A harrowing story about fear, betrayal and hubris...

Rating: 7/10 (6 June 2020)

Many elements of this film work well. There are some quality performances, most notably from Casey Affleck who is remarkably good as Robert Ford. Perhaps the best performance I've ever seen from him. Lovely sweeping visual imagery from Roger Deakins dazzles on screen and the idea is mostly engaging. Beautiful score too. That said, it takes a pretty special movie to justify a 160 minute running time. This wasn't quite good enough to do so in my view. The denouement trudges on for too long, and the voice over was excruciating to listen to by the end. Whilst this film is enjoyable, and quite moving, some elements do fail to crystallise, particularly the more periphery characters who felt lacking in substance - Zee James (Jesse's wife) felt like a squandered opportunity for example. Whoever decided the voiceover was a great idea should be fired. Less would've been tolerable, but it really does drone on and on. In my experience, it's a rare for a voiceover to work really well in a 21st century film, unless it is being used ironically. One couldn't help wondering whether it was used so heavily to cover up failings that emerged in postproduction. Good crack either way.