If you’re interested in this film because you like photographically beautiful depictions of woodsy areas populated sparsely with taciturn, hardened men treating women badly, everyone leading brutal, gritty lives, then watch Winter’s Bone instead.
If you’re interested in this film because you like the music of Atli Örvarsson, then, well, sure, go for it.
If you’re interested in this film because you think Sam Rockwell is hot, then, well, yeah, he’s hot in it, but be warned that he becomes less hot as his onscreen nerves become more frazzled.
If you’re interested in this film because you have the highest respect for David M. Rosenthal as a director, then you’re mistaken.
If you’re interested in this film because you like stories in which a gruff loner goes poaching on other people’s property, shoots a woman when he’s hunting deer, discovers the women had a boxful of bills stashed away, and pretends like he didn’t kill her, then, well, okay, check it out after therapy.
If you’re interested in this film because you’re hoping to recognize your neighbor’s house in West Virginia, then allow me to be the one who breaks it to you that no film is actually filmed in West Virginia.
If you’re interested in this film because you’re hoping to hear some good old Appalachian dialect, then son, you’re plumb out of luck, but you don’t want to see this sigogglin picture anyway.
If you’re interested in this film because Jeffrey Wright got second billing, then, well, I’ve got some bad news for you. I don’t know what numbskull is responsible for this, but Wright got cast as Simon, suicidally alcoholic recent ex-convict and one-time friend of John (Rockwell), and one of the 3.4% non-Hispanic Black or African American citizens of the state. Part of the blame lies on the writers; his best line is: “You know what the end of the world is, Jono? When your heart stops beating, partner; anything else is just a set-back,” a line he speaks remotely from the other end of the telephone. But most of the blame lies on Wright for giving one of the corniest straight performances I have ever seen.
He’s fucking awful. He’s the only part of the film that’s so bad it’s funny, though, so he might be the best reason for seeing it in addition to the worst. He doesn’t make a smart attempt to speak in the local tongue; he mumbles all his lines, for which he has the shoddy alibi that he’s so drunk he can barely speak to begin with, but we know what’s really going on. Somebody better make some GIFs of this dude’s cooky spluttering. He honestly sounds like the guy at the party who’s normally staid and thoughtful until he gets a few drinks in him, at which point he tries to speak in a British accent for ten minutes and is so wildly off-base, as if he can’t hear himself, or hasn’t ever heard a human being speak British, or has lost control of his face, that he cracks everybody up until he pisses them off.
If you’re interested in this film because when you read the following, you think “This is interesting”…
John Moon: Shit.
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John Moon: I’m right here! I’m right here!
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John Moon: I don’t wanna a divorce. I just want my family back.
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…then be my guest.
If you’re interested in this film because you want to be most impressed by the 60-second combined screen-time presence of a deer, then please see this film.
