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| Directed and Written by Quentin Tarantino |
Alo Party Peoples.
Despite his "I'm a guy that makes crazy movies out of other crazy movies" public persona, Tarantino doesn't just make what he thinks will look good onscreen. He puts a lot of thought into the images he creates; combining art cinema's taste for meticulous shot composition and labyrinthine dialogue with pop cinema's taste for mad-cap energy and cathartic indulgence, creating a unique blend of the two that has earned him the status as one of the great contemporary film makers.
The Hateful Eight leans more towards the art cinema side, eschewing the violent power fantasies of Django Unchained and Inglorious Basterds or the epic sprawl of Kill Bill for something almost Hitchcockian in it's simplicity. To wit, in the first decade after the Civil War, Samuel L. Jackson is Major Marquis Warren, a former Union cavalry officer that now works as a bounty hunter. While bringing a few bodies in to collect a warrant in a frontier town in Wyoming, he comes across John "The Hangman" Ruth and his prize Daisy Domergue heading the same way. He joins them, along with former Confederate sympathizer Chris Mannex, and they stop at a little frontier outpost called Minnie's Haberdashery when a blizzard hits, trapping all of them inside, along with a cowboy, a hangman, a former Confederate general, and a Mexican left in charge of the inn while the owner is out.
It's a bunch of disreputable people, all lying on one level or another about their backgrounds, many of whom have had a price on their head from someone, most of whom are armed, all stuck with each-other in a run down shack for several days while a blizzard rages on outside. It's as consistently engaging as anything else Tarantino has put out, but in a very different way. The Hateful Eight is not an action movie, it's not even really a Western; above all else, it's a suspense thriller. It's Tarantino stripped down to the basics. It's still just as quotable, but Tarantino takes his sweet time introducing all of the characters, giving us more time to get acquainted with them. His cinematography is just as beautiful as ever, which is more impressive since most of the film is confined to a single space. It's little more than a bunch of character actors in period dress slowly coming down with cabin fever, but with the director of Pulp Fiction at the helm, you may as well be on a tilt-a-whirl the whole time.
Not that the cast is bad, it's terrific, everyone involved is instantly memorable in their part, even when that part isn't really developed all that well. Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russel, and Jennifer Jason Leigh get the most screen time, as they're introduced before anyone else, and they're all amazing. You will be shocked by how much you enjoy such talented actors acting like complete sociopaths, and clearly enjoying themselves while doing so.
That's the thing that sets The Hateful Eight apart from Tarantino's other works, this time there are no heroes. There is no avenging gunslinging fallen angel like in Django, no clear villains like in Inglorious Basterds, everyone here is either a violent murder or a war criminal or both, we are left to try and find the least evil person present. It is a mean, nihilistic piece of work that encapsulates a hopelessly cynical worldview while expressing it in a way that still gets you to smirk along with it, only to brutally punish you for doing so with periodic bursts of horrific violence.
Yet the most striking image in The Hateful Eight is not Tarantino's signature bloodshed. It's the film opening on a long shot of a crucifix buried in snow as two of our main characters ride into the frame. That one image sums up the entire film without a single word; that everyone you are about to meet is beyond redemption, and their sins shall not be paid for but in blood.
Have a nice day, and I'll see you at the movies in 2016.
Greg.B
FINAL RATING: 4/5
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