With 'Red Dead Redemption 2' just five days away from release, just about every trailer we've seen so far points towards a richly designed, deeply immersive experience.

Like 'Red Dead Redemption' and the first game, 'Red Dead Revolver', Western movies are a huge influence on the game and the iconography and the visual palette appears to have been replicated perfectly. Although no plot details have been announced, beyond what we've seen in the trailer and gameplay videos so far, the plot of 'Red Dead Redemption' took inspiration from a number of movies.

Here's a few movies that most likely inspired 'Red Dead Redemption 2' and worth checking out before the game arrives on October 26th.

 

'Unforgiven'

'Red Dead Redemption' was very much about the death of the West and while the sequel is set a few years beforehand, that theme still persists. It's something that Clint Eastwood explored in 1992's 'Unforgiven', with Eastwood directing and starring as an aged gunslinger who's retired from the life. After he learns of a huge bounty that could save his failing farm and set his family up in comfort, he decides to saddle up for one last ride - but comes face-to-face with the realities of the violent life he left behind.

 

'The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford'

This one feels like it's borrowed more the visuals than the actual storyline. The train robbery, which has been repeatedly shown in trailers, appears to have taken inspiration from this exceptional sequence from 'The Assassination Of Jesse James By The Coward Robert Ford', directed beautifully by Andrew Dominik. Here's the scene in question.

 

'Once Upon A Time In The West'

As much as any film has influenced how Westerns are shot, Sergio Leone's 'Once Upon A Time In The West' and 'The Good, The Bad and The Ugly' have buried themselves in the public consciousness. Whether it's the music from Ennio Morricone, the parched landscapes, the morality or lack thereof, or just the wide landscapes that took it all, 'Once Upon A Time In The West' was clearly a touchstone. Hell, the dead-eye system in 'Red Dead Redemption 2' is basically boiled down to this scene.

 

'There Will Be Blood'

If you want to know just how much 'There Will Be Blood' inspired 'Red Dead Redemption', there's actually a large enough chunk of the map named after Daniel Day-Lewis' character, Plainview. Leaving that aside, Paul Thomas Anderson's eye for wide landscapes is something that's played a big part in the game.

 

'The Proposition'

John Hillcoat's twisted odyssey across the Australian landscape came at a time when Westerns were pretty much finished. Like this year's 'Black 47', what 'The Proposition' did was transpose the same texture and shape into a new landscape, but still adhere to the same tropes. 'The Proposition', however, took this to another level and set the story from the view of a bandit who's hired to track his own brother. 'The Proposition' plays with the idea of the encroachment of civilisation, and how it's actually not that civilised at all - something 'Red Dead Redemption' really took on.