Heaven's Gate

Heaven's Gate (1980) is Michael Cimino's sprawling Western epic — watch it online on iFILM. Set in Wyoming at the end of the frontier era, the story follows Sheriff James Averill as he tries to shield a community of immigrant settlers from a coordinated campaign of violence funded by the territory's cattle barons.

Kris Kristofferson plays Averill, a Harvard man who chose the West and found something worth fighting for too late. Christopher Walken is Nathan Champion, a hired enforcer caught between his employer and his conscience. Isabelle Huppert is Ella Watson, the woman at the center of their conflict. John Hurt, Jeff Bridges, and Sam Waterston round out an ensemble each chasing something the frontier has already stopped delivering.

On release, the film nearly bankrupted United Artists and was savaged by critics. Its full director's cut, restored and re-evaluated decades later, now sits alongside the major American Westerns — not as a cautionary tale about excess, but as an unflinching look at who the frontier was actually built on. Stream Heaven's Gate (1980) online on iFILM.