Grim Prairie Tales
1990 film

Grim Prairie Tales is a 1990 American independent horror Western film, written and directed by Wayne Coe, and starring an ensemble cast including James Earl Jones, Brad Dourif, Will Hare, Marc McClure, William Atherton, and Lisa Eichhorn.
An anthology film composed of four separate stories, it is told by two travellers around a prairie campfire. Morrison (Jones) is a grizzled bounty hunter carrying a body, while Farley Deeds (Dourif) is a clerk on the way to a romantic reunion with his wife.
Synopsis
The first story, told by Morrison, is about an Indian tribe's revenge against a grouchy old man (Will Hare) who desecrates their burial ground. When that tale fails to impress Deeds, the second story, also by Morrison, tells about a man (Marc McClure) who helps a seductive seemingly pregnant demon woman (Michelle Joyner) in trouble. Deeds, disgusted by the second story, responds with the only non-supernatural story of the three, about a homesteader family whose father (William Atherton) is forced to participate in a lynch mob. Finally, after feeling challenged by Deeds' story, Morrison tells about a gunslinger (Scott Paulin) haunted by a gunman (Bruce Fischer) he has killed in a shootout.
The next morning, Deeds points out to Morrison that the body he's carrying doesn't match the description on the wanted poster; Morrison cuts the body loose and rides out.
Cast
James Earl Jones as Morrison
Brad Dourif as Farley Deeds
Will Hare as Lee
Michelle Joyner as Jenny
Marc McClure as Tom
William Atherton as Arthur
Lisa Eichhorn as Maureen
Wendy J. Cooke as Eva
Scott Paulin as Martin
Tom Simcox as Horn
Bruce M. Fischer as Colochez
Production
The film was the sole directorial outing from Coe, a storyboard artist and set decorator. At one point, Coe was considering making a sequel entitled Grim Prairie Tales: Rescue Party.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Grim Prairie Tales” as 1990 film. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the arts & letters register because the source frames it as 1990 film. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Attribution, date and provenance are strongest when supported by the original work, a catalogue record and documented transmission. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5609195. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1990.
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This entry incorporates text from “Grim Prairie Tales” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.