Normally I’m not all that big on Westerns, but this one belongs up there with biggies like High Noon, Unforgiven and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.

Yuma’s storyline is simple: beleaguered rancher (Christian Bale) tries to take captured stage coach robber/all-around bad guy (Russell Crow) down the road a ways to put him on the 3:10 prison train to Yuma so he can be jailed and hanged, thereby earning himself the money he needs to save his ranch.

Sounds simple, right?

It’s not.

This story is filled with plot twist after plot twist, a ticking clock, which is always great for suspense and, best of all, fascinating, complex characters. Bale’s rancher, tired of being a loser, tries to find a backbone. His hotheaded teenaged son, played by talented newcomer Logan Lerman, has his own agenda.

As for Crowe’s villain, well … let’s just say I see another Oscar nomination in Crowe’s future. Not since Anthony Hopkins played Hannibal Lecter, or Denzel Washington played corrupt detective Alonzo Harris in Training Day, have I seen an actor infuse a bad guy with such gleeful malice.

This was, in short, a great, satisfying movie. If you see only one Western this year, or in the next five years, it should be this one.