It stars Suzy Amis as Monaghan, with Bo Hopkins, Ian McKellen, David Chung, René Auberjonois, and Carrie Snodgress in supporting roles.

For their performances, Amis and Chung earned Independent Spirit Award nominations for Best Female Lead and Best Supporting Male, respectively.

But Percy nurses a deep suspicion of women, which he later demonstrates by slashing the face of a prostitute who refuses to give him oral sex.

Largely ostracized by the town's people since the incident with the prostitute, Percy promises Jo he will not share her secret if she finances his journey out of the territory.

For five years she works as a shepherd, braving the deadly winters alone to the worry of her employer, Frank Badger (Hopkins), who has taken a liking to the "young man" he nicknames "Little Jo."

This is a masculine quality that goes beyond her ability to "pass," so Jo dons a dress once again in a feeble effort to step back into a more traditionally feminine role.

Tinman recovers, and on election day, Badger and Jo ride to Ruby City but are met by several of Grey's masked gunmen.

Six months before filming, Suzy Amis began training with a body builder and movement and vocal coaches, while taking sheepherding, shooting, and horse riding lessons.

A production office was set up in Red Lodge, Montana, on the edge of the Custer National Forest, and the art department was housed in an airplane hangar.

The website's consensus reads: "It sometimes moseys when it should have galloped, but The Ballad of Little Jo entertainingly upends genre formula while simultaneously highlighting its strengths.

"[6] Emanuel Levy of Variety stated, "Greenwald is so committed to a feminist agenda that her treatment leaves out a good deal of the humor and suspense inherent in the story.

"[7] Stephen Holden of The New York Times wrote, "It's not hard to view The Ballad of Little Jo as an allegorical critique of sex and power and men's-club values in America.

"[8] Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times described the film as "a severely de-romanticized view of the Old West and the women who labored—in more ways than one—on its frontiers."

"[9] Roger Ebert gave the film 3 out of 4 stars and stated, "The writer and director, Maggie Greenwald, wisely avoids an old-fashioned plot, and concerns herself more with the daily texture of life in the West."

Ebert also noted that "it is rather rough and crude, but it's in the spirit of the film, in which men of poor breeding lived and worked together in desperate poverty of mind and body.

[11] A stage musical adaptation by Mike Reid and Sarah Schlesinger premiered at Chicago's Steppenwolf Theatre Company on September 24, 2000.

The show was directed by Tina Landau, with Judy Kuhn starring as the title character, alongside Rondi Reed, Jose Llana, David New, and Jessica Boevers.