A neo-noir gem, one of the best films of the year.
Hell or High Water
Grade: A
Director: David Mackenzie (Starred Up)
Screenplay: Taylor Sheridan (Sicario)
Cast: Jeff Bridges (True Grit,Crazy Heart ), Chris Pine (Star Trek)
Rating: R
Runtime: 1 hr 42 min
by John DeSando
"The only thing you're guilty of now is being stupid." Bank Robbery victim to the brothers.
In Hell or High Water, Jeff Bridges plays modern Texas Ranger chasing outlaws in dusty West Texas. It fits the most stringent neo-noir requirements that match low-rent crime with seedy characters, in a land stripped of water and morality. Besides, this film is one of the best of the year.
Brothers Toby and Tanner (Chris Pine and Ben Foster) are robbing small banks to save the farm and give Toby’s kids an inheritance. Toby is the quiet, smart one (he says, “Poverty is contagious”) while Tanner is brash and stupid (“You’ll think there are ten of me,” he advises a punk who harasses him). As director David Mackenzie and writer Taylor Sheridan masterfully guide this crime drama through clumsy robberies and sardonic quips, few audience members will not like the woe-begotten boys and the irreverent ranger, Marcus, on the brink of retirement with his full wits about him.
More important than the sometimes exciting heists are the themes of brotherly love and legacy, both compromised by Tanner’s years in jail and the bank’s will to take their mom’s farm. Dissing banks has been a staple of Westerns for over a hundred years in film, a convenient metaphor for the disparity between the wealthy and the poor.
The idea that Toby will sacrifice so his estranged sons can have a future (there’s oil on that farm) helps endear the audience to Toby; nobody will ever sympathize with Tanner, a nut case just waiting to be killed. Together the brothers represent the passage of opportunity (except for the oil) from small towns to the big town like Lubbock, where Marcus and his half-Indian partner, Alberto (Gil Birmingham), come from. The characters bridge the gap between the impoverished countryside and the progressive city.
The pace is slow, as you would expect, and Jeff Bridges has a twang that ingratiates and threatens with silky smoothness. The soundtrack by Nick Cave (also a producer) and Warren Ellis is spot on, and Giles Nuttgens’ (a frequent collaborator with Mackenzie) cinematography is simply gorgeous.
Hell or High Water may not be the caliber of No Country for Old men, but the acting and the technicals are standing tall. It’s a superior film for the summer doldrums.
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts WCBE’s It’s Movie Time and co-hosts Cinema Classics. Contact him at JDeSando@Columbus.rr.com
