Review #1,335: 'Hostiles' (2017)

The tone is set very early on in Crazy Heart and Black Mass director Scott Cooper's latest slice of Americana, as a white family is set upon by a gang of blood-thirsty Comanches on horseback. The natives slaughter them all, including a young baby, all except for mother Rosalee (Rosamund Pike), who flees terrified into the wilderness soaked in blood and still clutching her dead child. It's a starling opening which is difficult to watch, and seems to set up an old-fashioned tale of good vs. bad with a modern twist. Only it isn't. As you can probably gather from the title, Hostiles is about the cycle of violence, fear and hatred on both sides of the coin, with the whites looking to settle in their newly colonised and unexplored land, while the natives seek to hold on to what they have by any means necessary. There's brutality on both sides, only the natives were there first.

Christian Bale plays Captain Joseph J. Blocker, a veteran officer known for the indifference with which he carries out his tasks, which mainly include rounding up nearby Apaches using a variety of questionable methods. In any other movie, Blocker may serve as the bad guy, but there's a discipline in his actions and a weariness in how he acts on his instincts. He and his close friend Master Sergeant Metz (an excellent Rory Cochrane) have taken about as much as they can take, and bear the scars of a life spent soaked in blood. Blocker is called to the office of Colonel Biggs (Stephen Lang) to receive his latest mission: to transport the dying war chief Yellow Hawk (Wes Studi) back to their home lands in Montana, as part of a political move under the instructions of the President. Under the threat of a court-martial, he agrees, and sets out on a long and perilous quest to help a man he still views as the enemy.

There is a lot to admire about Hostiles, especially the gorgeous cinematography by Masanobu Takayanagi, whose camera captures this vast and beautiful land as a sort of endless, mystical purgatory. The performances are stellar, with Bale and Pike leading a talented ensemble that also includes Jesse Plemons, Bill Camp, Q'orianka Kilcher, Adam Beach, Timothee Chalamet, Peter Mullan and Ben Foster. Yet there's a familiarity to the film's themes. The revisionist western movement has constantly depicted these times as cruel, representing the country's lowest moments, and it's no different here. The idea is that everyone can be hostile and capable of unspeakable acts when faced with mortal danger, something explored more profoundly in Cormac McCarthy's novel Blood Meridian. The poster may lead you to believe that the film is built around Blocker and Yellow Hawk's relationship, but Studi isn't given very much screen time, with the action focused more on the blossoming relationship between the grizzled Captain and the tragedy-stricken woman he stumbles upon and feels sworn to protect. Hostiles is interesting and occasionally riveting, but deeply flawed and lacking focus.


Directed by: Scott Cooper
Starring: Christian Bale, Rosamund Pike, Wes Studi, Rory Cochrane, Jesse Plemons, Adam Beach, Q'orianka Kilcher, Ben Foster, Stephen Lang
Country: USA

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie

Review #978: 'Black Mass' (2015)

Over his impressively long career, Johnny Depp has adorned make-up and a variety of wigs, contact lenses and outlandish costumes to deliver a plethora of memorable (and not-so-memorable) characters, performed with a trademark flamboyance now simpatico with the actor. The success of these films, which are often seen through the gothic lens of Tim Burton, makes it easy to forget that there is a good-looking actor capable of a fantastic 'normal' performance in there somewhere. Black Mass shows a bit of both sides. He has once again donned a rather distracting appearance - a set of pale blue eyes, a receding hairline and bulbous nose - to portray James "Whitey" Bulger, but there is also a terrific and unseen intensity to Depp here, convincingly scaring the shit out of anyone he comes across.

Clearly channelling Scorsese visually, director Scott Cooper of Crazy Heart (2009) and Out of the Furnace (2013) fame skips his main character's rise to criminal overlord in favour of showing us just how much of a bastard Bulger was (and probably still is). His otherworldly appearance, with blotchy skin and a mouth full of wonky brown teeth, is not how the real man looked but instead serves to highlight his monstrous nature. Bulger's activities are recollected by his former gang members Stephen Flemmi (Rory Cochrane), Kevin Weeks (Jesse Plemons) and John Martorano (W. Earl Brown), who all have their own bone to pick with him by the end of their story. His willingness to murder and threaten whether it be for business, pleasure, or to simply stay out of jail led to Bulger becoming one of the most notorious criminals in Boston history.

In the beginning, Bulger is approached by FBI agent John Connolly (Joel Edgerton), a local boy, who offers him a free ticket to the top of the criminal underworld. It's not snitching, but a deal that benefits both sides as Connolly is served rival gang members on a plate, and Bulger gets to carry on with his illegal activities without the prying eyes of federal agents. Only Connolly seems to be enjoying peeking into the criminal high life a bit too much while Bulger gives him diddly squat. Bulger plays him like a fiddle, managing to silence a dinner table with murderous threats thinly disguised as jest in one stand-out scene. And Black Mass is at its best when the film moves into darker territory, cruelly teasing the inevitable brutality to come whenever a disposable minor character shuffles onto the scene.

Narratively, it's all over the place and tends to neglect detail in favour of more conventional biopic storytelling. In the few scenes he has, Benedict Cumberbatch oozes a subtle sliminess as Whitey's Massachusetts State Senate President brother Billy. The vastly different paths these two brothers took could have made for engaging drama and given the film more balance, but strangely Cooper chooses to almost ignore the relationship completely to concentrate on Bulger's dealing with the FBI, so Cumberbatch is criminally under-served. However, as silly as he looks, Depp is genuinely unsettling and, like the film as a whole, gets under your skin. Black Mass sounds like it should be a horror, and as the creepy real-life security footage plays out over the credits, its hard to deny that in many way it is.


Directed by: Scott Cooper
Starring: Johnny Depp, Joel Edgerton, Benedict Cumberbatch, Dakota Johnson, Rory Cochrane, Jesse Plemons, Kevin Bacon, Peter Sarsgaard, Julianne Nicholson
Country: USA/UK

Rating: ***

Tom Gillespie

Review #31: 'Crazy Heart' (2009)

It was a rare heartwarming moment for me during the 2010 Oscars when Jeff Bridges won the Best Actor award and received a standing ovation from his colleagues and peers a like. He is an actor that was seemingly never going to receive the kind of recognition and status to which he so fully deserved. His films have ranged from computer game-film hybrid nerd-fest Tron (1982), to Peter Bogdanovich's masterpiece (and one of my all-time favourite films) The Last Picture Show (1971). After winning the award for this film, he seems to have been bumped up to the A-list, receiving another nomination this year for the exceptional True Grit (2010). The film is pretty damn good too, surprisingly.

I say surprisingly as the story of an over-the-hill country singer seeking redemption seems like Oscar bait to me, but I found it a rather uplifting experience, and a piece of quality drama. Bridges plays the legendary Bad Blake, who, when we meet him, is emptying a bottle of his own piss onto the car park floor upon his arrival at a bowling alley where he is due to play his next gig. He has returned to his home, and the locals are excited to see him sing some of his classic tunes and live up to his bad boy name. Yet he is unhappy. He spends his time on his own in his fleapit motel room, drinking his favourite whisky and chain-smoking cigarettes, and arguing with his hard-working manager who is keen to buddy him up with his protege Tommy Sweet (Colin Farrell). There is unspoken resentment from Blake for Sweet, who seems to be highly successful while Blake wallows in misery, his time long since past. However, Blake seems to be awoken from his self-destructiveness when he is interviewed by the daughter of a liquor store owner, Jean (Maggie Gyllenhaal), who is as taken by him as he is by her. Living up to his name, Bad is always one step from screwing it up, as his drinking becomes a bigger problem than he imagined.

The main strength of the film is the genuine unlikeability of Blake. He is rude, offensive and in his first performance in front of his home crowd, spends the majority of the time throwing up in a bin outside while his backing band plays an instrumental on a loop awaiting his return. He also drinks to excess, throwing away his ability and refusing to write new material due to his jealousy of a younger and more successful emergent in Sweet. As he opens up to Jean, we also discover he has a son he hasn't seen in well over a decade, and has possibly fathered more that he doesn't know about. During an uncomfortable and achingly sad scene, he phones up the mother of his son and is informed of her death, and finds out his son wants nothing to do with him. Describing the film, it actually sounds like something you would have seen in other films countless times, but here the script is written with such heart, and the performance are so great, that it doesn't matter.

Another highlight is the performance of Maggie Gyllenhall. I've long since been a fan since her turn in the excellent Secretary (2002), and here she is better. Unfortunately she has been unfairly drowned out by the masterclass of Bridges. She is both brittle and strong, looking after her son as a single mother, and being unable to resist the charms of Blake while always being aware of the danger of falling for someone like him. In a scene where she admits their relationship is an accident waiting to happen, Gyllenhaal's face is torn up by resentment and defeated sadness.

For a film with so much music, this could have fallen flat on it's face. But within the trusted care of music legend T-Bone Burnett, who has worked with the Coen brothers on a number of occasions, and Ryan Bingham, the music and the on-stage performances of Bridges are electric. The pair won the Oscar for Original Song, for the wonderful 'The Weary Kind', which Blake writes at the start of his road to redemption. A great love-song to the world of country music and the legends that have eclipsed the genre, as well as being a good story very well told.


Directed by: Scott Cooper
Starring: Jeff Bridges, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Colin Farrell, Robert Duvall
Country: USA

Rating: ****

Tom Gillespie