Heroic hero

3:10 to Yuma is a Western that doesn’t celebrate the rakish outlaw | Megan Basham

What makes a man a man? In the midst of all the gunfights, barn burning, and stagecoach robbing, this is the question that 3:10 to Yuma (rated R for violence and language), like so many classic Westerns, poses. While the film features a few modern flourishes to engage attention-challenged audiences, its answer remains surprisingly the same.

From the outset, we are given two models of masculinity. The rakish and charming Ben Wade (Russell Crowe) is an outlaw who takes what he wants from life—money, women, and lives—without regard to conscience or consequence. Dan Evans (Christian Bale) is Wade's physical and psychological opposite. A crippled Civil War veteran trying desperately to save his farm, Dan fears that his inability to provide is turning him into something less than a man in the eyes of his family. But he refuses to let his woes drive him to sin, and during the worst of his troubles he turns to prayer.