After he earned his initial fame based on Westerns, Clint Eastwood largely avoided the genre once we got to the 1980s. For his only non-comedic take on that domain from the decade, we go to 1985’s Pale Rider.

As the “California Gold Rush” continues during the 1850s, land baron Coy LaHood (Richard Dysart) tries to muscle out small-time prospectors. He uses local law enforcement represented by Marshal Stockburn (John Russell) to intimidate and harm these people.

Into this setting comes Preacher (Eastwood), a mysterious figure with a murky past. An excellent shot, he becomes the strongest line of resistance against LaHood’s wicked ways.

As mentioned at the start, Rider offered Eastwood’s only “serious” Western in the 1980s. He’d next revisit the genre with 1992’s Oscar-winning. Unforgiven.

Preacher feels like part of Eastwood’s character evolution. He offers elements clearly reminiscent of his legendary “Man With No Name” but he also comes across as wearier, a vibe that points toward Unforgiven’s jaded and remorseful William Munny.

Don’t expect Preacher to offer a role as deep as Munny, though – or as iconic as Man With No Name. Like the rest of Rider, Preacher comes across as a somewhat simplistic take on this sort of anti-hero.

That doesn’t mean I think Rider devolves into the worst kind of 1980s cheese, of course. However, it does seem to reflect the era’s often black-and-white view on topics, a factor that means it lacks the nuance of Eastwood’s better Westerns.

Not that I find anything especially wrong with Westerns that depict battles between clear good and evil. However, I expect more from Eastwood, so the simplicity of Rider becomes a disappointment.

We get this attitude literally from the start, as Rider paints Stockburn’s thugs as such pure evil that they murder a cute little dog for no reason other than cruelty! This leads to the pup’s owner – sweet and innocent teenaged Megan Wheeler (Sydney Penny) – to pray for a miracle.

As Megan intones her hopes, Eastwood intercuts with shots of Preacher as he rides toward town. While not quite as heavy-handed as that sounds, the sequence nonetheless conveys that we’ll get a story that lacks subtlety.

Which continues the rest of the way. Again, this comes across as a reflection of the 1980s vibe, as that period’s movies leaned away from the cynicism of the 1970s and tended toward fare easier for audiences to digest.

This ensures that Rider leans schmaltzy too much of the time, especially when it gets into Preacher’s interactions with 14-year-old Megan. Do we really need the overly long scene in the girl tries to seduce the much much much older man?

No. The character information involved seems wholly superfluous – and pretty creepy as well.

I won’t say Eastwood seems bored as Preacher, but he also doesn’t invest the part with much real personality. While we assume he comes with prior sins, the movie keeps him in “white knight” mode to a degree that makes his past semi-irrelevant.

This means Preacher fails to become particularly intriguing or engaging. Eastwood gives him a sense of cartoon hero without much more to his depiction.

No one else in the cast manages to step up either. Though all provide perfectly competent turns, none of them deliver work that seems especially compelling.

That goes for Pale Rider as a whole. While it delivers a moderately engaging Western, it seems too simplistic and cliché to become better than just okay.

Pale Rider appears in an aspect ratio of 2.40:1 on this 4K UHD Disc. Expect a strong presentation.

Sharpness usually looked crisp and well defined throughout the film. A little fuzziness crept into some wide shots, but most of them seemed clear and distinctive.

Jagged edges and moiré effects presented no problems, and I detected no edge haloes. Grain felt natural and the image lacked print flaws.

Rider offered a natural palette that leaned a bit brown to suit its Western setting, and these hues seemed solid. The colors felt vivid and dynamic, and HDR gave them extra punch.

Black levels appeared deep and detailed, and shadow detail came across well, as low-light scenes seemed appropriately dark. HDR added power to whites and contrast. Outside of some softness – which I suspect reflected the source – this turned into a fine presentation.

Downconverted to Dolby TrueHD 7.1, the movie’s Dolby Atmos track provided a soundfield that seemed well-defined and encompassing. Throughout much of the film, the audio provided a broad and engaging presence that created a good sense of interactivity.

Adapted from the original stereo mix, the soundscape opened up in a positive manner. While the material largely focused on the front channels, the elements broadened to the surrounds in a fine fashion.

This meant we got pretty good movement and localization in the front as well as appealing involvement in the back channels. These components meshed together to create a smooth package that didn’t overwhelm with gimmicky tendencies.

Audio quality worked fine, with speech that came across as natural and distinct. Music showed nice range and dimensionality.

Despite a smidgen of distortion, effects usually came across as accurate and full. The soundtrack barely showed its age and worked very well.

As noted, Pale Rider ran with a stereo mix theatrically in 1985, and the 4K UHD’s DTS-HD MA 2.0 track replicated that. Across the front, we got pretty good – though not exceptional – imaging.

At times the soundfield could feel a bit monaural, but it opened up pretty well at times. This meant music spread to the sides in a reasonable fashion and effects also displayed largely positive localization.

Sound quality seemed similar to what I heard on the Atmos track, albeit with less low-end. Not that the stereo version lacked bass, but it reined in that side a bit more.

Otherwise I found music and speech to remain pretty close between the two. Whether you go with the original stereo or the newfangled Atmos audio, you’ll find yourself satisfied.

When we shift to extras, we get a mix of old and new materials. Narrated by Morgan Freeman and created during the shoot of 2009’s Invictus, The Eastwood Factor runs one hour, 28 minutes, 27 seconds and offers information solely from Clint Eastwood.

Eastwood chats a bit about his family and childhood, and he also gets into his early career and what led him to his longtime affiliation with Warner Bros. That period dominates “Factor” and becomes the focus of Eastwood’s remarks, as he discusses his directing/acting in many of the scores of flicks he’s made for the studio.

When Eastwood speaks, he tends to provide fairly good information. The director/actor looks back on his career in a frank manner and delivers a mix of reasonably worthwhile thoughts about his work.

Key phrase: “when Eastwood speaks”, as much of Factor revolves around film clips. Rather than concentrate on interviews and other informative bits, most of the program focuses on snippets from Eastwood's movies.

These are fine, but we simply find too many of them. The documentary lacks balance, and the heavy presence of the movie snippets means that Factor occasionally threatens to turn into nothing more than a promo reel.

To some degree, how much one enjoys Factor will depend on how many of the films one has seen. If you’re an Eastwood junkie with no Clints unturned, then you’ll probably find yourself somewhat bored here. You’ll already know the movies, and the various insights aren’t substantial enough to keep you interested.

Another documentary called Eastwood Directs goes for one hour, one minute, 41 seconds. It offers remarks from Clint Eastwood, former WB President of Production John Calley, filmmakers Steven Spielberg, Martin Scorsese, John Lee Hancock, Kevin Costner, Paul Haggis, and Peter Hyams, producers Brian Grazer, Bill Gerber and David Valdes, editor Joel Cox, stunt coordinator Buddy Van Horn, screenwriter David Webb Peoples, and actors Kevin Bacon, Meryl Streep, Hal Holbrook, Marcia Gay Harden, Gene Hackman, Hilary Swank, Tim Robbins, Tommy Lee Jones, Morgan Freeman, and Reni Santoni.

As the title implies, the program looks at Eastwood as a director. Inevitably, we get more than a little fluff, but the show includes many insights that outweigh the happy talk.

Lessons from the Set spans seven minutes, 26 seconds. Here we find notes from actor Sydney Penny.

We get Penny's memories of the shoot. Nothing revelatory emerges but she offers some engaging thoughts.

Next comes Painting the Preacher. It lasts eight minutes, 36 seconds and brings comments from Cox, Penny, film and media professor John Trafton, journalist Jim Hemphill, assistant professor of film studies and screenwriting Dr. Leah Aldridge, media theory and criticism profesor Dr. Debarti Byabartta, cinematography professor William McDonald, senior lecturer in film studies Sue Richardson,

"Painting" covers the movie's cinematography and some reflections on the film. It offers a decent examination.

Also found on the 4K UHD for Outlaw Josey Wales, Reinventing Westerns occupies 17 minutes, 36 seconds. The featurette involvesEastwood, Hancock, Scorsese, Costner, Cox, Valdes, Freeman, filmmakers Mel Gibson, Frank Darabont, and James Mangold, screenwriter George Gallo, film historian Sir Christopher Frayling, producers Albert S. Rudd and Peter Morgan, and actor Richard Harris.

"Legacy" looks at Eastwood's career in Westerns. Expect a mix of decent overview and praise for Eastwood.

Clint Eastwood’s first dramatic Western in a few years, Pale Rider showed the actor and director on autopilot. While a perfectly serviceable project, the movie seems too derivative and simple to become anything especially compelling. The 4K UHD delivers very good picture and audio as well as a mix of bonus features. Though not a bad film, Pale Rider simply fails to connect in a meaningful manner.