Today at the Venice Film Festival, Brad Pitt has spoken about its latest movie “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford”, in which he plays the famous American outlaw Jesse James.

Based on the novel by Ron Hansen, “The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” delves into the private lives of America’s most notorious outlaw and his unlikely assassin to offer a new perspective on a legend and address the question of what really may have transpired in the months before that infamous shooting. 

Directed by Andrew Dominik, the film has been described as a "psychological Western." and Pitt said it was his most difficult film. Brad Pitt is also one the movie producers.

The movie explores who was Jesse James, really—behind the folklore and the selling of newspapers.  And who was Robert Ford played by Casey Affleck (Ben Affleck's younger brother), just nineteen and a member of Jesse’s inner circle, who was able to bring down such a formidable figure when lawmen across ten states had tried and failed?  How did they come to be friends and what happened between them in the days and hours leading up to the gunshot that would end one man’s life and become the definition and sum total of another’s?    

It really is not a Western, but a drama about a man, Pitt explained.

"This is a very complex and complicated film that isn't part of the current zeitgeist of film-making - it's more a throwback to some of the great films of the Seventies," Brat Pitt said.

"I think it's a delicious film, it sits and breathes like good wine, and it's ultimately my favourite kind of film-making," he added

Pitt says he loves to play complex and negative characters that are not simply drawn as black or white, which he says is often the case today in cinema. The film is competing for the Golden Lion prize.

"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" opens in North America on September 21. The cast includes Mary-Louise Parker, Sam Shepard, Sam Rockwell and Zooey Deschanel.