The Hateful Eight

***This review pertains to the 70mm Roadshow version of this film. From my understanding, the only differences between this and the theatrical version is a longer runtime as well as an intermission roughly halfway through the film.***

Quentin Tarantino has done it again.

Just barely missing being appropriately named considering this is Tarantino’s ninth film; The Hateful Eight continues the filmmaker’s string of critical hits that has permeated his career since Reservoir Dogs. With his new film, Tarantino has chosen to focus on a pressure cooker situation set in the snow-covered wilderness of the Wild West. The set-up is simple enough: a bounty hunter by the name of John Ruth (Kurt Russel) is caught up in a blizzard on his way to delivering the criminal Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh) to the Hangman. Unable to progress further in the hazardous white out conditions, Ruth settles for stopping at Minnie’s Haberdashery until the storm blows over. Soon enough, the small shack is filled up with six other people seeking shelter from the storm, and as we begin to delve into who these strangers are as well as their reasoning for being there, we slowly (and I mean slowly) start to see that not everyone is who they claim to be.

Let the talking and violence begin.

A straightforward premise such as this lends itself to being more of a character driven film than any, and with Tarantino behind the camera that is doubly true. As with nearly every film he’s ever made, the characters, acting and dialogue are all top notch. Having such stellar actors to work with such as Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth, Demian Bichir, Walton Goggins, Bruce Dern, and Michael Madsen, it’s kind of hard to make a bad film and for the most part, the roles are perfectly cast. Nearly everyone is a joy to watch as they handle the material to the best of their abilities, and since the script is so wordy, it’s essential that the actors pull their weight when it comes to delivering lines and bringing their characters to life. Michael Mardsen, who looks and acts like a bargain bin Woody doll and who just doesn’t fit well in the movie’s setting or atmosphere, is really the only weird inclusion to the film. I know he’s a Tarantino “regular” but that shouldn’t be an automatic in if he doesn’t fit the role, and unfortunately, he doesn’t. He fairs a bit better during a late flashback scene, but it’s too little too late in my opinion.

More or less, each actor gets their moment to shine as well as a chance to interact with one another either separately or in groups. Each scene feels natural and realistic in regards to the situation they’re in, with most of the film pretty much moving along in real time. It’s clear Tarantino wanted us to be inside the cabin these people inhabit, so while everything does flow pretty smoothly and organically in order to put us in the moment with these characters, boy does it take its sweet time getting to anything super interesting.

Sure, watching these characters do their thing as they slowly peel back the layers of deception and motivation behind what is actually going on is all good fun and actually quite enjoyable, but the first quarter of the movie moves along at a snail’s pace. I know that the general excuse is “well that’s Tarantino” but as I mentioned in my Star Wars: The Force Awakens review, forgiving the pitfalls of the film just because “it’s Star Wars” doesn’t cut it anymore. It takes far too long to get into the central mystery of the story and usually that’s all fine and dandy if something else is going on, but instead we waste a lot of time just watching talking heads spout a lot of exposition with very little plot progression. You can talk all you want but if it doesn’t mean anything then what’s the point? I know that this Roadshow version of the film is a bit longer than the theatrical cut (not counting the fifteen minute intermission obviously) so I’d be interested to find out where the theatrical cuts happened. My money is on the first quarter of the movie.

Considering the sheer amount of conversations being had, you’d expect some kind of emotional connection to at least one of these characters before the end credits, but once the bullets start flying and the blood starts spurting, I not once watched the carnage onscreen and cared about the outcome of any of these characters. I wasn’t invested in them as much as I was invested in the idea of what they were doing, and to me that kind of lessened the impact of what ends up happening to them. Don’t get me wrong, I loved the over the top violence and the various and abrupt ways Tarantino offed his cast, but is it too much to ask to feel something when they bit it? I know the name of the movie is The Hateful Eight, emphasis on hateful, but if we are to believe that these are truly living, breathing, three dimensional characters, I expected something a bit more on the emotional front when the shit hit the fan.

My last few gripes about the film really come down to the tone of the movie itself. Tarantino is known for his odd sense of humor and his envelope pushing violence, but I felt, more often than not, that a lot of it was hit or miss. The movie is mostly populated by brilliant scenes coupled with a handful of funny exchanges between characters, but there are a couple scenes that just go a bit too far and a few comedic moments that just don’t work. For example, I still don’t know what to make of the scene between Samuel L. Jackson and Bruce Dern concerning Dern’s character’s son, but I’ll let you figure out what I mean by that. Lots of talk about wieners in that scene.

Other than that, the music, scored by legendary composer Ennio Morricone, is a great fit. I actually ended up preferring his score when it didn’t take its cues from that of an old western flick, but overall it still worked just fine. Tarantino also does a great job of injecting some social commentary into the film in regards to racism and the idea of how black and white folk treat each other. It seemed a bit forced at points but I get where he was going with it and I applaud him even attempting to say anything on the matter, especially with all the craziness going on in the country nowadays. We need more of this type of commentary in Hollywood.

As for the 70mm format of the film I’ll say this: outside of people familiar with what 70mm actually means when shooting a film, I have doubts that it will be appreciated by the general public as much as it should. I’m sure I could show a clip of the film to someone and have them not notice any difference from a regularly shot film, but for me, it was a new and unique experience. Tarantino uses the extra wide 70mm framing to turn nearly every shot into an ensemble piece, carefully fitting in as many actors as he can into the background while our attentions are focused on the characters at hand. It’s fun to see what these actors do when the camera isn’t solely focused on them, furthermore showing their commitment to their characters since they essentially have to stay in character at all times since they are always onscreen. Outside of that, there are a bunch of really nice exterior shots that use the format to great effect.

By the end of the film I was pleasantly surprised at how well this movie succeeded with it’s relatively limited scope and simple plot. The Hateful Eight is all about the realness of these characters and the way they interact with one another, and while the story is nothing to write home about, the performances, brutal violence, and bold social commentary sees Tarantino thrive in his craft yet again.