The film starts out with three subplots. Prophet Josiah (Jason Isaacs) has lead of group of followers from Utah to New Mexico. He preaches righteousness, has multiple women share his bed, and has no problem killing. He also raises sheep.

A young couple who are farmers have lands that are adjacent to that of Josiah. The sheep come over and graze to the dismay of Miguel (Eduardo Noriega) and Sarah (January Jones of "Mad Men").

The third subplot involves Sheriff Cornelius Jackson (Ed Harris) who has just arrived in town. He is brutish and unorthodox, but knows a guilty man when he sees one. We later find out he hung Sarah's father.

The preacher is in the role of the antagonist as the film turns into a "I Spit on Your Sweetwater."

It was not your ordinary western, but it was one that held my interest even with the formulaic script and ending.

Parental Guide: F-bomb, sex, rape (off screen) nudity (January Jones, Jiji Hise, Jenny Gabrielle-full frontal)

In 19th Century New Mexico Miguel Ramirez gets in to a feud with religious zealot Josiah . When Miguel fails to return to his home his wife Sarah suspects that Josiah may be behind her husbands disappearance

This went straight to DVD in Europe which is somewhat surprising because it does contain relatively well known names in Harris , Isaacs and Jones . That said reading the comments on this page you are struck as to the number of comments that describe the film as being " funny " but I should qualify this by saying it is funny in the same way as Al Swearengen is funny in DEADWOOD because this is black comedy at its most brutal and uncompromising along with role reversal revenge fantasy and you can see why it might have been a difficult film to market

It's not a very well paced film and some scenes seem to go on for too long and the fact that there's not a lot of incidental music to these scenes means they seem longer than they really are . That said it's probably the effect the director wants because SWEET VENGEANCE concerns it self with mood rather than narrative and is a very moody revenge thriller . One does notice that the cinematography is rather murky and fails to make the most of the New Mexico landscape , especially when you get the instinctive feeling that there's a subtext of man - or more specifically woman - versus nature going on there somewhere but this aspect comes over slightly confused and isn't as well developed as it could have been . Regardless of that if you enjoyed DEADWOOD then you might just enjoy this blackly comical violent Western

January Jones plays the main lead in this and she is really great in this. Ed Harris also has a blast and the movie overall is a nice addition to the western genre. It has all the right ingredients (with added female nudity, which isn't something that is a given of course) and was obviously fun to shoot.

The movie itself which was playing at the Fantasy Filmfest in Germany when I watched it, is predictable because of the known story line (even without me saying where this is going, you'll see it coming from a thousand miles). But the fun you can have with it, is still there, especially if you have a soft spot for Western movies in general