Bite the Bullet

Bite the Bullet (1975) is a Richard Brooks western you can watch online on iFILM. It's the early twentieth century, and a newspaper stages a brutal endurance race across open country: seven hundred miles, several days, one cash prize for whoever survives it first.

Nine very different riders line up. Ex-Rough Rider Sam Clayton and his old friend Luke Matthews, the lone woman in the field Miss Jones, a green cowboy, an Englishman, a Mexican, and an aging man for whom the distance could be fatal. Some will sabotage a rival to steal a few minutes; others stop to help even the competition. As the week-long ride grinds down horses and men alike, the contest slowly turns into a measure of what decency is left in each of them. Gene Hackman, Candice Bergen and James Coburn anchor the ensemble.

Brooks shot it the old way — real horses, real dust, wide desert vistas instead of soundstage backdrops. Among seventies westerns it's a rare one built around stamina and dignity rather than gunfights. Stream Bite the Bullet (1975) online on iFILM.