The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

2018 Directed by Joel Coen, Ethan Coen

Stories live forever. People don't.

Vignettes weaving together the stories of six individuals in the old West at the end of the Civil War. Following the tales of a sharp-shooting songster, a wannabe bank robber, two weary traveling performers, a lone gold prospector, a woman traveling the West to an uncertain future, and a motley crew of strangers undertaking a carriage ride.

Tim Blake Nelson James Franco Zoe Kazan Liam Neeson Tom Waits Tyne Daly Brendan Gleeson Jonjo O'Neill Saul Rubinek Chelcie Ross Bill Heck Harry Melling Willie Watson E.E. Bell David Krumholtz Tom Proctor Clancy Brown Stephen Root Ralph Ineson Jesse Luken Sam Dillon Grainger Hines Jefferson Mays Ethan Dubin Matthew Willig Paul Rae Tim DeZarn Martin Palmer Danny McCarthy Show All…

Alternative Titles

Near Algodones, The Mortal Remains, Meal Ticket, All Gold Canyon, The Gal Who Got Rattled, La Ballata Di Buster Scruggs

western music comedy drama

132 mins More details at IMDb TMDb Report this film

Popular reviews

Review by Ralph ★★★★ 23

A genuinely funny and wonderfully acted version of A Million Ways to Die in the West.
Review by Sean Baker 43

Love this film and very disappointed that it isn't getting a proper wide theatrical release. I would have greatly preferred to see this on a big screen. I watched it on a 50" television and it felt disrespectful to the film.
Joel Coen & Ethan Coen's second collaboration with French cinematographer Bruno Delbonnel and I hope it continues. He's brilliant.
Review by Matt Singer ★★★★ 6

Imagine a bunch of Western-themed Twilight Zone episodes shot in glorious color. (This is a very good thing.)
Review by vern ★★★½ 5

glad the three billboards deer found more work
Review by Patrick Willems ★★★★ 5

I loved every story but also I'd watch a 6-hour series just about Buster Scruggs.
Review by demi adejuyigbe ★★★★ 13

“PAN SHOT!!!!!!!”
I love the Coen Brothers so much and this is the most Coen Brothers movie that could ever be made. Extremely nihilistic, beautiful, funny, sharp, well-directed, even upsetting at times.
It’s also so long. If this were just three or four of the stories, it would easily be my favorite movie of the year. As much as I fully believe it should be a TV series instead of a singular movie, I also think it’s so beautiful that it should be seen in a theater if you can manage it.
Review by iana ★★★½ 23

cut out three of the stories and i would’ve liked this a lot more ugHHH IT HURTS TO SAY THIS
Review by Karsten Runquist ★★★★ 6

Finally got around to it.
Some people I know have loved this a lot and others haven’t and I can see why it’s like that. I’m definitely on the side that likes it a lot. The Meal Ticket and Prospector stories were definitely my favorite. As a lot of people have been saying, this thing feels like it’s 3 hours long which bummed me out because while that final part was written incredibly well, I felt like it needed to do some more to keep me invested at that point in the film. To solve this I feel like it could have been as easy as balancing out the lengths of each story. The Bank Robber story felt like there…
Review by Peter Labuza ★★★½ 1

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs: Death Comes Unexpectedly
Near Algodones: Death is Inevitable, But Sometimes There's Grace
Meal Ticket: Death is Inevitable, There's No Grace
All Gold Canyon: Sometimes You Can Escape Death
The Gal Who Got Rattled: Sometimes You Can't
The Mortal Remains: Sometimes You're Already Dead
Review by lauren ★★★ 2

the ‘no animals were harmed in the making of this film’ disclaimer obviously didn’t account for the poor horse who had to film scenes with james franco
Review by Gabriel Gundacker ★★★★★ 2

Like with Wes Anderson and Grand Budapest Hotel, the Coen Brother’s have proven a mastery their tone, and to such an extent that they now get to fuck around not with how we expect stories to be told, but how we specifically expect them to tell a story. With any other director, I may be weary of their choices, but I don’t think anyone in this theater ever felt in danger, even when Tim Blake Nelson was flying away with mini-wings in the 13th minute.

Their organization of these short stories, starting cold with a straight-up musical cartoon and then guiding us around James Franco to a deeply effecting Fordian epic about a gold miner and some butterflies, was so hilariously,…
Review by Lucy ★★ 14

the ballad of buster scruggs: ★★★½
near algodones: ★★★
meal ticket: ★
all gold canyon: ★½
the gal who got rattled: ★★★
the mortal remains: ★½
overall: no noise

Recent reviews

Review by popojohno ★★★★½

The most quotable movie for medical professionals
"When they built this guy they forgot to put in the quit"
"He didn't hit nothing important"
"Now I'm not a physician or a botanist..."
The Coens only break out their **really** flowery language every few movies (Arizona, Lebowski, O Brother, this) but God it really sings when they do
Review by lubchansky ★★★★

this one feels like it’s perfectly constructed for me, who simply just tends to vibe with whatever the hell the coens are doing like 98% of the time. and let’s face it - the coens are CERTAInly doing whatever the hell they want here. yee-haw
Review by daltonasper ★★★½

6 shorts about the wide variety of the Wild Wild West. The first one was a five stars easy. It was fantastic. However everything that follows.... it varies widely. Some were entertaining others I struggled to watch. So with that said its a pick and choose.
Review by JackRosencrans ★★★★

This is fun because the main character are not invincible as in most movies. I just want to see more Buster
Review by Luowaw ★★★★★

Just something about it, watched countless times
Review by Eric Melin ★★★½

The Coens tackle the spectre of death in 6 different corrosively funny existential morality tales. So happy that Netflix funded such a weird & wonderful anthology project.
Review by recklessrapid ★★½

I love me some Coens but I didn’t love this. Overly long (like all films now) and I just don’t know what the point is. I like when they’re very stark and pessimistic in their outlook but the multiple
stories in this just made it feel like the point was buried into the ground.
Review by Manuel Couto ★★★★

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is a hilarious, clever and violent modern western by the Coen Brothers. It tells six different unpredictable stories set in the Wild West.
The script is flawless, the score is exceptional and the directing is masterful, as expected. The pace changes a couple of times, but for me it wasn’t an issue at all.
Of course I found some stories more entertaining than others, but each one of them brought something new to the table. The cast is great and the performances are on point.
I feel like the Coen Brothers are the masters of humor and dialogue. Every joke lands and whenever characters are talking, it’s a captivating experience for the viewer.
“A song never fails to ease my mind out here in the West, where the distances are great and the scenery monotonous.”
Review by kpg131 ★★★★

i liked it! fun set of short stories, lots of variety.
Review by merlin ★★★

Enjoyable. Nice soundtrack. Sad.
Review by FelipeMarin ★★★★½

I, as the trapper, have no use for them words.
Review by Vaccinia ★★★★½

I loved how dark and comedic this was. It does a great job of showing how brutal life is/was while also having plenty of madcap characters/situations.