Hell or High Water (2016)
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Review #1,416 |
THE SCOOP
Director: David Mackenzie
Cast: Chris Pine, Ben Foster, Jeff Bridges
Plot: A divorced father and his ex-con older brother resort to a desperate scheme in order to save their family's ranch in West Texas.
Genre: Action / Crime / Drama
Awards: Nom. for Un Certain Regard Award (Cannes). Nom. for 4 Oscars - Best Picture, Best Supporting Actor, Best Original Screenplay, Best Film Editing
Runtime: 102min
Rating: M18 for some strong violence, language throughout and brief sexuality
International Sales: Sierra Affinity
Singapore Distributor: Shaw Organisation
IN RETROSPECT (Spoilers: NO)
“I've been working here
for 44 years. Ain't nobody ever ordered
nothing but a T-Bone steak and baked potato.”
Hell or High Water comes highly-acclaimed,
and mirroring the Oscar nominations, this is one of the best American pictures
of the year. It is a muscular work about
two brothers Tanner and Toby, played by Ben Foster and Chris Pine respectively,
who in order to save their family ranch, have to devise a desperate plan involving
bank robbery in their sleepy neighbouring towns.
So
they mask themselves, armed with guns, seeking to raise enough money to pay off
bad debts and save their home. Tanner is
an ex-con, an independent if volatile man who doesn’t really need the house,
but who shares such a close bond with Toby that he would do whatever it takes
to make sure their plan is successful. Toby,
a divorced father and a more compassionate man, seeks to give his children a
better future, even if they may or may not like him.
And
then we have Jeff Bridges’ character, a weary and cynical sheriff who’s about
to retire, whose conversations with those he meets largely providing the film with
its offbeat humour. He wants to catch
those robbers, whoever they are, in one last hurrah. He never lets anything get him down, least of
all his pride.
The
director is David Mackenzie, who made such films as Hallam Foe (2007) and Starred
Up (2013). He has such a great grasp
of the fundamentals of the bank heist thriller that the film proves solid and riveting,
often in an old-school way. Accompanied
by music (by Nick Cave and Warren Ellis no less) that gives it a potent dose of
authentic Southwest ethos, Hell or High
Water knows how to entertain like a page turner, yet gives enough room for
the characters to develop.
The
sizzling Ben Foster-Chris Pine chemistry owes a great debt to Taylor Sheridan
(screenwriter of Sicario (2015)),
whose gift for dialogue imbues their characters with a certain likability. So is Bridges' character. Hell or
High Water is one of those rare films where we are made to root for folks
on both sides of the law, without feeling any moral dissonance.
Perhaps
setting the story in the rundown, capitalism-ruined towns of the Southwest is the
masterstroke—it has an old rustic charm, but ravaged by greed and ineffective
laws. What are laws anyway when there is
no justice? But there’s poetic justice
in this one.
Verdict: A solid and riveting bank robbery thriller
with a potent dose of authentic Southwest ethos.
GRADE: A-
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