Prickly, Murky and very Compelling

Rating: Null/10 (7 December 2007)

Plot:
As his gang and legend begin to fragment, train-robber and outlaw Jesse James (Pitt) is a haunted man. He can feel his death approaching, but can he foresee that fringe gang-member Robert Ford (Affleck) will be the man to pull the trigger?
My Review:
Brad Pitt's career takes an interesting turn in this idea of a modernised Western based on a legend. At the helm of a two-time director Andrew Dominik, it's fair to say that new Western has likely left perplexed studio execs somewhat long in the face. It's also fair to say that we expected Mr. Jolie at the back of a greasy gun saying some ponderous if not idiosyncratic line to a enemy facing the other end of the barrel.
The source is Ron Hansen's fictional recreation of the chaotic events that brought James-gang-hopeful Robert Ford (Affleck) to shoot his iconic leader in the back as he phased out of the frame of the picture. However, what Mr Dominik has given us is a unconventional thrill seeker, (all those expecting a thrill seeker may want to go get another thrill with more premise) a spurring yet slow and pensive poem-like film that makes existing luxuriant western outings seem less buzzing.
Director Andrew Dominik cultivates a not-unfamiliar revisionist aura of America's formative days, a period drama that feels very modern, with the borderline being on the precipice. It shares the unique blend of contemplative power and unmaking of myth from say Unforgiven and shares its sepia-hued authenticity and indistinct morality. This is almost the most unusual form for a conventional idea of a Western with a backdrop of a psychological landscape.
Andrew Dominik matches the book's shapelessness faithfully: messy like the throes of garbled history and hear-say with an undercurrent of the actual shards and slivers which is it's composite. Loosely weaved plot that feels more tangled than vague. With its few superlative undercurrents, and beneath a rambling exterior is a true immersing theme of death and assignation so foul that it makes you think of convention planned murder-outings being the weaker copies of this.
Pitt is very impressive as he is most effective stalking the fringes of sanity - seeing how he borderlines his 12 Monkeys and Fight Club twitchy-ness that made him luminous - so he is fittingly cast as Jesse James. Affleck also gets more to work with than most previous outings. Each man lives in each others shadow, James parses his infamy in newspapers and observes the edgy brutal loyalty of his gang, especially Ford (Affleck). And when Pitt loosens the hinges a fraction, he really loses it, maniacal laughs like a death has a new best friend.
A lot of weather-swept horizons and desolate farmhouses in post-Civil War Kansas and especially Missouri, float across the screen with less Western orientation, more like 'here is the countryside, look at it and "see" it'. There is no real colour, more like a bloated texture of a summers afternoon, left to some gold's, bronze's and faded styles of almost 'Deadwood' type haunts and well-dress gents who crave murder.
No momentum like any ordinary thriller, more like it's laced with a cruel menace; with an inescapable clash as scenes travel disturbing and unpredictable paths. On that note, no guns, no galore-ness of any kind, very suave and unpleasantly vindictive, but we do get one possibly statuesque of modern train-robbery scenes that you will ever see, brutal and very indicative of the gangs of old. Just how much myth creates monsters is a overall theme.
Verdict:
Edgy, dark and maniacal in all-sorts, not the Western we all have an idea of. 8.5.