Introduction
Hollywood mainstay Thomas Jane has carved out a rare career—one that moves effortlessly between noir, action, prestige television, and, increasingly, the American Western. With his new film Frontier Crucible, Jane returns to the sun-baked moral battlegrounds of the Old West, starring as Mule in a tightly wound pulp-fiction standoff adapted from Harry Whittington’s classic novel Desert Stakeout.
Synopsis
From the producer of Bone Tomahawk. A wagon carrying crucial medical supplies needs to be transported through hostile territory. The only man who can guide it through to its destination is Merrick Beckford, but to get there, he’ll need to enlist the help of a trio of dangerous outlaws hell-bent on survival. When they accidentally kill an Apache scout, all bets are off, and survival is the name of the game in director Travis Mills’s western thriller.
Interview
Speaking with Cinema Scholars’ own Glen Dower, Thomas Jane opens up about the film’s origins, the psychology of Westerns, director Travis Mills’ old-school vision, and what it was like filming on the same Arizona terrain once used by the legendary John Ford.
Lightly edited for content and clarity
Glen Dower:
Mr. Thomas Jane. How are you, sir?
Thomas Jane:
I’m right on, man.
Glen Dower:
Nice. So we’re talking about Frontier Crucible, and I had such a great time with this movie.
Thomas Jane:
Thanks.
Glen Dower:
So tell us about your character, Mule, because it seems to be ‘Thomas Jane is in the Western era of his career’.
Thomas Jane:
Yeah, right on! My company, Renegade, has done a few Westerns now. The last one we did is called Murder at Yellowstone City, and that made it to number one on Netflix.
Glen Dower:
What an ensemble that was!
Thomas Jane:
Yeah, man, so that was cool. It tells me that there’s an audience out there that enjoys a good Western. So I hope that we get to make some more of them. Dallas Sarnia brought me this script. It was written by Craig Zoller, who did Bone Tomahawk. So you know what you’re in for with this. And it was based on a book by Harry Whittington. Now, Whittington is known as the King of the Pulps, right? He wrote in the 50s and 60s, and he was the most prolific pulp novelist of all time. So they gave him the title The King.
About six of those books are really, like, really good. They’re like classics. And one of them is Desert Stakeout, which this film is based on. We follow Desert Stakeout to the letter. We tell the story of the book, all the characters, and everything that happens. It’s a desert state, which, by the way, if you want a great short pulp read, check out Desert Stakeout. So I was in from the beginning. I love all that kind of stuff. It was right up my alley.
Glen Dower:
For sure. And I just had Mr. Dermot Mulroney ‘sitting where you are’, if you like, in his most recent Western. I asked him the same question: Why do you think the Western genre endures? Because, over the decades, we’ve had genres that have come and gone. They reach their peak and think they’ll last forever, and slowly disappear. But Westerns endure. Why do you think that is?
Thomas Jane:
Great question. It’s civilization versus nature. It’s human nature versus the law. So we are constrained by civilization, society, social mores, and rules. And when you get out there into the Wild West, all you’ve got is a moral code. The letter of the law doesn’t exist. You do what you’re willing to live with. Everybody’s got a different sort of, and it depends on what day, which side of the bed you woke up on sometimes, and what situation you’re in. And the moral law changes with the problem, with who’s doing what to whom, how you can help or not help. That’s why the Western endures, in my opinion.
We’re looking at, what if I could do whatever the hell I want? What would I do? Would I kill my neighbor just because he pisses me off because he put in those new lights and they shine into my bedroom? You know, what would I do if we were out? And what I just shot the lights out and tell them to knock it off, you know, or would I try to be friendly? You know, and that’s what the West sort of offers. It offers you…confrontation with yourself.
Glen Dower:
Wow. And let’s talk about your director, Mr. Travis Mills. He obviously loves this genre, and that comes across in every frame. I mean, you shot exactly where John Ford shot in Arizona.
Thomas Jane:
Yeah!
Glen Dower:
And does that come across daily when he’s directing, from little things like how you chew your food, to costumes, to the setup? Can you tell us about working with Mr. Mills?
Thomas Jane:
He had a specific vision that I signed on for right away. I loved the idea of bringing the nostalgia of the 1960s Westerns. They had a look at them. They were more colorful. You know, when Leone came along in the late ’60s, that changed the game. Peckinpah changed the game. And those movies are fantastic, and they modernized the genre. But the original Western had a different flavor. And that’s Bud Bedeker in The Tall T, Seven Men From Now, and then Anthony Mann’s movies like The Naked Spur.
By the way, I did a video essay on The Naked Spur. People should check it out. It’s on YouTube. I did that with Rich Johnson and Eric. That’s getting a lot of attention. People really like that. I hope that Westerns are seeing a little bit of a resurgence. It goes like this over time. It’s a lot of fun.
Glen Dower:
Of course, you’re the leading man, Myles Clohessy. It wasn’t lost on me that he bears a passing resemblance to a certain young Mr. Eastwood. Did that come across as well?
Thomas Jane:
Yeah, yeah. I tell him, play against that, and nobody can do Clint. And he does a good job with it. Look, we all have strengths and weaknesses. And we got to work with what we got. And Miles does have a passing resemblance to Eastwood. But you can’t play Clint Eastwood. That’ll just kill you. And he does. He does a good job. He’s a young actor, stepping into the role of a leading man quite well. And this one, I think, he does quite well in.
Glen Dower:
And it’s a great ensemble. In the film, I noted ‘like a little theater troupe’ because all of you are on camera most of the time, even the guy in the coma. You guys just like playing off each other and getting to know each other. It just builds the tension throughout.
Thomas Jane:
For actors, it’s the greatest. Because, you know, it’s acting. It’s like there’s nothing else. It’s just our characters getting scrappy with each other over 90 minutes. And that’s really why we do what we do. I got to be pals with Armie Hammer. You know, he was part of our gang. And I had a great time with Armie. We would make cowboy coffee in the morning. We’d light a fire on set and keep the fire going all day. And really got into the spirit of living out in the middle of Arizona for a month. And it changes you.
It adds something to the characters. We all dressed in the same dressing room. So in the morning, we’d all stumble downstairs with our coffee. And we were all getting, like you said, Glen, a theater troupe, backstage. We’d all be getting dressed together. Putting on our cowboy outfits to go out and, you know, get scrappy for a day. It was a lot of fun.
Glen Dower:
And the film is a lot of fun for the audience. Mr Jane, it’s been a pleasure. Thank you so much for your time.
Thomas Jane:
You bet, buddy.
Closing Thoughts
Thomas Jane brings an infectious enthusiasm to Frontier Crucible, a film that blends pulp, tension, and classic Western atmosphere. With its roots in Whittington’s hard-boiled storytelling and Mills’s reverence for old-school cinema, the film marks another confident step in Jane’s Western renaissance.
Frontier Crucible will be released In Theaters and On Digital on December 5, 2025.
