Surprisingly Good for January

Rating: 9/10 (26 January 2016)

The Revenant is directed by Alejandro Iñárritu and is based on the true events of an nineteenth century fur trapper named Hugh Glass (Leonardo Dicaprio) and his epic tale of redemption. After he is savagely attacked by a grizzly bear, Hugh must be taken care of by his fellow expeditioners, which proves to be hard. After his team leader accepts that he is just a burden, he pays three men to stay behind and take care of him, while the rest push on forward. The three men that stay behind are Hugh's Native American son Hawk (Forrest Goodluck), a rival of Hugh's named Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy), and another teenage boy named Bridger (Will Poulter). Fitzgerald eventually murders Hugh's son, buries Hugh alive, and takes off with Bridger, lying to him about Hawk's fate. Then, Hugh crawls out of his early grave to seek vengeance upon Fitzgerald.
I saw this movie the day it premiered in my state, on January 8, and walked in expecting a crappy January movie, and I was dead wrong. The Revenant, I think, is definitely an Oscar worthy movie, and only competition would feature Spotlight, Mad Max: Fury Road, and The Martian. If not for those three films, The Revenant would win without a doubt. First I'll discuss the better qualities, then I'll jump into the negatives.
To start off, this movie has literally the best cinematography in movie history, apart from Avatar (2009). This film looks absolutely beautiful. Some of the shots look unreal due to how amazing they look. When Iñárritu was filming The Revenant, he refused to use any lighting effects at all. Yes, obviously, the editing team enhanced it, but all lighting in the film was either form the sun, the moon, or fire. That's risky, and it worked out masterfully.
Another thing was Dicaprio's acting. It genuinely makes me mad that this man has yet to win an Oscar, but if he doesn't for this film, I'll just be that much more mad. He has already won the Golden Globe for best actor, but that's just not the same. Another great performance is Tom Hardy's. Tom Hardy is already an amazing actor, but this just shows off his skill even more. He really proves himself in this movie, and shows that his abilities are barely below, if not on par, with the greats like Dicaprio.
A third amazing thing about the film was the script. Prior to the live burial of Glass, there really wasn't too much dialogue throughout. It had bits and pieces here and there, mostly between Fitzgerald and Bridger, but there was still a large absence of lines. Some people will complain about this, but I think it really helps the film. This movie is supposed to be very real and wild, and in a situation like that, a man that's alone for most of the movie wouldn't really talk too much. So the lack of speaking really advances the film.
Now there are some bad things to the movie, just like every other one. It's main problem is the run time. The movie is good, of course, and the plot is exciting, but the movie seemed a little too long. The movie comes in at about 2 hours and 36 minutes. Now, personally think they should've shaved off 15 or 20 minutes, and it would've been a bit better. Obviously that's a small problem, but I can't say the movie's perfect when it's not.
So, overall, I would commend The Revenant for its cinematography, acting, directing, and script. After a lot of thought, I'd give The Revenant an A, or a 9 out of 10 stars.