Beautiful but not for everyone

Rating: 6/10 (23 December 2015)

Alejandro González Iñárritu who directed last year's Best Picture winner 'Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)' has returned with his next film 'The Revenant'. The films couldn't be further apart in nature. I remember saying when I reviewed the former film that it wasn't going to be for everyone, and despite the films being worlds apart, this fact remains the same. 'The Revenant' is a beautiful film to look at, but it's a tough film to sit through. There's a pretty amazing true story being told here, but it's being told in such a slow, drawn out way that it lost a lot of impact for me.
The buzz around town is that the time may finally have come for Leonardo DiCaprio to get an Oscar for his performance in 'The Revenant'. Personally I would be disappointed if this turns out to be the case. Don't get me wrong he delivers a very fine performance here. But of all the charismatic, layered performances he's given over the years, this was not his best work. People will justify it saying the filming conditions were immensely tough and that he put in the hard yards for the role, however the I believe any actor given this role could have come up with a very similar performance. There was nothing DiCaprio did here that no one else in the business could have pulled off. That hasn't been the case in other roles he's nailed.
Be prepared going in to 'The Revenant'. Be prepared to be very patient. It's a long film with not a lot happening for the most part of it. The flaw for me was how much time was given to each aspect of the story. The survival aspect takes up 95% of the time, which granted was a great way to show just how harrowing of an experience it would truly have been and the determination it would have taken, and the "revenge" aspect is just rushed in at the end almost as an afterthought. For mine the ratio needed to be closer to 80-20% for the sake of an audience who are demanding a more satisfactory ending.