"In the mid-sixties, the maverick American director Monte Hellman (Two-Lane Blacktop) conceived of two westerns at the same time. Dreamlike and gritty by turns, the two films would prove their makers adeptness at brilliantly deconstructing genre. As shot back-to-back for famed producer Roger Corman (The Wild Angels), they feature overlapping casts and crews, including Jack Nicholson (Five Easy Pieces) in two of his meatiest early roles. The filmsThe Shooting, about a motley assortment of loners following a mysterious wanted man through a desolate frontier, and Ride in the Whirlwind, about a group of cowhands pursued by vigilantes for crimes they did not commitare rigorous, artful, and wholly unconventional journeys into the American West."