THE UNHOLY TRINITY (2024)

SYNOPSIS: The Unholy Trinity starring Pierce Brosnan, Samuel L. Jackson and Tim Daly unravels a tale of betrayal, revenge and redemption in the dusty lawlessness of 1870s Montana. When Henry Broadway returns to witness his estranged father's execution, he learns the hanging was the result of a brutal setup. Determined to avenge him, Henry rides into the town of Trinity, a place ruled by buried secrets and shifting allegiances. There, he's caught between Sheriff Gabriel Dove, a lawman with a haunted past, and the enigmatic St. Christopher, whose motives remain dangerously unclear. As blood is spilled and loyalties fracture, Henry must fight not only for survival but for the truth that could finally set him free or destroy him.

MOVIE REVIEW:

Once a dominant Hollywood staple, the Western has struggled to find its footing in recent decades especially in the wake of high-profile disappointments like Kevin Costner’s ambitious Horizon saga. Still, the genre occasionally finds new life on the streaming market, where indie projects like The Unholy Trinity can appear seemingly out of nowhere.

To its credit, The Unholy Trinity isn’t entirely a low-profile affair. With Pierce Brosnan and Samuel L. Jackson leading the cast, the film carries enough star power to turn a few heads. Written by Lee Zachariah and directed by Richard Gray, it attempts to pack betrayal, revenge, greed, and all manner of frontier evil into a lean runtime sometimes to its detriment, but rarely without intrigue.

Brosnan plays Gabriel Dove, the town’s lone sheriff, while his wife Sarah (Veronica Ferres) conveniently serves as the local doctor. Trouble arrives in the form of Henry Broadway (Brandon Lessard), a young man bent on killing Dove for the hanging of his father. Meanwhile, a mysterious figure named St. Christopher (Jackson) rides into town with his eye on the gold Henry’s father left behind. A third thread involves Running Cub (Q’orianka Kilcher), a Native American woman accused of murder, whose innocence Dove insists on defending despite the townsfolk clamoring for her death.

It’s a busy script, though Zachariah doesn’t quite weave its many threads into a cohesive whole. The pacing drags, and centering so much of the story on Henry Broadway—an underwhelming character at best robs the film of the intensity it promises. A sharper conflict between Dove and St. Christopher from the outset might have delivered the kind of tension the film sorely lacks.

Even so, Gray manages to stage some satisfying old-school shootouts and bursts of sudden violence that keep the film from flatlining. Brosnan, aging gracefully, remains a magnetic presence as the weary sheriff, while Jackson injects unpredictability and menace into his ex-slave drifter. A brief cameo by David Arquette as a phony priest adds a touch of pulp charm.

The Unholy Trinity isn’t for everyone. It gestures toward epic scope but never fully delivers and much of its cast is saddled with underdeveloped or shady roles. Yet the combination of Brosnan, Jackson and the sweeping Montana backdrop makes it an easy if imperfect watch. Hardly a classic but good enough for fans craving a few shootouts and a whiff of frontier grit.

MOVIE RATING:

Review by Linus Tee