High Plains Drifter is a 1973 American Western film directed by and starring Clint Eastwood. The movie follows a mysterious gunfighter, known only as “The Stranger” (Clint Eastwood), who rides into the small town of Lago, a mining community in the American West. The townspeople are initially wary of the Stranger, but after he guns down three outlaws who try to kill him, they begin to see him as a hero and hire him to defend them against a group of ruthless outlaws who are planning to attack the town.
As the Stranger becomes embroiled in the town’s affairs, he begins to uncover a web of corruption and deceit that threatens the very existence of the community. With his unique skills and mysterious past, the Stranger must use his wits and his guns to protect the town and its people from the outlaws and the corrupt officials who are working against them.
Throughout the film, the Stranger’s true identity and motivations remain unclear, adding to the sense of mystery and intrigue. The movie’s climax features a dramatic showdown between the Stranger and the outlaws, and the film’s ending is open to interpretation, leaving audiences to ponder the Stranger’s true nature and the fate of the town.
High Plains Drifter is a critically acclaimed film that explores themes of justice, morality, and the American West, and features Eastwood’s characteristic blend of action, suspense, and dry humor.
A comment on X from TES I saw this morning:
Since I often post links to TES’s work, I feel mildly compelled to post an answer to the above. From it and some of his other writings, I diagnosis a commonplace Western (mis)understanding of religion which entails seeing all of them as similar in important ways to the Abrahamics. There are literally thousands of competent Buddhist teachers who could disabuse TES of his wrong views if he would but ask. Since Buddhism is both complex and fundamentally a mind-to-mind and experiential body of knowledge, deeper understanding will take some time but it is there for the taking if he wants it. TES has been first-rate in his analyses of covid and frequently claims to have expert skills based on both his understanding of how to interpret real-world data and his experience in the real-world doing that. A good Buddhist teacher could be described in just that way. I have a great deal of respect for TES and will continue to post links to his work on covid and global warming and maybe some other stuff. ABN
UPDATE: I should add that TES has a way out since the Buddha himself asked that his teachings never be written down to prevent them from becoming ‘religious scriptures’ people worshipped without understanding. That said, in other places TES has displayed deep ignorance of Buddhism and lumped it together with other traditions in ways that are seriously misleading. Incidentally, for many years Buddhism was considered a philosophy in the West rather than a religion. American tax laws settled that argument. In truth, Buddhism is both a religion and a philosophy. It is the philosophical side of Buddhism that is most often misunderstood, not unlike how skepticism is often misunderstood. Moreover, ironically, it is highly likely skepticism has been influenced by Buddhism and vice versa. ABN
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