Fifty years after Glenn Ford and Van Heflin cocked their pistols in the original 3:10 To Yuma, based on a story by Elmore Leonard, director James Mangold saddles up for a fast-paced remake that reinvigorates the western genre.
 A classic parable of good versus evil set in the mythic Old West, the new version relishes the stellar casting of Christian Bale and Russell Crowe as rancher Dan Evans and notorious outlaw Ben Wade, bound together on a perilous three-day journey to meet the train of the title. During that odyssey, Bale’s kind, self-sacrificing father is forced to make terrible choices to safeguard his loved ones. He stares evil, in the shape of Crowe’s mean, conniving gunslinger, straight in the eye and hopes that his faith will carry him through, even when the odds are stacked overwhelmingly against him. “Just remember, it’s your old man that hauled Ben Wade to that station, when nobody else would,” Dan tells his eldest son proudly. Former Union Army officer Dan Evans has abided by the letter of the law his entire life, and now lives on an Arizona ranch with his wife Alice (Gretchen Mol) and sons William (Logan Lerman) and Mark (Benjamin Petry). Drought has driven the family to the brink of starvation, so Dan agrees to the sum of $200 to escort vicious criminal Ben Wade to the prison train, which leaves at 3.10pm from the town of Contention. The horseback journey to the station is fraught with dangers including attacks by Apache Indians and Wade’s gun-crazy second-in-command Charlie Prince (Ben Foster). Adding to Dan’s woes, 14-year-old William runs away from home to join the posse, hoping for an adventure like in the dime store novels. 3:10 To Yuma begins at a canter and slows only a couple of times to develop the fractious relationship between Dan and Ben, which morphs into something far more intense and complicated by the time they reach Contention. | 
