Watching Sam Raimi's film The Quick and the Dead was an unusual experience for me. It is that very rarest of gems, a movie that meets my expectations and is everything I want it to be. In this case, what I wanted it to be, and what it is, is a truly subversive female western.

The Quick and the Dead is the story of a female gunslinger, known as "The Lady," played by Sharon Stone. The Lady comes into a Wild West town to enter a quick draw contest. She says she's there for the cash, but it is clear early on that there is more to it, and we find out after a bit that she's avenging the death of her father, a marshal, at the hands of the town's overlord and the contest's reigning champion, Herod (Gene Hackman). She was forced to not only watch but participate in her dad's murder when she was a child, and she hasn't really gotten over it.

On her path to being able to kill Herod, The Lady beds the pretty blonde (Leonardo DiCaprio), saves the life of the redeemed outlaw (Russell Crowe), and redresses sexism in several forms, from shooting the gunslinger who harasses the bar maid in the groin to knocking a stool out from under a man who assumes she's a whore. She's also given great quips, responding to "I need a woman" with "you need a bath," and "you wanna play poker with me little lady?" with "looks like you're having a pretty good time playing with yourself." And to top that off, she can hold her own with her fists as well as with her gun.

Best of all, The Lady has no romantic interest in either of the two "available" men that are thrown at her (DiCaprio and Crowe), nor does she stick around after the dust clears. Rather, she tosses her dad's marshal badge at the still-standing Crowe, declares "the laws is back in town," and rides off. I half expected a kid to run after her, yelling "Shane! Come back Shane!" What a wonderful reversal.

If only The Quick and the Dead was as conscious of race as of gender. Sadly, it is populated with typical western racial stereotypes, and it's not 100% clear whether they are supposed to be making a point or whether they're being played for laughs. The worst is Native American "Spotted Horse," who declares that no bullet can kill him and keeps getting up "magically" after he's shot (until one goes directly through his forehead). There are also an uncomfortable number of nameless sombrero-wearing Mexican peasants watching the gunfights. I realize that racial politics would muddle a straightforward revenge story, but it's impossible to talk about a Western land baron without getting in to the lives of the people he's stolen the land from, and when they aren't even mentioned and none of them are actual characters, it comes off as nothing so much as caricaturization.

At the end of the day, I give The Quick and the Dead three stars. The heroine content in it is flawless. Sharon Stone is an unmitigated bad ass, and she's not even a mommy. Were I ranking it solely on this scale, it would surely get four. However, I have to delete one star for the sub-standard racial portrayals, particularly the nearly-invisible Mexicans and the stereotyped Native American.