What lies beneath

Rating: 7/10 (8 January 2016)

Quentin Tarantino's eight film is The Hateful Eight. By this time we know what to expect, lots of talking, some of its fast and loose.
Even though the publicity blurb mentions John Carpenter's The Thing as an inspiration (Kurt Russell even riffs a line from that film about going without sleep,) it really is an Agatha Christie style mystery done Tarantino style.
We visit the snowbound wild west post civil war where the wounds of war are still raw.
Kurt Russell is bounty hunter John Ruth better known as the Hangman. Where other bounty hunters kill and take the bodies for the reward. He brings them back alive so they can hang. He is taking back Daisy Domergue, a female captive with a big reward for her head. On the road he meets Major Warren (Samuel L Jackson) another bounty hunter and they ride together until they meet the designated new sheriff also on his way to his new post at the town they are heading to.
A blizzard means they have to hole up in an inn where there are other people staying. Bruce Dern is the bitter, racist confederate General Smithers trying to find the fate of his son. Tim Roth is Mobray on his way to the same town as the sheriff to be the new hangman. There are several other people, we believe that some of them are bluffing. Ruth thinks that one of them is not what he claims to be and lies have been told.
As I said there is a lot of chatter, maybe too much, lots of suspicion, lots of rubbing people up the wrong way. We do wonder what this is all leading to, as maybe events are unravelling too slowly and then bang, the bodies start to fall and Tarantino does his reveal.
The film has dark twisted humour, mean characters bristling with menace, bloody cruel violence. In his heart it is a visceral mystery thriller told in a slow simmering style.