REVIEW: Hostiles

Directed by Scott Cooper
2107 Western
2 hours, 14 minutes
From Entertainment Studios Motion Pictures

Starring
Christian Bale
Rosamund Pike
Wes Studi
Jesse Plemons
Rory Cochrane
Adam Beach
Q'orianka Kilcher
Timothée Chalamet
Ben Foster

Westerns are rarely made anymore and we cowboys don't much care for that.  So it was with much anticipation that kept my eye on the release date for the film in my neck of the woods.  (The last quarter of the year is the only time I miss living in Los Angeles.)  I also concluded while I was anticipating that this would be a very fine, if not great, western... otherwise, who'd pop for the cash to make it in these times? 

The studio would have us know that this is the best western since Unforgiven, Clint Eastwood's 1992 Academy Award-winning classic.  That may be a little wishful thinking but you'll note I gave it three stars.  I certainly liked it and heaven knows it's nice to be back in the saddle again.  The real question, however, is what will the public think.

Men tend to like their westerns to be pretty rough and tumble and I have read numerous reports that it's very violent.  It has some violence (none of it gratuitous as I see it), yes, but I daresay not enough to satisfy my longing cowboy friends.  Many of them will find it to be too slow.  I found it to be slow.  Do note the difference.
Additionally it is a thoughtful piece... an emotional western... it has something to say.

What it most certainly does have is another great Christian Bale performance.  He IS this movie.  He is a laconic, hard-nosed Cavalry officer, about to be retired, who is ordered to take a hated Cheyenne chief, suffering from cancer, and his family from their confinement at a New Mexico fort to Montana where the chief wants to live out his final days.  He refuses to do it and only when threatened with losing his pension does he give in.

He has a small company of men accompanying him and along with the chief are his wife, his son, his son's wife and two children.  They soon meet up with a woman and her dead baby.  Her husband and two daughters have been killed and their house burned.  She is an emotional wreck and terrified when she sees the Indians in the northbound caravan.  The tragedy of her family is the scene that opens the film.

The quieter scenes involve the devastation felt by the woman and the understanding and respect the old enemies gain.  Obviously this trek involves five or six encounters that are exciting enough to bring some action to an otherwise more cerebral western.  

One thing that is so good about Bale's character is that there is an arc to him, he is a character who evolves... a rare thing indeed in a western although I can think of some great ones that did that very thing.  One thing that is so good about Bale's acting is that most of it is done with his face.  Should he have index cards on various facial expressions, he must have them all out for this.  Taciturn though the character certainly is, he is never dull.  Bale has seen to it.

How interesting that the two leads in an American western are Brits.  Rosamund Pike as an emotionally devastated pioneer woman gives a performance etched in pain.  Her character also evolves, making two characters now, which is more than one can ask for in a western.  This is a far cry from her turn in Gone Girl.

Wes Studi, so memorably evil as Magua in 1992's The Last of the Mohicans, is also playing a role far removed from that one.  His dying chief is wise and contemplative.  The remainder of the large cast hits all their marks.

I wish we could have known more about the Indian characters but it seems westerns are still not there.

I saw Hostiles, basically a brooding piece, as having an uplifting theme... one of inclusion.  These are people of different backgrounds who learn to pull together in the face of adversity.  

Most all of the film is on the trail and as a result, of course, there are some lovely shots of beautiful locales.  Cinematography by Masanobu Takayanagi was a definite plus, as it is with all great westerns. 

Director Scott Cooper also wrote the screenplay.  He handled both chores in Crazy Heart (2009) and Out of the Furance (2013) as well.  Cooper filled the movie with people who had worked together previously which likely made this easier on everyone, aided also by filming it in chronological order... a rare event.  

I absolutely loved the last scene... memorable and so touching.  So much could be written about it.



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Yet another review