Hateful Eight (2015) Movie Review

The Hateful Eight (2015) – 3.5/5

Cast : Kurt Russell, Samuel L Jackson, Tim Roth, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Michael Madsen, Demian Bichir, Bruce Dern, Walton Goggins

Director : Quentin Tarantino

Review by Zulfiqar

Quentin Tarantino’s ‘hateful eight’ is a confused genre of cinema which leaves the viewer undecided regarding his inference of the characters and their motives behind the happenings. Quentin Tarantino, a legendary filmmaker of shuffled screenplays and long intriguing verbal exchanges, doesn’t give either of his defining traits, the usual treatment he generally dishes with a very panache-laden hand. Even then because of the cohesive script and crisp depiction of the characters and the events, ‘hateful eight’ manages to go as a passable thriller, if you resort to not aspire for the usual artisanship of the auteur filmmaker.

The movie starts post-civil war era, with a bounty hunter, John Ruth (Kurt Russell), who is on the move in a stagecoach with his latest catch, notorious a Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh), when he comes across another bounty hunter Major Marquis warren (Samuel L Jackson). The latter fella is transporting three corspses, his bounties to Red Rock, the same destination of John Ruth. Chris Mannix, a dubious future Sheriff of Red Rock, joins them after a long conversation between the three. They alight at a stagecoach lodge, Minnie’s Haberdashery, where a new stand-in Mexican bar in-charge, Bob (Demian Bichir), a hangman named Mobray, a cowboy called Joe Gage and an old General are cooped up. A blinding blizzard compels the new company to spend the next couple of days with the above gang, making the criminal and contemplative heads reveal their hidden beliefs, natures and motives out into the open, leading into a bloody ending of brutal gore.

Tarantino takes up many matters of discussion while he conducts the plot. Main one of them is the racial concept. In his previous ‘Django Unchained’ he makes the viewer get the shock value of the interracial exchanges with brutish of cuss words and with gore-ish of vehemence behind it. He indeed succeeded in showing the pathetic state of the racial division in 1800s. but in ‘hateful eight’, there doesn’t seem to be a motive behind it, but just a dandying quality of cuss-ism at its mightiest. It is associated with one of the most sexually embarrassing scenes where Samuel L Jackson’s Warren makes his prisoner do unimaginable things in the pathetic of ways. Another small reference is made about the American ways with the Mexicans, while Warren talks about haberdashery stand-in-charge Bob. Then there are the interactions between the bounty hunters and their prisoners. Ruth’s physical handling of Daisy is wickedly cruel and probably intends to incite the viewer’s anger. This would have served well if there was some sort of clear-cut portrayal of the dangerousness of Daisy. The director doesn’t give that. This aspect may cut two ways. It probably is Tarantino’s defiance and gives a new viewer experience for the audience to understand the matters as they are, with not a pinch but handful of salt. There are many sudden shock-value incidents when the characters are bumped off at the unlikeliest of times and the unlikeliest of them. But more radical is the sequence is the flashback, when we see the gentlest of country folk handling the lodge and how they play into the hands of a group of bandits. However there are indirect and unintended retributions in the path to the climax.

The witty, eerie and funny conversations of tarantino’s characters, who talk about almost anything with the randomness of a surfing TV channel, doesn’t follow the template here. It had a diverse logic behind a single sermon in ‘pulp fiction’, a sort of impending dread in ‘Inglourious basterds’. The dialogue in ‘hateful eight’ is almost around a single point and doesn’t move much. There is certainly a nice piece of writing around Lincoln’s letter, but the rest is almost repetitive. Tarantino’s strength in the movie strongly lies in explaining the validity of the letter and how the opposite forces unite in the face of danger. He probably makes a statement of the utility of putting aside racial hatred and fight against the community’s scourge of crime. Samuel L Jackson, who best recites the director’s script, is like a central point of almost every conversation. It explains Tarantino’s fondness of him, but doesn’t have the vivacity of earlier works.

The movie’s redeeming points, however, are the setting and the impulsiveness of the events. The cinematography of the stormy blizzard and the haberdashery give a unique ambience to the movie. Ennio Morricone’s score has a nostalgic and authentic touch of the old westerns.Each chapter is followed by another intriguing and unexpected chapter in the unique Tarantino fashion. His old team graces the cast, which probably is a strength for the movie’s lucid presentation. Only Christopher Waltz is missing and you would easily make out, which actor replaced him. Samuel L Jackson is not only the central character, who tries to worm out his way like the others, but he even has a Christie’s detective moment, when he tries to decipher the villain at the end. Jennifer Jason leigh’s Daisy is not only graphically diabolical, but characteristically maniacal. Leigh plays it eccentrically, which is a very rare thing for a woman criminal. Tim Roth switches the British and Australian accents quite convincingly, while Madsen and Bruce Dern are written in small roles. Kurt Russell’s John Ruth however is a nice character. His role has a country life and warmth in it, though occasionally maybe ruthless. And his whiskers are the best I had ever seen in a movie. They even compete with those of Tom Selleck and Sam Elliott. He can even be the big brother of Asterix and Obelix, just for the machismo of his mustache.

Tarantino never shies away from the blood spurting gun-sequences, but then again he infuses a technical and operatic choreography into it and thus leaves a mark of his own. Similar are the results here. The story and the plot are unique with the grandest of atmospheres with the best of cast. It flies and lands well too, but doesn’t have the eerie eloquence and Tarantino’s stamp of some radical work.