Jesse James is an impressive film

“The film you are about to see is a very long film. And in its length it acquires, I think, a sort of lyricism.”

This isn’t what I want to hear before I watch a film. But despite the initial scepticism engendered by QFT’s extremely nervous expert and his rambling introduction, I expect The Murder of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford to require some beating for the title of best film I see in 2008. And we’ve reached what ……. January the 7th?

The film is a subtle retelling of one of the American west’s most enduring tales. Andrew Dominik’s movie portrays a waning James and deals with the ambivalence of hero worship as well as the complex relationship between assassins and their victims. The besotted assassin Robert Ford’s admiration is tempered with jealousy and he hopes to acquire, in his murder of the Brad Pitt character, some of his fame and notoriety. His infatuation with James is inextricably linked with parallel feelings of hatred and resentment. For his part James is simultaneously drawn to Ford and repelled by him.

Ironically I did not think that the film was too long. It was easy paced and did not rely on a surfeit of shooting or action to unfold its story. Pitt plays Jesse James in impressive fashion, portraying the charisma and compelling charm of the outlaw, but also illuminating the dark and destructive elements of his character. James is seen one moment doting on his daughter and the next is administering a brutal beating to a young boy.

Casey Affleck’s Ford is also subtly drawn. The journey from wide eyed fan to assassin is entirely convincing. The tragic consequences of Ford’s own celebrity form a prescient end to the film which can be read as a parable about fame for modern times.

I know Kloot thought the film rambled on too much and I know others have shared this view, but I do not agree. I found the movie to be visually arresting and thought-provoking.

Comments

Anonymous said…
Saw this last night, based on your recommendation. Good film with excellent performances, Affleck in particular. Not in the same league as "The Lives of Others" though or possibly "This is England" for title of best film seen in 2008.
kenny
8 April 2008 at 19:50
Anonymous said…
Keep up the good work.
10 November 2008 at 12:59
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Football fever in Russia

Russia Blog is getting excited about Euro 2008. Indeed it is drawing parallels between Guus Hiddink and Peter the Great in terms of successful Russo-Dutch exchanges of expertise. Meanwhile, in Moscow, fans have been taking to the streets in order to celebrate the national team’s achievements.
Read more

Stormont might not collapse but paramilitaries continue to disfigure Northern Ireland

Image
The devolved institutions in Northern Ireland are supposedly ‘teetering on the brink’ of collapse yet again.  After repeated failures to agree a balanced budget or implement welfare reform created months of uncertainty, the Executive’s future is now in doubt because the PSNI believes members of the IRA were involved in murdering a republican hit man.  Despite its apparent seriousness, this particular predicament is unlikely to bring the shaky edifice at Stormont crashing down. The IRA was supposed to have disbanded its military ‘structures’ and decommissioned its entire arsenal of weapons back in 2005.  It was on the basis of this understanding that power-sharing resumed in 2007 and the DUP entered government with Sinn Féin.  From the outset it was a fairly flimsy pretext.   Less than a year after John de Chastelain, the retired Canadian general, oversaw decommissioning, the Independent Monitoring Commission reported that the IRA retained a substantial haul of arms.
Read more

Walker loada rubbish

Former BBC employee Brian Walker has overrun Slugger O’Toole lately with countless poorly structured, poorly written posts. It is possible quickly to recognize and avoid these by subjecting each Slugger piece to a cursory inspection and identifying those which feature characteristic lack of paragraphing and a tenuous grasp on the technicalities of linking source articles. Although I generally evade Walker’s posts by this method, occasionally (and unfortunately) I have persevered and found that their content is as unrewarding as the style in which they are written. Today, for instance, I inflicted upon myself Brian’s thoughts on a mooted Fianna Fail / SDLP merger . In actual fact, he is right to welcome news that the Southern Irish party has dropped this proposal from its agenda; however, the logic by which he arrives at this conclusion is parochial nonsense. To summarise, Walker believes that pursuing realignment with larger parties, whether they are from the rest of the UK or fro
Read more