The Harder They Fall (2021 film)

The Harder They Fall is a 2021 American Western film directed by Jeymes Samuel (in his feature directorial debut), who co-wrote the screenplay with Boaz Yakin. The film stars Jonathan Majors, Idris Elba, Zazie Beetz, Regina King, Delroy Lindo, Lakeith Stanfield, RJ Cyler, Danielle Deadwyler, Edi Gathegi, and Deon Cole. It is one of few Westerns whose principal cast members are all Black. Its characters are based on real cowboys, lawmen, and outlaws of the nineteenth-century American West.

The Harder They Fall premiered at the BFI London Film Festival on October 6, 2021. It received a limited release on October 22, 2021, prior to streaming on Netflix on November 3.

Plot

Eleven-year-old Nat Love is eating dinner with his parents when Rufus Buck and his associate Cortez arrive. Nat's father begs Buck to spare his wife and son and asks Buck for forgiveness, but Buck shoots and kills both of Nat's parents and then carves a cross into his forehead.

Twenty years later, Love finds and kills Cortez. Meanwhile, his partners, sharpshooter Bill Pickett and quick draw Jim Beckwourth, ambush the Crimson Hood gang and steal their haul from a recent bank robbery. The lone survivor tells them the $25,000 they have stolen belongs to Buck. Love travels to meet his former lover Mary Fields, who runs a chain of saloons. Pickett brings news of the heist to Love.