Dual: The Lone Drifter (2008)

Michael Worth plays Luke Twain, a cowboy who rides into the town of Devil’s Plate to find all of the residents dead.

So he begins cleaning up, collecting the bodies, then burying them, vowing to find the person responsible.

One person is left alive, a pretty oriental saloon girl named Ember.

At one moment, she seems frightened by him. At the next, she’s trying to seduce him.

More than anything, he wants to protect her from the mysterious rider who seems to be circling the town.

After all, he might be coming back to finish the job and kill the last two people alive in Devil’s Plate.

Review:

You quickly suspect nothing is what it seems in this low-budget Western. But the actors and director Steven R. Monroe do a very nice job of pulling it off nevertheless. Unlike so many 21st Century Westerns, it never screams low budget.

Some scenes that have little meaning at the time — like Luke cleaning a porch, like Luke sending telegraphs presumably for help — wind up meaning much more as the film unfolds. And for the first 35 minutes, Michael Worth has the screen pretty much to himself.

If you’re looking for a traditional Western, full of shoot-outs, good guys and bad guys, you’d best skip this. If you’re willing to watch something different, this makes for an interesting 90 minutes.

Michael Worth as Luke Twain in Dual, The Lone Drifter (2008)

Karen Kim as Ember in Dual, The Lone Drifter (2008)

Directed by:
Steven R. Monroe

Cast:
Michael Worth … Luke Twain
Tim Tomerson … Jared Deston
Karen Kim … Ember
Margot Farley … Mother

Runtime: 90 min.

Tim Tomerson as Jared Deston, the stranger in Dual, The Lone Drifter (2008)

Margot Farley as Luke’s mother in Dual, The Lone Drifter (2008)

Memorable lines:

Ember, about the dance hall: “It felt good making something out of nothing. That’s what the purpose of life should be — to take something ugly and make it beautiful.”

Ember: “Passion can make a man walk all over common sense.”