Bludgeons you, lies to you

Rating: 2/10 (10 January 2016)

Pretending to be realistic, the Revenant bludgeons you with extreme, extended close-ups of gore such as a horror film might do. In this case the pretense of authenticity ("based on real-life events") begs us to suspend our disbelief across too many literally incredible events. The pretense is shredded by various happenings in the film, that go far beyond the limits of reason. Having been badly mauled by the bear, near death and not expected to live, having not eaten for days, our hero lays out in the bitter cold all night without anything but the damp clothing on his back. The hypothermia would have killed any healthy person. Then in his diminished state he goes floating down a northern river in the dead of winter, ice water really, for ten minutes, gets out all wet and manages to survive. So far he would have been dead three times. He evades a chase by a whole gang of Indians firing bullets and arrows at him. Fourth death. He and horse run headlong off an 80-foot cliff. A tree breaks his fall, and he's just fine. Fifth death. It's not an amazing will to live. It's BS.
The captain doesn't take a whole crew out with him in the middle of the night in the dead of winter to hunt down the culprit--just the hobbled, ill Glass. Why?
This is "real life" events made into a comic book. The film asks us to be gullible fools. It insults our intelligence. It wants to stimulate us with intense violence, a cheap device used all too often in American films. Why? Because it's easy. It works if you let it. You're like, Wow. It speaks to the teenage boy in you. If you're not a teenage boy, move on.
Don't let the artistic veneer of the film seduce you into believing it's great. It just uses the same cheap shots as all the films shown in the trailers when I saw it last night--all with explosions, gunfight, gore, occult, etc. Worse, the intense, extended violence in this film could traumatize some. Beware.