The Revenant

Saturday morning I went to an early showing of "The Revenant", because the Golden Globes were the next day and this film was getting major Oscar talk. Leo won Sunday night, along with the director and the film, and today was awarded with twelve Oscar nominations. So it's about time I write my review.

I am a fan of Alejandro G. Innaritu and Leonardo DiCaprio, so I was interested in the film. I also had heard that it was shot in mostly natural light, which always piques my interest. But when I saw the first trailer, I was not immediately excited to see it.

Leonardo does an excellent job. Innaritu does an excellent job. But something still fell flat for me on this one. Don't get me wrong, the stuff on film is quite awesome and beautiful to look at. The shots of the wilderness are beautiful and evoke still images. After awhile, though, the story just didn't hold my attention.The camera work was distracting to me. Instead of adding to the story, it distracted from the movie. It felt like technical wizardy and achievement for the sake of technical wizardly and achievement.

At the Globes, some of the winners mentioned that this was a story about the "triumph of the human spirit." I think that is grossly wrong. Yes, Hugh Glass survives a bear mauling and being buried alive, survives clashes with the frontier, and eventually meets up with the man who is started the chain of events. It is a tale of one man's revenge, to stop at nothing - not being buried, not riding a horse off a cliff, not sleeping inside a dead horse, not floating down a river - to get the man who killed his son and left him for dead. Revenge tales are fine stories to tell (Unforgiven, Gladiator, Braveheart, The Count of Monte Cristo), but let's not say that this is a story about the triumph of the human spirit.

Bottom line: the film ended up being more form than function for me. Beautiful to look at, but not terribly interesting story-wise. I want my films to look good  and tell interesting stories. Still pulling for Leo on Oscar night, though; his performance is pretty spectacular. Well, also Michael Fassbender. Because he's stellar.