Slow West

So at the end of last year I reviewed a film called Tornado. If you haven't seen it yet, giddy up. I said I would go back and check out director John Maclean's first film, Slow West. I finally got around to doing it and it's also fantastic. Maclean has only made these two feature films and IMDb tells me they didn't make a whole lot of money. Which is a shame. I feel like there is some sort of injustice, much like the Wild West Maclean likes to write about. Both of Maclean's films have this quiet savagery to them, a kind of Darwinesque, eat-or-be-eaten quality. But as I said, it's quiet, subtle. It takes a long time to build up to the violence, then it's fast. The threat of it always seems to hang there, like a gun just laying on a counter. What's it all about? A young, very naive Irish man, Jay Cavendish (Kodi Smit-McPhee), is heading West across America in search of the love of his life, Rose (Caren Pistorius). Turns out that Rose is also a wanted fugitive. Tracking Rose is bounty hunter Silas (Michael Fassbender) who has had a falling out with a group of fellow trackers led by Payne (Ben Mendelsohn) who fashions a coat that looks like something Johnny Depp wore in Dead Man. They are all heading for destination Rose. Quentin Tarantino had already made seven films (ten if you include Four Rooms, True Romance, and Natural Born Killers; maybe eleven if you add Sin City) before he made Django Unchained and then The Hateful Eight. I would say Maclean's first two films are better Westerns. Saddle up and get yourself to your local video store, that would be Movies 'N Stuff here in Ottawa, and rent Slow West today.