Suffers From Being Over-Long and Over-Indulgent But Stick With It, There's A Very Interesting Murder Mystery Here

Rating: 8/10 (13 January 2016)

It's hard not to be excited when Tarantino puts something new out but with the additional hype surrounding The Hateful Eight, it became one of the must see movies of the winter. If you're a fan of his classic works all the ingredients are here: exploitation level violence, appearances by Michael Madsen, Tim Roth, Kurt Russell and Samuel L. Jackson and a group of some real nasty people cursing, hitting and murdering each other.
*Minor Spoilers Ahead* After a couple of very long shots of the landscape a coach rides up to a man with several bodies stacked behind him. After asking the driver if he can hitch a ride, that man is told that he has to talk to the passenger. After being disarmed, we get the official introduction to our 3 main characters. Our hitchhiker Major Marquis Warren (Samuel L. Jackson), our passenger is John "The Hangman" Ruth(Kurt Russell) and his associate is Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh). Marquis and John are bounty hunters who have met previously and Daisy is a fugitive being escorted to her demise by John for a lot of money. He's suspicious of Marquis trying to steal his payday but they finally reach an arrangement and the Major comes aboard.
As they travel to Red Rock they reminisce a bit and Daisy gets hit by John a few times for having a truly foul mouth. They talk about John's nickname and his tendency to bring in his bounties alive to hang. After an unexpected stop caused by Daisy trashing a prized possession, they pick up another passenger named Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins). He's a son of a famous rebel leader who doesn't take kindly to Mannix or any northern sympathizers but is nonetheless grateful for the ride and he informs them that he is the new sheriff of the city Red Rock and he will be sworn in as they arrive. Unfortunately with a storm raging behind them, they stop at a popular way station, Minnie's Haberdashery to wait it out.
I think the most definitive thing I can say about this feature is that it's pure unfiltered Tarantino and that works both to the movie's credit and it's one of its chief drawbacks. The movie is very dialogue driven, especially at the beginning and like any other Tarantino movie it works well. You also have pretty good characterization for such a large ensemble, which is rare and another hallmark of the director. The characters that populate the film are very much similar to Inglorious Basterds or Reservoir Dogs, they are tough, nasty and they all have very cool back stories. They walk the line of being nasty but not too nasty that you can't watch them.
Now on the flip side, the movie feels very self-indulgent or at least to me it did. The great dialogue is there but there are many times where scenes just drag on because there has to be one more witty retort or one more monologue and there were times I just wished the movie would get on with it. The fact that most of the film is a bottle film doesn't help that, you don't get a change of scenery or too many new characters introduced to freshen things up. This movie really needed a tighter cut, I understand it had an engrossing story to tell but you could probably shave at least 15 minutes off this film, maybe even up to 30 min. But I think that the long run time is partly due to the fact it's Tarantino's project and there's the line of thinking that he shouldn't have to cut anything because he's Quentin Tarantino.
When it comes to the acting, you've got a big cast so while the performances are all good I can only comment on so many. Samuel L. Jackson and Kurt Russell function as dual leads and they both are throwing their all into it. Russell is boisterous and vicious as John Ruth and Jackson is his normal charming/wise-cracking self as the Major but his character has more to him than meets the eye and Samuel's performance evolves as the movie advances. Jennifer Jason Leigh doesn't have much to do at the start except get beat up and get showered by bodily fluids but as you close in on the halfway point, she gets her time to shine and you realize her character, man or woman, deserves what's coming to her. Surprisingly, Walton Goggins was the acting standout for me. I liked him in Django but he's got a deeper character to work with and I was surprised at how good his work was in The Hateful Eight. There wasn't a weak link in the chain and it's not a surprise considering the big names you see in the cast.
When it comes down to it, I think the level of enjoyment you will personally get from the Hateful Eight is how much you enjoy Quentin Tarantino's filmography. The Hateful Eight is an interesting and enveloping mystery with a good cast and an expert at the helm. I just wish it didn't take so long to get where it was going and that it more evenly spaced out the action to avoid the peaks and valleys it ventures into. That being said the ending is pretty good and the twists are surprising. I saw very little of it coming and after having been fidgeting in my seat for an hour and a half, when the other foot hits the ground, boy does it take off. Yet, I didn't enjoy it nearly as much as Inglorious Basterds, Django Unchained or Jackie Brown I would actually give it a 7.5/10 but if I had to go one way or another I enjoyed it more than I didn't so I'll give it an 8/10.