The Hateful Eight (2015)
Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Damian Bilchir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern. Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.
(I’m writing this so as not to spoil anything about what I think is a film worth avoiding spoilers for, even though I don’t recommend the film)
Eight men (and one woman) are trapped in a haberdashery in a violent blizzard. Some of them are bounty hunters. Some of them claim to be lawmen. Some fought for the Confederacy; some fought for the union. One of them is black. This is the perfect setting for Quentin Tarantino’s love of storytelling, dialogue, and suspense, and The Hateful Eight is some of the director’s best film-making. You know that Christopher Walken scene in Pulp Fiction, where Walken’s character gives the young Butch character his father’s watch? There are a few scenes like that, extended monlogues that take the viewer out of the cabin and into whatever tale is being told, and although some of it gets long (and even boring), most of it is quite well done.
Ennio Morricone, my favorite movie soundtrack composer ever (he did all those Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns, and the unforgettable soundtrack for The Mission), composed the film’s score, and it’s beautiful and magnificent, and probably destined to lose out to John Williams for Star Wars in the Oscar race this year. That score is fantastic, but this one’s just as good.
This being a Tarantino flick, there are also generous doses of violence and blood, and here is where the film is kind of ruined for me. I have a feeling I’m going to have to see it again in order to see it better, but I was made very uncomfortable by some of the violence done to one of the characters. The character has done some terrible things (it seems they all have), probably much worse than what he or she receives during parts of this movie. At first, it looks like some kind of torture porn, one use of the medium I think is inherently evil, but Tarantino’s a better (and more enlightened) writer than that. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, I believe he’s trying to make a statement about people’s attitudes toward violence, possibly about violence in his movies in particular. If just one aspect of the character were different, I think, my discomfort with the violence would nearly be eliminated. Is this one of Tarantino’s points? If it is, it’s effective, and I think I’m convinced, but that doesn’t change the fact that I was horrified by what I saw, so uncomfortable that my horror outweighed all the other good stuff put together.
Roger Ebert wrote that if you’re trying to make a parody of porn, even just to make a statement, you’re still pretty much making porn. Tarantino made me endure something I was very uncomfortable with, then held up a mirror, and gave me something to think about. But I still resent having to endure, and unless I can get over that with a second viewing, I can’t like this movie.
7/10 (IMDb rating)
72/100 (Criticker rating)
The Hateful Eight
Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Damian Bilchir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern. Written and directed by Quentin Tarantino.
(I’m writing this so as not to spoil anything about what I think is a film worth avoiding spoilers for, even though I don’t recommend the film)
Eight men (and one woman) are trapped in a haberdashery in a violent blizzard. Some of them are bounty hunters. Some of them claim to be lawmen. Some fought for the Confederacy; some fought for the union. One of them is black. This is the perfect setting for Quentin Tarantino’s love of storytelling, dialogue, and suspense, and The Hateful Eight is some of the director’s best film-making. You know that Christopher Walken scene in Pulp Fiction, where Walken’s character gives the young Butch character his father’s watch? There are a few scenes like that, extended monlogues that take the viewer out of the cabin and into whatever tale is being told, and although some of it gets long (and even boring), most of it is quite well done.
Ennio Morricone, my favorite movie soundtrack composer ever (he did all those Clint Eastwood spaghetti westerns, and the unforgettable soundtrack for The Mission), composed the film’s score, and it’s beautiful and magnificent, and probably destined to lose out to John Williams for Star Wars in the Oscar race this year. That score is fantastic, but this one’s just as good.
This being a Tarantino flick, there are also generous doses of violence and blood, and here is where the film is kind of ruined for me. I have a feeling I’m going to have to see it again in order to see it better, but I was made very uncomfortable by some of the violence done to one of the characters. The character has done some terrible things (it seems they all have), probably much worse than what he or she receives during parts of this movie. At first, it looks like some kind of torture porn, one use of the medium I think is inherently evil, but Tarantino’s a better (and more enlightened) writer than that. Giving him the benefit of the doubt, I believe he’s trying to make a statement about people’s attitudes toward violence, possibly about violence in his movies in particular. If just one aspect of the character were different, I think, my discomfort with the violence would nearly be eliminated. Is this one of Tarantino’s points? If it is, it’s effective, and I think I’m convinced, but that doesn’t change the fact that I was horrified by what I saw, so uncomfortable that my horror outweighed all the other good stuff put together.
Roger Ebert wrote that if you’re trying to make a parody of porn, even just to make a statement, you’re still pretty much making porn. Tarantino made me endure something I was very uncomfortable with, then held up a mirror, and gave me something to think about. But I still resent having to endure, and unless I can get over that with a second viewing, I can’t like this movie.
7/10 (IMDb rating)
72/100 (Criticker rating)
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