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Category 4: Watch a fictional movie based on historical events

Badland (2019)

Badland is one of those gems that no one’s ever heard of that randomly pops into your Netflix recommended, and you end up watching it because you’re bored, only to be surprised that it’s actually a pretty decent movie. First and foremost, Badland is a western, inspired by the older Clint Eastwood and John Wayne movies. The movie dips into plenty of spaghetti western cliches throughout its runtime, going so far as to have a climactic duel at the end that involves the camera zooming in on the characters’ narrowed eyes while a slow, ominous maraca rattles in the background. Despite this, the movie manages to follow a coherent, interesting plot with well developed characters that managed to keep me engaged and on the edge of my seat for the whole film. 

I was surprised to find that history played a major role in the story, which is not always the case in westerns. Set about ten years after the Civil War, the movie follows Matthias Breecher (which is an amazing name for a character in a western), who works for the Pinkerton Detective Agency. If you are unfamiliar, the Pinkertons were a real private organization from that time period. They were essentially made up of hired guns who could be paid to do all sorts of jobs. Eventually the Pinkerton Detective Agency would become part of the government and evolve into what is now known as the FBI. In the movie, Breecher has been hired by two African American senators to track down and apprehend a number of high ranking Confederate officers who were convicted of war crimes in the Civil War. I’m not sure if that actually happened in real life, but it is very plausible, which is why it serves as such a great plot for this historical movie.

There are a number of other historical references throughout the film. For example, Breecher’s personal goal is to earn enough money to buy some fertile land on the frontier where he plans to live peacefully as a cattle driver. He is seen carrying around a flyer advertising land for “$1.25 an acre,” which is historically accurate. The US government wanted people to settle out west, so they divided up the territories into acres and sold them at low prices to incentivize people to develop the frontier.

In conclusion, Badland is a pretty decent historically inspired western movie that is worth the watch.