Hostiles

Plot: Captain Joe (Christian Bale) is taking old Apache Chief Yellow Hawk (Wes Studi) and his family to Montana so he can die at home. Along they way they meet Mrs Quaid (Rosamund Pike) whose family was just killed by outlaw Comanche. Captain Joe aided Yellow Hawk to find and battle the Comanche. Mrs Quaid tags to Montana with them. On the way the women (Q'orianka Kicher, Tanaya Beatty) get kidnapped and raped by white fur trappers.  When they finally get to Montana, there are more hostile men to shoot. Everyone in this movie is Hostile.  [imdb]    [photos]

Review: You can make a 2010's Western about the 1890's, by drawing out all the subplots that got skipped in mid-20th Century Westerns. The hostile people are different groups of white people and different groups on natives. In Hostiles the suffering of the women is foregrounded. The theme is common humanity of the Native Americans, the White people and the one Black soldier. A second theme is the hardness and arbitrariness of life in the old west.

Hostiles is slow paced. Lots of faces talking slowing at night, or just staring. The style is either supposed to evoke old-fashion Westerns or more modern Art movies. It was particularly slow at the beginning.

Christian Bale's Captain Joe is evocative, but really under-acted; He is not trying to be a 1890's soldier -- he is a little more woke. Rosamund Pike's Mrs Quaid was so great when she was hiding under the rock from the Comanche. She played a traumatized Mom pretty well with a nice mix of primal scream and stoic blank stare. Like all 2010's heroines, Mrs Quaid shoots the bad guy who says she doesn't have the nerve for it.

Hostiles shows that you can update the Western to modern moral standards, but so what? It is still a boring old Western. 

Cast: Christian Bale, Rosamund Pike, Wes Studi

Directed and Screenplay by: Scott Cooper

Manuscript by: Donald Stewart

The Music: Almost no music. It makes the stillness stiller. I liked the shrieking sound effect at the first Comanche attack.

The Visuals: Some great outdoor landscapes.

Rating: 2.5 stars: With all the strong points, it is still a boring old Western.

 

More: A surprisingly international cast: Rosamund Pike is English, Adam Beach - Canadian, Tanya Beatty - Canadian, Q'orianka Kilcher - German

Even More: Editor Tom Cross says that he was trying to set up a mediation on the landscape to show the vast distances and to show how far the characters are going psychologically. link

Yet More: "One other interesting technical tidbit was that because of the SPCA [Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals] and the desire to keep horses safe, you’re not allowed to use full load blanks near horses, and you’re not really allowed to use squibs very close to horses. So a lot of the muzzle flashes and gunshots were enhanced digitally later." From an interview in at deadline.com

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