Tombstone

Factual error: When Doc is playing poker with Ed Bailey and Doc lays his guns on the table, in the middle of the table is the reverse (back) of a Washington quarter. These type of Washington quarters began being minted in 1932.

MovieFan612 ★

Continuity mistake: During the fight at the OK corral, Doc Holiday has a double barrel shotgun but he shoots it three times, once in the air to spook the horse, once again to shoot the guy behind the horse, then the scene changes and he shoots another guy with the same gun without reloading.

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Suggested correction: This is already explained in corrections. The "third shot" is the same as the second shot from a different angle. The mistake is that he changes how he shoots. However, the same guy is shot - and falls dead from each angle.

Zwn Annwn

I don't buy the explanation. What would be the point of the filmmaker doing that when it's not done elsewhere in the movie, and why would the killing of the guy Doc shot be important enough to warrant a shot of it from two angles when none of the others were? No sale; still an error.

Continuity mistake: The scene where Ed says "there's three of them over there" referring to the Cowboys, but when the shot is shown there's actually four Cowboys.

Factual error: Billy Breakenridge in real life was a large man who was almost certainly not gay. He certainly wasn't effeminate as the film makes him out to be and he was known as a good shot and a tough individual.

Deliberate mistake: When Wyatt comes out of the Oriental and joins his brothers in the street to tell them he's acquired a quarter interest in a game, a herd of cattle is passing them in the street but there's no dust kicked up by the cattle, when in reality there would be a lot of dust on a dry desert street in Arizona.

MovieFan612 ★

Continuity mistake: After shooting up the wedding near the start, they are sitting at the table eating the feast. As the camera shows Curly Bill's plate the food on it keeps changing.

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Trivia

Trivia: Val Kilmer has been quoted as saying that screenwriter Kevin Jarre insisted the actors wear real wool costumes, in accordance with the time period. During the scene in the Birdcage Theater, Val Kilmer says, a thermometer was placed on the set, and it read 134 degrees Fahrenheit. Kilmer suggested jokingly that this was the reason Doc Holliday killed so many people: "It's just, like, he wore wool in the summer, in the Arizona territory, and that made him mad."

MovieFan612 ★

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Questions

Chosen answer: A reckoning is like a judgment day, exacting retribution for one's actions. Doc was very well educated and had a very large vocabulary. He was correctly pointing out the subtle difference between revenge (to make Wyatt feel better about losing Morgan and about Virgil's crippling injury) and the fact that Wyatt was bringing about a judgment day (or reckoning) for each of the men who hurt his family.

MovieFan612

Answer: I've spent a lot of time thinking about this very question, and here's what I've come up with. I think there are at least two differences between revenge and a reckoning. First, I think it has to do with the scale of the response to an offending action. Revenge, in my mind, is an eye for an eye, i.e, "You killed my brother and wounded another, so I will inflict the same action on your family (or group, gang, whatever). " A reckoning is less a measured response to an offending action and more of a full-scale punishment, i.e, "You killed my brother and wounded another, so I will now slaughter your entire family-including those who were not directly responsible for the offending action." Second, I think there is also a difference in motivation. Revenge tends to be a very personal response to something, whereas a reckoning tends to be more of a response fueled by a need for justice. In Wyatt's case, it was both. He was enraged by what happened to his family, but was also a lawman.

Franklin Vaughn

Thank you for this response! I've only seen Tombstone a million times and asked the same question every time. It's hard to separate the difference between the two but I believe you nailed it. Well done.

I'm thinking the opposite in terms. Revenge is "Reflexive" and is generally any means necessary (out of an abundance of pain or rage) to hurt the other party. "Revenge is a dish best served cold." If one is exacting justice there's no need to be cold hearted. Therefore, Reckoning is (to me) a fair balancing of the "scales" hence "an eye for an eye." Not only consequences of actions as it were but a corrective action to an incorrect circumstance. Just my understanding.

The problem with that theory is there is no difference in the end because the end result was the same...the killing. True reckoning could have only been achieved though the apprehension and punishment by trial and jury, anything other than that is simply revenge.

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