Heaven’s Gate (Director’s Cut)

Dir. Michael Cimino. 1980/2012, 219 mins. DCP. With Kris Kristofferson, Christopher Walken, Isabelle Huppert, Jeff Bridges, John Hurt. “I had an opportunity to create a total mood in a way that I never had before,” said cinematographer Vilmos Zsigmond of his work on Cimino’s notorious and monumental epic. Credited with ruining United Artists—and all but ending the auteurist brilliance that defined the 1970s—Heaven’s Gate became an industry punching bag, its failure preordained in the press. When the studio cut hours from the film after a disastrous first screening, they made things worse, releasing a chopped-down film considered incoherent. Yet this revisionist western, restored to its full length, is a marvel of ambition and complex storytelling, dramatizing the Johnson County War of 1892, when European settlers were targeted for death and displacement by cattle barons.

Tickets: $15 / $11 senior and students / $9 youth (ages 3–17) / discounted for MoMI members ($7–$11). Order tickets. Please pick up tickets at the Museum’s admissions desk upon arrival. All seating is general admission. Review safety protocols before your visit.