The Old Way

The Old Way is a 2023 American Western film directed by Brett Donowho, from a screenplay by Carl W. Lucas, and starring Nicolas Cage as a retired gunman on a mission to find the outlaws who killed his wife. The film was theatrically released by Saban Films on January 6, 2023, and received mixed reviews by critics. Plot In 1878 in the Montana Territory, gunfighter Colton Briggs is a member of an extrajudicial posse organized to arrest and hang the brother of Walter McAllister, a notorious bandit. Walter and his men try to foil the public execution, resulting in a shootout that leaves Colton and McAllister's son, James, as the only survivors. Colton assures Walter's brother that he won't kill him; his execution was merely a feint to force his brother out of hiding. Enraged, the younger McAllister tries to shoot Colton in the back. Without hesitation, Colton guns him down and calmly rides away as Walter's young nephew James watches. Twenty years later, Colton is a changed man: under the influence of his wife Ruth, he has become a respectable, clean-living merchant with a general store and a small farm, raising a twelve-year-old daughter named Brooke. To Colton's dismay, Brooke is defiant and unruly; he notices that she is also emotionally withdrawn and unable to behave like "normal folk", traits that remind him of his former life. Four men ride up to Colton's farm one day; their leader identifies himself as James McAllister. His gang stabs Ruth to death before painting a taunting message with her blood on the wall and leaving.