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Once they have returned, they discover their tiny, dusty town now occupied by the Union army, and a local farmer has been hung for treason. (Tough times I presume?) We meet the families, the obligatory love interest and, shortly thereafter, the bad guys. The gentlemen in charge of "acquiring" the land present a good story, stating that the town can be legally seized if they don't decide to sell to make clear for the pending railroad. However, our book smart farmer and future outlaw, Frank James, figures differently. Meanwhile, Jesse's good buddy Cole Younger has been paid a similar visit by the railroad's liaisons, only he didn't take it as well as the James's. Cole shoots a few of his visitors and winds up at the gallows. Welp, it Jesse and the Backstreet Gang to the rescue and into outlaw history, with permanent peach fuzzdom for all.

The number of days remaining for the teen exploitation genre, apparently, is still in limbo. While equally miserable flicks like this one, Crazy/Beautiful, and 13 Ghosts perform terribly at the box office, the likes of Scary Movie and The Waterboy make over $100 million each. It seems some films are marketed better than others? However, judging from a script that rivals Supernova in terms of laugh-out-loud lines and painful direction from that guy who directed Encino Man, did we have the right to expect much else?

The cast, on the other hand, is admirable, but all have done better work. Colin Farrell who starred in Tigerland and will soon costar with Bruce Willis in Hart's War, not to mention Spielberg's Minority Report and Schumacher's Phone Booth, plays Jesse James. Scott Caan, portraying Cole Younger, has been seen in Varsity Blues, Boiler Room, Gone in 60 Seconds, Novocaine, and the forthcoming Ocean's 11. Also from Varsity Blues is Ali Larter, the love interest. She's been in many a teen flick among them, all better, including House on Haunted Hill, Final Destination and Legally Blonde. And best of all is Gabriel Macht as Frank James. He hasn't been in much before this film, which is surprising, as his is the finest performance.

Now as for the grown-ups (who should have known much better), they shine, but fail to realize that their mortgage payment can't be that bad. Timothy Dalton is Pinkerton, the man whose detectives are out to capture Jesse James. Kathy Bates plays Ma James. She's great, and unfortunately for us, is only in the flick for a couple of scenes. Evil railroad baron, Thaddeus Rains, is devilishly depicted by the always professional, Harris Yulin. In all, a fine cast, bad movie.

Video: How Does The Disc Look?

The WB and Morgan Creek have sure put together a fine 1.85:1 anamorphic transfer for this undeserving film. This came out just four months ago, and looks as eye-catching as I am sure it must have had in the theater. The print is pristine with not a single nick or scratch apparent. Blacks are very rich and shadow delineation is very sharp, and even with a bit of non-distracting edge enhancement this image looks very detailed. Colors are also a highlight as they are carefully rendered and realistically presented. Fleshtones are dead on and balanced nicely with the other brown hues of the barren landscapes. Overall this is an excellent transfer.

Audio: How Does the Disc Sound?

Ah, the true star of our show, the audio. Presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 as well as (quite rare for Warner, so kudos to Morgan Creek) a DTS mix. Both of these tracks rock. The soundstage is marvelously wide with superb imaging between the front and back. The surrounds are fully engaged during every action sequence and even in some of the more intimate scenes. There is also some fantastic surround use with the oft-moving trains and other ambient effects. Music is powerfully reproduced across all five channels, and low end is rock solid, but truly shines with the score. Dialogue is really the only detraction as sometimes it can reverberate, ever so slightly, but its distinction from the rest of the very smooth audible ingredients can be fairly diverting of one's attention.

Now, for the DD/DTS assessment. The DTS mix was recorded at 754 kbps and the Dolby at 448 kbps. One of the most active scenes is right in the beginning during the Civil War battle. Bullets whizzing by and ricocheting, horses galloping furiously, cannons firing and the like make for a great basis of comparison. The DTS track has its obvious advantages: greater sidewall imaging, tighter bass response and more distinct subtleties. However, this particular DTS track takes it a few steps more. I also compared the middle of chapter three where "Find My Baby" by Moby begins to play. In this scene the music is much more solid and spread out than in the Dolby Digital track. The low end is also even better defined. The surrounds in both scenes one and three seem more active as they give the greater appearance that more is happening all around you. The Dolby Digital track is great, but the DTS mix is superb. If it weren't for that rascally dialogue this would be close to reference quality.

There is also a Quebecian French dub in Dolby Digital 5.1 (that's French dubbed in Quebec) and another English track in Dolby 2.0 surround. The subtitle choices are French, Spanish and English, along with English Closed Captions.

Supplements: What Goodies Are There?

This disc has quite a few extras, though few are any more bearable than the film itself. Certainly worth mentioning is that the Scene Selections display moving images of the scenes - I always dig such extra effort. Anyway, let's start slow. First up we have a section for cast and crew filmographies. This is one of the most complete cast and crew sections I've ever seen. There are nine of the main cast members and the director, producer, both writers, composer, editor and even the costume designer from the crew. Each entry has a few pages of a text bio followed by listings of their film credits.

Next is a screen- specific audio commentary with director Les Mayfield, co-writer John Rogers and editor Michael Tronick. This commentary is screen specific but appears nicely edited from various conversations. (In fact, don't even watch the flick, simply turn on the commentary. You can thank me later.) This is an informative track but Tronick can be annoying, but at least he does ask the director a ton of questions, which really keeps the chat going. There are some absolutely horrific pops throughout this track, so don't turn it up too loud. Weird.

Next up is the dreaded deleted scenes supplement. Fortunately there were only two and they are both in non-anamorphic widescreen. Also included is a collection of three short featurettes in the behind-the-scenes area. Here we have the 8-minute The Making of American Outlaws, a typical EPK with some good behind the scenes stuff and chats with the actors and director. Next is Creating the Old West, a six minute look at the construction of set pieces and the town the production built from the ground up. Very interesting movie-magic stuff. And finally we have How to be an Outlaw, a 5-minute piece chronicling the actors trails and tribulations at cowboy boot camp.

Wait, there's more ... a selectable area called Artwork displays three options: Storyboards, Costumes and Blueprints. The storyboards section has three self-guided story boarded scenes, the Costumes section is also self-guided and the Blueprints section has three separate blueprints showing how they used one spot for three locations. Mildly interesting. Finally, the Publicity Gallery contains just about all the American Outlaws promotional material one could handle. Included here is the teaser trailer, an astonishingly obnoxious theatrical trailer (both trailers are anamorphic and in Dolby 5.1), four TV spots, a self-guided photo gallery of production stills and another trailer gallery entitled Morgan Creek DVDs. This last gallery includes anamorphic trailers for Ace Ventura, Chill Factor, The In Crowd, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves (Costner/Rickman), True Romance and Young Guns II. Lastly

DVD-ROM Exclusives: What do you get when you pop the disc in your PC?

Also included is just a minor bit of ROM features that include a screenplay viewer which allows you to watch the film along side the storyboards or the script. There is a link to Morgan Creek online and a website archive.

Parting Thoughts