Poetry juxtaposed on painting

Rating: 9/10 (4 February 2016)

From the time the movie opens up it feels as if you have opened your eyelids and you are at the forefront of the elk hunt. This space that you are at very rarely strays during the duration. You are not a spectator, you are a fellow journeyman.
This movie is not just a film. It's a cinematic expression of the entire crew both on and off the screen. And the architect of that expression is Inarritu. I can only imagine how hard it must have been to convince the studios to see the vision just through the concept. After all it's just the constant battle of one man against the nature and the nature of man. The movie rests on his portrayal of his grit and tenacity. And would audiences who are used to all high tech visual effects and racing story lines be patient enough to sit through only one man's ordeal?
Well the answer lies at the heart and soul that the protagonist has poured, seeped, toiled into the character. With the camera focused on his each grimace, each torsion of his body Leonardo Di Caprio reigns tall from the moment the finger lays on the trigger of the gun. He is the bullet that you see even before the gun has been fired.
Tom Hardy one of my fav actors is the perfect foil to the intent of Di Caprio s character. Here i have to digress a bit. Both these actors were there in inception - one of my all time favorite. There we see the masterful Nolan cerebralise these characters and there too we see them doing the tango gracefully. In the revenant that dance form is waltz and both of them dance around their inevitable duet with poise and patience.
Am not a fan of the cold climate but when in spite of that i feel the desire to visit that place says a little something about the cinematography. Lubezki is the maestro painting his deft strokes. And back to the architect of this entire vision. Seriously one has to blind not to see the nuance of the vision that Inarittu lays in front of us. We are entrenched in the snow alone with him. Thanks for bringing such an expression where we see how mankind is indebted to mother nature. In spite of all the ravages we as a human race has inflicted on her nature still hides us and we hide inside her entrails