Quentin Tarantino's dark, funny, cynical and, yes, hateful eighth feature plays like a modern-day State of the Union address pulled screaming from the depths of a bygone American hell.
THE HATEFUL EIGHT
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Cast: Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demian Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern
Rating: (R18)
Four and a half stars (out of five)
Set in Wyoming, six (or eight, or twelve) years after the civil war, where the scars from that conflict still run deep, a group of disparate and suspicious strangers hole up in a lodge (the wonderfully named Minnie's Haberdashery) during a cold and brutal blizzard.
Central are rival bounty hunters Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson) and John "The Hangman'' Ruth (Kurt Russell), who agree to protect each other's bounties, including the outlaw Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh).
It is a film of two halves.
The first is subdued, talkative - a master class in the intricate construction of character, narrative, mood and suspense.
The second is loud, brash, messy, violent, and a giant middle finger to the conventions of storytelling and cinema.
It is all helped immeasurably by Ennio Morricone's haunting, propulsive score, as well as Robert Richardson's staggering widescreen cinematography (although viewers here will not get to see this in its intended Ultra Panavision 70 format).
For Tarantinophiles, this is as good as it gets - a great director using every trick to cast light on contemporary America, and where it might be headed, through the prism of the Old West.
For everyone else, enter at your own risk.
- Jeremy Quinn
