Thursday, January 21, 2016

Film Review - The Hateful Eight (2016)

The Hateful Eight is the new film from Quentin Tarantino and stars Kurt Russell as the Hangman who is taking Daisy Domageue (Jennifer Jason Leigh) to Red Rock for Hanging but they're caught in a blizzard and decide to house up in Minnie's Habidashery where they meet the inhabitants (Samuel L Jackson, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Walton Goggins and Bruce Dern) but one of them is not who they say they are.

I am very very mixed on this movie I really am as there is an awful lot to like about it, once again Quentin shows what a genuinely talented man he is in terms of creating his signature dialogue set pieces and getting great performances out of all of his actors, Robert Richardson's photography is gorgeous to look at (he is one of the most underrated DPs in the business I think) and Ennio Morricone's score is fantastic and it really makes you feel like you're watching a film which has not always been the case with QT in the past.

Plus the performances across the board are great with Russell and Jackson being the main highlights though Roth is clearly imitating Christoph Waltz (I wonder if QT wrote that character with Waltz in mind before he turned it down.)

However this movie simply becomes too much by the end and at 167 minutes long (187 minutes in its proper 70mm Roadshow release version) it did get to feel too long for its own good and the violence and the language become very overdone in the second half, there's only so many times you can see Leigh's character being abused or pools of blood or the N word or the B word and saying that is a shame as was really getting into it and the stage feeling of the film made me think that QT could easily transition to TV or Theatre if he decides to retire after 10 films and both of those mediums would be a great fit for him given his way for constructing dialogue set pieces.

All in all the Hateful Eight has a lot of good going for it but again it overstayed its welcome, 2 and a half out of 5.

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