Runtime:
115 minutes
Directed
by: John Hillcoat
Starring:
Shia LaBeouf, Tom Hardy, Guy Pearce, Jessica Chastain, Gary Oldman
From:
The Weinstein Company
Here
is a movie that I had only first heard of earlier in the month, when
they were heavily advertised on a UFC pay per view. I then looked
into it and I was interested by the whole deal; it was based on a
book known as The Wettest County in the World, by Matt Bondurant,
based on the exploits his old relatives had in rural Virginia in the
1930's running moonshine and dealing with their enemies. As an
independent production they unfortunately ran into money issues. It
took Shia's involvement to get the project made.
I
already explained the basic plot of the story. It follows a trio of
brothers, Jack (Shia), Forrest (Hardy), and Howard (Jason Clarke) as
they run a moonshine operation in rural Virginia in the early 1930's.
In fact, let me steal the plot given on IMDb:
“The
three Bondurant brothers run a bootlegging operation during the
depression, up in the mountains of Franklin County, Virginia. Crooked
Special Deputy Charles Rakes (Pearce) is after a share of the
brothers' profits. Compounding their troubles, the local competition
is elbowing in on their activities. Forrest's boisterous defiance and
Cricket's (Dane DeHaan) knack for moonshine production help the
brothers gain a local monopoly. When Forrest is wounded as tension
with Rakes escalates, Jack, initially the timid one, must prove his
worth against gangster Floyd Banner's (Oldman) mob, and we see him
metamorphose into a cocky exhibitionist in his attempts to woo the
off-limits preacher's daughter, Bertha. (Mia Wasikowska)”
Yep,
that sums it up pretty well.
This
movie has gotten a mixed reaction. I mean, many critics enjoyed it
but many others also were disappointed by it. I'll say that while
this doesn't reach the heights that it could have given the plot and
the quality cast assembled, I still managed to quite enjoy it. It's a
pulpy tale where you see various colorful characters interact in a
cool setting and while it's mainly dramatic, when you get outbursts
of violence, it's quite intense. I mean, there's Tommy guns, knifes,
brass knuckles, and other implements of destruction and when they're
used, the results are real bloody. I mean, this film doesn't mess
around when it comes to the violence.
Pearce's
villain role is rather interesting. He just acts peculiar. He sticks
out from the backwoods folks in Virginia in a drastic way. I mean,
it's implied by subtle and not so subtle clues that he's a
homosexual, but there's more to it than that and it's unexplained why
he's so odd. It's quite the performance from him; Hardy as the
seemingly indestructible Forrest also delivered a fine performance.
He manages to deliver a good old boy accent quite well for an
Englishman. Even Shia's performance was unobjectionable to me and
usually I'm “meh” towards him. Really, I have no complaints with
the cast. And for you horndogs there is some female nudity present
also.
I
also have to mention that while Oldman's role isn't too large, he
does look AND sound eerily like Charles Bronson. No kidding. I have
no idea how much of the story told in the book is entirely truthful
(let alone it getting adapted to the screen) but what I saw was
wildly entertaining. Mr. LaBeouf is a rather odd character in real
life; that said, I do have to say it is ballsy on his part to at
least say he is going to leave the big studio world and only do
moveis in the independent world. Will he stick with that... who
knows.
I'll
be back Sunday night.
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