Three Billboards

Last night, Nathan Jr, Dr Desert Flower and I went to the old La Paloma theater in Encinitas where they were showing Three Billboards Outside of Ebbing, Missouri.  We'd heard it was good.  Mistakenly thought it was a Coen Brothers movie, as Francis McDormand is it in the lead role,  and the 90 year old La Paloma was somewhere we'd never been, so we bought our tickets in cash at the old time box office (they don't take credit cards), sat in the dilapidated non-reclining seats (circa 1928), and breathed the chilly air of the theater, waiting for the show to being.

It is a somber, moving film.  It is a Very Violent film.  It is a sad film.  It's a well acted and well directed film.  And, as someone who lived in semi-rural the South for 16 years of his adult life, I'd say it is a fairly accurate depiction of life, prejudices, and culture in rural American "fly-over" country.   Beautiful country-side combined with a deep, thick, undercoat of lawlessness and a loose-sense of imposed community that often times runs no deeper than superficial pleasantries.

Francis McDormand should win an Oscar or Golden Globe for her role.  Woody Harrelson is great in it, throughout.  Sam Rockwell - who admittedly is NOT one of my favorite actors as he often plays a goof (Hitchhiker's Guide), clown, a fool, a cocky & flawed playboy (F is for Family) - makes you Hate him, viscerally in the first 2/3rds of the film.  Clarke Peters (Lester, from The Wire) is under-stated in the movie.  I don't want to spoil it, but it was both a great movie and very disturbing at the same time.

After the movie, we were all somewhat down, silent, depressed, retrospective... pondering life & existence... akin to how my buddy Ryan and I were after seeing Schindler's List in Atlanta back in 1993, but without the genocide.  So we got a good meal and some strong drinks at the Encinitas Bier Garden, before driving back up to the homestead.