Creative Western whodunit is an amusing black comedy, but also profane and repugnant

Rating: 7/10 (17 October 2016)

RELEASED IN 2015 and directed by Quentin Tarantino, "The Hateful Eight" is a Western about a cruel bounty hunter (Kurt Russell) taking an outlaw woman (Jennifer Jason Leigh) in to Red Rock, Wyoming, to hang. Along with a black bounty hunter (Samuel L. Jackson) and the new Sheriff of Red Rock (Walton Goggins), they hold up at a rural haberdashery during a blizzard with several dubious characters (Tim Roth, Demián Bichir, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern and Channing Tatum). Dana Gourrier and Zoe Bell appear in small roles.
This was Tarantino's second Western in a row after 2012's "Django Unchained," which ranks with the best Westerns of all time. This one's not as good, but it certainly has its points of interest, like the great wintery wilderness atmosphere, which is to die for. Moreover, the plot is intriguing. It's basically an Agatha Christie whodunit a la Murder on the Orient Express transferred to the Old West. Roughly 90% of the film takes place in the haberdashery and, less so, a stagecoach. It's basically a theater play masquerading as a movie and I found it a unique setting for a Western.
The movie starts out with spectacular Colorado winter cinematography highlighted by an excellent Ennio Morricone score, his first full-length score in over three decades (!). Compelling extended dialogues have always been Tarantino's strong suit; and so it is here. The amusing melodramatics are entertaining and the story keeps your interest despite the one-dimensional setting. Everything's SO exaggerated that you can't take it seriously. The movie's intentionally offensive and you have to roll WITH the excesses to be entertained; otherwise you'll hate it.
On at least one occasion the overindulgences don't work, like the disgusting fellatio sequence. I get that Marquis (Jackson) was lying to the other guy to compel him to draw, but we didn't need a visual on his fabricated story. It's sordid excess that has no place in a Western or any other movie, except gay porn, but Tarantino obviously included it in order to be "edgy" or whatever.
The excellent opening with the figure of Christ dying for our sins keys off the theme, which is humanity's fallen condition and dire need of redemption. The title, "The Hateful Eight," is a perversion of "The Magnificent Seven." The latter celebrates the noble and heroic whereas this movie parodies the base and odious. Tarantino is poking fun at our petty hostilities that separate us based on race, gender, sectionalism, faction-ism, envy and rivalry. Furthermore, men divided by hatred of culture and race can unite in hatred of something else, in this case misogyny.
THE FILM RUNS 2 hours, 47 minutes.
GRADE: B