The Revenant

Yesterday afternoon I took my retired parents to the Carlsbad Cinépolis to see the movie The Revenant.  Cinépolis costs more then a normal movie but it has drinks service during the film and you get to sit in the reclining leather chair with foot rest and assigned seating so that know one blocks your view.  Headquartered in Mexico City, Cinépolis has multiple theaters in Southern California.  I had seen several films there previously, and I was not disappointed.  

My father absolutely loved the leather recliner and catered atmosphere.  I ordered a pineapple martini and he ordered an Icee, raspberry flavoured, with my mother abstaining from any delicious beverages.   The theatre darkened, and the film began.   

I will not spoil the film The Revenant but I will say that it is an excellent piece of cinema. There is a substantial amount of blood and violence depicted in the film.  Filmed in Canada i& Argentina the scenery is spectacular.   If you go into the theatre with any romantic or idealised notions of the 1800s in the Western North America, you will find those notions quickly obliterated in the opening 10 minutes of this film.  The next 2 1/2 hours continues to grind the heel of reality brutally into the romantic illusion to destroy any idealized notions of the "Wild West".  

Leonardo DiCaprio's Golden Globe was well earned.  This movie is a cinematic masterpiece.  If it does not get an Oscar there is something wrong.  

Intense. Remarkably sad. Violent. Carnal, base, unaccountable evil, juxtaposed with magnificent scenery, fantastic acting, cut to the bone writing, and superb direction... I will go see it again with DDF sometime later this month.   (She had to work, while I hosted my visiting parents).   

If you are squeamish about blood and violence, then you probably should not pay the price of a theatre ticket to go see this… But you will be missing out.  

On a closing note, Tom Hardy shows that she can again play a complete asshole, like unto his Batman Bane character, if Bane had been a mercenary & ruthless fur trapper in the early 1800s.  Since this theatre was the same theatre I watched Mad Max Fury Road, Hardy's performance impressed me tremendously.  Also, being fluent in French, I was able to understand the slang spoken (and written) in French without subtitles, which was an unexpected pleasure.