History Film / Tombstone

** Debatable whether this is a CrowningMomentOfAwesome or a [[Narm/{{Film}} Narm]] that qualifies Russell as a LargeHam.
** Considering there are eyewitness accounts of Earp actually going through point-blank gunfire unscathed and taking many baddies down, probably the former. That scene at the watering hole where Wyatt waded out and [[spoiler:shot Curly Bill at point-blank range]] where the Cowboys' bullets were flat out missing Wyatt had eyewitnesses confirming it, including a fatally wounded Cowboy who had no reason to embellish.

** Wyatt [[spoiler:becomes a DirtyCop when he leaves Tombstone... and gets a U.S. Marshal's badge, using it as a means to cover his RoaringRampageOfRevenge against the Cowboys who wounded Virgil and killed Morgan.]]
*** More like CowboyCop. He made it clear that he was declaring war on The Cowboys, and that if he saw a man wearing a red sash, he would kill the man wearing it. At the end, he lets those who take off their sashes go.
* DirtyCoward: Ike Clanton.
** Ironically, the one time he does try and stay and fight, he gets himself killed.
*** He is shown in his last scene of the film ripping off his Cowboy sash while being pursued by Wyatt and the Immortals. The narrator lets us know - during the WhereAreTheyNow closing as the credits roll - that Ike was later killed during a robbery in New Mexico.

* SmugSnake: County Sheriff Behan is in it to be popular and nothing else.

* RefusalOfTheCall: Wyatt refuses to become a lawman again, despite every official under the sun pleading with him to make a return. He becomes ResignedtoTheCall in support of his brothers, [[spoiler:and later [[JumpedAtTheCall throws himself headfirst]] into the fray, becoming a U.S, Marshall to hunt down the cowboys after they murder Morgan.]]

-->'''Wyatt''': You're willing to risk all that(a gunfight) over a misdemenour?
-->'''Virgil''': Damn right I am. They're breaking the law!

* SympatheticMurderBackstory: Wyatt feels nothing but remorse over killing a man in a gunfight (despite being on the side of right and doing his job as a lawman) in the NoodleIncident in Kansas city that made him a hero. He tells Morgan that he shouldn't ever want to find out what its like to kill another man, right or wrong.

* RecklessGunUsage: Curly Bill, while on some kind of psychidelic drugs after a night in an opium den, starts shooting wildly at buildings and people, culminating with a dogged attempt to shoot the moon out of the sky.

** Doc Holiday is pretty camp in his mannerisms, yet he is completely devoted to Kate.

** Also, the [[Mooks Cowboys]] are seen smoking [[OpiumDen Opium]]. One even mistakes [[YourHeadASplode a gun for a pipe]].

* -> '''Wyatt Earp''': I just want you to know it's over between us.
'''Curly Bill''': Well... bye.
'''Johnny Ringo''': Smell that, Bill? Smells like someone died.->

* '''Wyatt Earp''': I just want you to know it's over between us.

'''Johnny Ringo''': Smell that, Bill? Smells like someone died.

* Wyatt Earp: I just want you to know it's over between us.
Curly Bill: Well... bye.
Johnny Ringo: Smell that, Bill? Smells like someone died.

* BilingualBonus: The unsubtitled Latin dialogue between Ringo and Holliday. The intention is to show that these two characters are educated. Ringo calls Holliday a drunk; Holliday says he's a better gunfighter than Ringo.
** Not explicitly he doesn't. He tells Ringo to mind his own business and dismisses him. Ringo then threatens him by saying something to the effect that fools learn from their mistakes, gesturing to his gun with Doc ending the dialogue with a line ambiguous between calling for peace and threatening death. [[http://latindiscussion.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6909 Commentary]]

* HappilyMarried: Virgil and Allie Earp. According to numerous biographies and eyewitness accounts, this was TruthInTelevision.
** Subverted all to hell with Wyatt and Mattie. Whatever reasons they married were soon lost the second Wyatt saw Josephine and Mattie found the laudanum.

* EvenEvilHasStandards: Oneo of the Cowboys--McMasters--drops his red sash and falls in with the Earp brothers after someone fires a gun into the Earp household, nearly killing one of the brothers' wives; he flatly states that attacking defenseless women was something he simply couldn't stomach. (This is foreshadowed during the implied rape scene at the Mexican wedding in the introduction.) He even joins Earp in his vendetta against the Cowboys.

The film is [[TruthInTelevision somewhat accurate]], although it does portray an idealized version of the Earps while also making the whole story a lot more dramatic. In reality, the conflict between the Earps and the Cowboys is not entirely clear-cut; the Earps are generally regarded as the "good guys" only because they happened to be the ones wearing badges at the time.

While the film largely focuses on Wyatt Earp, most find Doc Holliday--as portrayed by Val Kilmer--[[EnsembleDarkhorse to be more memorable.]]

** Debatable whether this is a CrowningMomentOfAwesome or a [[{{Narm/Film}} Narm]] that qualifies Russell as a LargeHam.

* CulturedBadass: Johnny Ringo and Doc Holliday. (Ringo as a villain is technically WickedCultured.) Early in the film Ringo understands a Mexican priest's warning (in Spanish), and translates it by quoting TheBible. Holliday is described as a (former) SouthernGentleman and plays Chopin on the piano. The two hold a conversation in Latin during their first meeting.
* DawsonCasting: Dana Delany as Josephine Marcus. Delany was 36 when she played the role of a 20-year-old actress working the towns of the Wild West.

* DirtyCop: County Sheriff Johnny Behan, at least in-film where he's seen siding with the Cowboys [[spoiler:and leads a Cowboy-filled Posse chasing after Wyatt's vendetta]].

*** More like CowboyCop. He made it clear that he was declaring war on The Cowboys, and that if he saw a man wearing a red sash, he would kill the man wearing it. At the end, he lets those who take off their sashes go.

** Where Costner's film focused on a more thorough (over 3 hours!) and historically-accurate telling of Wyatt's life, ''Tombstone'' focuses mostly on the events in Tombstone and [[RoaringRampageOfRevenge the immediate aftermath]].

-->'''Doc Holliday''': Yes, but there's just something about him. Something around the eyes, I don't know, reminds me of... Me. No. I'm sure of it, ''I hate him''.

* FiringOneHanded: Wyatt Earp blows away a fleeing enemy with a double-barreled shotgun... one-handed, while riding on a horse, at full gallop. Granted, since it's a shotgun, you don't have to be precise, but...

* GunTwirling:

** Subverted all to hell with Wyatt and Mattie. Whatever reasons they married were soon lost the second Wyatt saw Josephine and Mattie found the laudanum.

* HeyItsThatGuy: A number of actors in small roles have this effect, some of them famous from older films, others having gone onto greater fame later. Robert Mitchum, Charlton Heston, Thomas Haden Church, Billy Bob Thornton (pre-''Sling Blade''), Jason Priestley, John Corbett, Billy Zane (pre-''Titanic''), Terry O'Quinn (pre-''Lost''), and Stephen Lang (pre-''{{Film/Avatar}}'').

* ProfessionalGambler: Doc Holliday. The degree to which his RealLife counterpart corresponded to this trope is debatable.

** The film shows Wyatt and his allies wiping out a mass army of Cowboys, but in the real vendetta ride Wyatt killed [[spoiler: four men (Frank Stilwell, "Indian Charlie" Cruz, Johnny Barnes and Curly Bill) before fleeing to Colorado after four days of riding. The film's climactic duel between Ringo and Holliday is based loosely on Wyatt's confession that he had snuck back into Arizona to finish the Rampage of Revenge on Ringo.]]

* YouRemindMeOfX: Doc Holiday does the DeadpanSnarker version, saying how Ringo reminds him of himself... which just means that Doc ''really'' hates Ringo.