Tall Tale

Tall Tale (also known as Tall Tale: The Unbelievable Adventures of Pecos Bill) is a 1995 American Western adventure fantasy film directed by Jeremiah Chechik, written by Steven L. Bloom and Robert Rodat, produced by Walt Disney Pictures and Caravan Pictures and starring Scott Glenn, Oliver Platt, Nick Stahl, Stephen Lang, Roger Aaron Brown, Catherine O'Hara, and Patrick Swayze. It tells the story of a young farm boy who receives aid from tall tale figures in saving his town from a greedy developer. Though shooting of the film was completed in 1993, it did not get a theatrical release until March 1995. The film received mixed reviews from critics and was a box-office bomb, grossing only $8.2 million on an estimated $32 million budget. Plot In 1905, Daniel Hackett, a young farm boy from the western town of Paradise Valley, is unhappy with his life and dreams of life in New York City. His father Jonas likes to tell Daniel tall tales about Pecos Bill, Paul Bunyan and John Henry, which Daniel has heard many times, leading him to doubt their existence. Meanwhile, Paradise Valley is being coveted by a greedy developer, J.P. Stiles. Stiles attempts to convince Jonas and the other farmers to sell their land to him with Jonas' farm lying in the center of where he wants to develop. However, when Jonas refuses to hand up his deed, Stiles hunts him down and shoots him, but not before Jonas hands the deed off to Daniel for safe keeping.