The Revenant — Page 2

FindingNamo said: "It has no socio-political agenda.

You're so sweet!

Thank you, Snarky McCondescend. Have you even seen the movie, or are you just assuming it's a white supremacist tract because, well, because it's what you do?

DiCaprio makes the easiest paycheck of his career -- he crawls and grunts for 160 minutes, and isn't convincing for a single moment of screen time.

"It wasn't even made by a white American."

Last time I checked Mexico was indeed part of North America. Do have any idea which box Alejandro González Iñárritu checks on any forms requiring a certain all-important classification?

javero said: ""It wasn't even made by a white American."

Last time I checked Mexico was indeed part of North America.

And while that may be true, we generally mean "U.S. citizens" when we say "American," and also it's irrelevant. Unless ... wait, what have we determined in this discussion? That AGI is a militantly racist colonialist imperialist using film as a propaganda tool to further his Aryan supremicist aims? Is that where we are?

I'm not sure what you mean by that. If you're saying every act of creating a work of art is a political act, then we can talk about that. If you're saying every work of art is a deliberate expression of the artist's political beliefs, then I'm dying to know what political message Air Bud: Golden Receiver is meant to convey.

Which, again, you haven't actually seen. Do you ever have a normal conversation, like a person?

Finally saw it earlier today. Namo, I encourage you to reconsider.

It's a brilliant throwback to a nearly bygone era in which directors and screenwriters knew how to use the sparsest of dialogue, cleverly-timed action sequences, and location shooting at arresting settings to tell a story. Leo's character battles the elements, friends, and foe alike driven by two very powerful motives, survival & revenge, with Tom Hardy's John Fitzgerald as the perfect foil.

It felt like an honest & unapologetic depiction of frontier life for a fur trader of that era that captured the indomitable human spirit to survive & exact justice. There was also a code of honor among men of that era which would have compelled the protagonist to seek retribution as he did.

There were no casting miscues. Leo was allowed to finally escape the man-child figure he typically cuts on screen. John Wayne, Charles Bronson, Clint Eastwood...fellows step aside. There's a new sheriff in town and his name is Leonardo DiCaprio. That said, if Tom Hardy weren't so vertically challenged he could easily displace Leo. Neither is likely to ever get cast as Superman but Tom is the better actor pound-for-pound.

One obvious nit is that the female characters were grossly underdeveloped. I also believe that the director & screenwriter could have gotten a little more mileage out of the relationship between Leo's character and his onscreen son who would have been called a half-breed at the time. On balance, it's one helluva movie that's not for the faint-hearted.

Updated On: 1/18/16 at 05:04 PM

I feel I can take a pass because I saw the movies from the bygone era. Your Jeremiah's Johnson, your Littles Big Man. At least back then they put the genetalia references right in the titles. I've seen all the tough heterosexual males films I need to in this one lifetime.

I actually loved Birdman and it's the only film from the director I've enjoyed. If I thought the film were even half as good as what javero described, I probably wouldn't have bothered to start this thread. I just couldn't get past the ridiculously flawed screenplay that lays out the predictability of Tom Hardy's character (when you can understand his dialogue) to such an implausible eye-rolling laughable extent, there's no reason to sit through the sluggish, labored and torturous (to the audience) performance of DiCaprio. DiCaprio is dirty and growls and moans a lot. It's a monotone performance that didn't appear to highlight any particular essence of maturity or manhood other than he looks older and dirty. His performances in Gatsby and Wolf of Wall Street seem subtle, layered and nuanced by comparison.

There was also a code of honor among men of that era which would have compelled the protagonist to seek retribution as he did.

Which wasn't portrayed in the film at all. There was a strong-willed protagonist. There was no code of honor among men in the screenplay. Had there been, the film might not have seemed completely idiotic.

I found this a chore to sit through. I'm kinda sad that this is the role Leo is going to win all the awards for - definitely not his best at all. And what a predictable movie! I knew exactly how it was going to end ten minutes in.

Having seen 7 of the 8 best film nominees, Room (or even the Martian) would get my vote.

The same director's Oscar-winning BIRDMAN at least did me the favor of evaporating as I sat there: I've had more memorable rides in elevators. But there's something extra-special about THE REVENANT that's going to piss me off for weeks, especially on Oscar night, when DiCaprio wins a spectacularly ill-deserved knickknack for wearing prosthetic makeup and crawling through snow for 160 minutes. It's like a feature length film of the Quaalude scene from WOLF OF WALL STREET, but you know, not played for anything like laughs, because SERIOUS.

Be warned: THE REVENANT isn't merely serious. It is SERIOUSLY SERIOUS -- it is SOLEMN, PROFOUND, SERIOUSLY SOLEMNLY PROFOUND, PROFOUNDLY SOLEMNLY SERIOUS, and PROFOUNDLY SERIOUSLY SOLEMN. It's just so serious that I found myself giggling helplessly at a couple of the more blatantly serious moments -- Mr. Hardy delivers an Oscar-clip-ready speech about God that was so stupidly written and delivered (in an accent and voice tone borrowed from Heath Ledger but without Ledger's clearer diction) that it came off like something out of BLAZING SADDLES, he's like the grizzled old prospector nobody can understand, I sat there expecting a church bell to drown him out everytime he started to speak, but no such luck, because you know, SERIOUS.

Few films in my experience work so HARD to bludgeon me with their SERIOUSNESS OF SERIOUSOSITY. You can see the STRENUOUS SERIOUSNESS in every single frame, and at 24 frames a second, at two hours and forty minutes, that's a hell of a lot of bludgeons the average audience member gets subjected to. So much STRENUOUS EFFORT on the part of the cast and crew, who are all REALLY OUTSIDE in REAL COLD and REAL SNOW -- I can imagine the director carefully choosing the exact texture of snow for DiCaprio to crawl through, and precisely measuring out how much blood was going to leak out of DiCaprio's mouth at each plot juncture. It's all so airless and lifeless and carefully composed that I never once just gave in and rolled with the story, my disbelief was never suspended for a single solitary second.

And so much of it is knocked off from other filmmakers -- there's Malick (the gorgeousness of the gorgeousity, the whispered voiceovers from THE NEW WORLD and TREE OF LIFE and THIN RED LINE), there's Tarkovsky (shots are lifted straight from STALKER, NOSTALGHIA and THE MIRROR). The only thing missing, as so often with so many films in general but with Inarritu's in particular, is any reason to give a sh*t about anyone or anything in it.

Updated On: 1/19/16 at 07:15 AM

With the exception of The Birdman comment, everything Roscoe said was pretty spot-on with how I felt. And that NEVER happens. I only wish the movie had somewhat resembled what javero described, but that's not the movie I saw. At least the awful screenplay didn't score a nomination.

It's just so serious that I found myself giggling helplessly at a couple of the more blatantly serious moments

My bf and I weren't so much giggling as openly laughing and shaking our heads at all the silliness. When we weren't laughing, we were asking what Tom Hardy said or sitting in a stupor with our heads resting on our hands wondering if it would ever get any better. It didn't.