Two brothers are robbing banks in West Texas. Only small amounts, only what's in the till, nothing too substantial. Two Texas Rangers are on their trail. But what motivates them and what will become of them is the meat of this engaging thriller-drama. It's clearly got modern-western influences (the depleted nature of the rural communities, the Nick Cave/Warren Ellis soundtrack, even Jeff Bridges performance, which is not wildly far away from his "True Grit" performance even if a tad less mumbly).
But most of all this is a vehicle from some great performances - Chris Pine stands out as the somewhat more decent brother, solid and true, but Ben Foster also enjoys his moments as the more improvisational-wild-card brother. And Bridges and Gil Bermingham have a lovely give-and-take companionship as the two rangers - while having Bridges be just-short-of-retirement should feel slightly cliched at this point, it mostly serves to let him be slightly outmoded and a little carefree in how he goes about his work, with Bermingham largely being his straight-man companion.
There is a pure rage that's boiling just under this about the unconscionable nature of banking in destroying rural communities, but it's never quite at the polemic level, instead letting this be about the people and the story. And this is a solidly engaging story, well told, and well worth catching.
No comments:
Post a Comment