Civil War, in a South crawling with carpetbaggers and occupied by Union troops, the hot-headed Jesse (Rob Lowe) and his clear-headed older brother Frank (Bill Paxton) take to the trail in a campaign of bank jobs, train robberies, and stagecoach holdups while evading the dogged efforts of Allan Pinkerton (William Atherton) and his detective agency. Writer-director Robert Boris presents the boys as heroes of the defeated South, gentleman robbers avenging the pillage of their people by the ruthless railroad and bank concerns pouring in from the North and pursued by a maniacally driven Pinkerton on a personal quest for revenge. In the wake of Clint Eastwood's Unforgiven, Frank and Jesse comes off as old-fashioned and a little naive, but the measured pace and casting of country singer Randy Travis (who narrates and plays Cole Younger with a voice like molasses) gives the film, in moments, the intimacy of a ballad. --Sean Axmaker

Customer Reviews

OUTLAWS? How about defenders of freedom?
People who watch this movie will finally perhaps realize what was behind the James gang. These were not rebel raising outlaws who stole for fun, they were men who were ran off their land and ATTACKED by our own corrupt government, the railroads burned out and killed anyone who would not sell so that they may lay their precious track...so Frank and Jesse went to work.
Also introduces Pinkerton, the man who founded the Pinkerton detective agency and later on the secret service. He was a real JERK, by the way...:)

Fact Versus Legend.
There have been over a dozen movies based upon the life of Frank and Jesse James. Some have been historically accurate, but extremely boring and others have totally ignored history, but are extremely good movies to watch. FRANK AND JESSE falls somewhere in the middle.

The movie is really enjoyable to watch. It ignores much of the James' early years and instead focuses on their days as a gang after the Civil War. There are a few historical facts that are presented correctly in the film, but there are a lot more that are totally ignored or changed. Instead, the film is based more upon the legend of the James and Younger gang.

There is no doubt that Jesse James and company were bankrobbers who had a ruthless streak to them. Nevertheless, a person cannot deny the fact either that to many people in Missouri and other rural areas in the country, the James and Younger gang were heroes, Robin Hoods of the American West. Pinkerton asserted as much time and time again in his attempts to catch and round up the gang. Having been raised in a rural area not too far from the state of Missouri, I understand why people believed and still believe that in some ways the gang were heroes. In fact, I am inclined to agree. Therefore, this "romanticizing" of the Jesse James' legend isn't anything new. It's just the other side of the same coin and usually makes for a better story.

Worth renting
I rented this movie because I was doing a school report on Jesse James and was covering Hollywood's portrayal of the James gang. I ended up being very impressed. I think that Rob Lowe and Bill Paxton do a wonderful job as Jesse and Frank James. As a matter of fact, just about everyone in the movie are good actors. The shootouts are just spectacular (much better done than "The Great Northfield Minnesota raid" I might add) but if your looking for a accurate historacl account you might try looking elsewhere. This movie has a lot of the legends around the gang, such as checking passengers hands on a train, to determine whether or not to rob them, (soft hands--get robbed...calloused hands, meaning you were a working man,--don't get robbed) but almost everything about the Northfield raid is fiction. Here and there, parts of the movie are also made up, but Northfield was the killer for me. Anyway, if your up to a great western, try watching, you wont be let down, but if your looking for something out of a text book, try looking somewhere else.