Bone Tomahawk

Bone Tomahawk, directed by S. Craig Zahler, is what I consider to be a slow burn to a very dramatic ending with intense violence and bloodshed. In some ways this reminded me of Clint Eastwood’s The Unforgiven, though with a different story line, a different cast, a first-time director, and a really small budget. If this film had had a larger budget and Clint's name as the Director, I can almost guarantee that it would be up for all kinds of awards, including an Oscar.Some viewers, because of the film’s slow beginning, aren’t going to like the movie. That’s okay with me. I loved it, and how the film took the time to introduce the main characters with their strengths and weaknesses. It also helped that the posse was led by Kurt Russell (aka Wyatt Earp). He somehow managed to keep the film in balance between over-acting and the comedy elements interjected at different points in the film. Richard Jenkins (Deputy Chicory) brings in the humor with his wit and comedic tales. In fact, Jenkins nearly steals the movie right out from under everybody else.This is the story of a few citizens of Bright Hope being kidnapped by cannibalistic savages that dwell in the mountainous caves about five days from the small town. One of the people kidnapped is the beautiful Dr. O’Dwyer (Lili Simmons). Her husband is determined to get her back alive with or without the help of the town. Kurt Russell plays Sheriff Franklin Hunt, who gathers four men (not nearly enough for a posse) to go after the Indians and their captives on a rescue mission. Joining the posse are Deputy Chicory (Richard Jenkins), Arthur O’Dwyer (Patrick Wilson), and gunslinger and Indian killer, John Brooder (Edward Fox). I really liked the character of John Brooder. He was a no-nonsense kind of man who would just as soon shoot you as argue.As the posse goes after the Indians, you begin to learn about the crippled Arthur O’Dwyer and his determination to save his wife. Though you hate the character of John Brooder at first, you come to appreciate his knowledge of killers and the West, and to understand what happened in his past to make him the way he is. Deputy Chicory, who had to fight to get the Sheriff to let him come along, offers the comedic relief for the movie’s intense moments, giving the audience his insights into what’s happening with his funny one-liners and also the tale of the flea circus that he once saw.Now the Indians, or Troglodytes, are fearful savages out of your worst nightmare. They’re huge and tall, and eagerly fight to the death. You don’t want to be one of their prisoners because these Indians are cannibals and have unique, but violent ways of killing their captives and later eating them.When the posse finally confronts the Troglodytes, the battle that ensues is not what you expect; nor, is the ending. This is an in-your-face kill or be killed fight with no holds barred. What happens will literally take your breath away in horrific shock and maybe even give you a nightmare or two.Bone Tomahawk never showed in the theater I frequent. So, I had to wait for the DVD to come out in order to see the movie. There are certainly things that viewers and critics might not like about the film. There’s very little music in the background, which I believe is due to the low budget. The movie is a long one with most of the action at the end. The ending is definitely not what a viewer would expect. And, the cutting and editing of the film is clearly by a first-time director, though the actual editor helped the director to put together the best movie possible;.Now, given all of that, I still loved the film. This was a movie that was made from the passion of its director and cast and crew. Nobody made any money off of this. Still, this is type of film that will eventually become a cult classic in a big way. I certainly enjoyed the actors in each role and thought they did a magnificent job in bringing their characters to life. All of them played a vital part in the movie. Though Kurt Russell is the star and does a tremendous job of playing the low keyed, man-of-few-words hero, all of the other actors certainly brought their A-List performances to the making of this film. The director clearly did an excellent job when you consider the fact that there wasn’t much of a budget for him to work with, or to pay the cast and crew.This was definitely a Western film in the biggest sense of the term. Word of mouth will soon spread about this excellent, low budget movie, and people will be buying the DVD or seeing it on Netflix. Keep in mind that some will not like it, but those that do will rave about it to others. Bone Tomahawk is going to be one of those films that develop a life of its own on DVD much like Ed Harris’ Appaloosa has and John Carpenter’s The Thing. This movie is not for the squeamish. Make no mistake about that. The ending will stay with you long after the film is over.Oh, and the DVD has nearly an hour of Behind-the-Scenes information on the making of the movie, along with questions and answers from the cast and crew.For me, this is the best type of picture to see…one that makes you ponder and think and question.Highly recommended!

Well fleshed out characters who bring it the entire movie. You will love the characters and the stunning outcome of their rescue. Gross stuff but the movie is a wild ride.

Fans of "spaghetti westerns" and Italian cannibal films a la Rugerro Deodato (remember 1980's "Cannibal Holocaust," the self-proclaimed most controversial film ever?) will be intrigued by this mash-up of two seemingly disparate genres. Clearly influenced by John Ford's classic 1954 western "The Searchers," Kurt Russell's crusty yet polite character, Sheriff Hunt, leads an ad hoc posse of western-film stereotypes including an old duffer deputy, Chickory (Richard Jenkins), a dandy gunslinger (Matthew Fox) and a hapless cowboy foreman with a broken leg, Arthur (Patrick Wilson) whose wife, a young doctor names Samantha (Lili Simmons) has been kidnapped by a band of "troglodytes" along with Deputy Nick (Evan Jonigkeit) and a wounded, suspicious drifter named Purvis (David Arquette). Much of the film is dedicated to the arduous journey west these four men must take to find the missing trio, an aspect of the film that many viewers elsewhere have complained vociferously about, but in fact, it is this part of the film is probably the most important, providing the insights into the characters of each individual (yes, actual character development). Once the lair of the mysterious cave dwellers is found, the film morphs into a gruesome cannibal drama strongly reminiscent of the above referenced Deodato gory schlock-fest, only here it is mud-slathered mutated giants with bone inserts in their vocal chords to allow them to produce a bone-chilling, bestial roar that eat people instead of mud-slathered Amazonian Indians without bone inserts who eat people. The transition is sudden and shocking, particularly the over-the-top fate of poor Deputy Nick in his preparation for dinner (with him as the main course). Again, like Deodato, no graphic detail of the torture, scalping, or human bisection is spared, but in spite of the horror, it seems less gratuitous, almost being done with a wink and a nod to a genre of Italian cinema in the early 1980s that most typical viewers of Westerns might be completely unaware of, which I believe is the whole point.It is clear that the budget for this film was virtually non-existent (one source quoted under $2 million), and must have been a labor of love for actors of Russell's and Jenkin's caliber. In fact, it is these two actors' skill at their craft that holds the film together. Russell returns to a type of role he has not tasted since "Tombstone" and it is prescient of that of the bounty hunter he plays in Quentin Tarantino's "The Hateful Eight" which was released not long after "Bone Tomahawk." David Arquette is appropriately slimy as Purvis, as is Sid Haig as "Buddy", the latter being the first to taste the wrath of the "troglodytes" at the film's beginning.One interesting aspect of this film is its political correctness regarding the subject of the "savages" portrayed in this film that in earlier, less culturally conscious times would have been relegated to a particularly naughty group of Indians. However, we are told with great authority that the cannibals are not Native Americans by the only educated man in the small Texas town of Bright Hope (the small town where this saga unfolds), a man who is referred to as "the Professor," clearly a Native American himself who, after studying an arrow recovered from a stash of items hidden by Purvis, claims that the kidnappers are actually "troglodytes" (a term for cave dwellers derived from the Greek word for "hole"), non-Indian mutants who have been eschewed by his people for millennia. Bright Hope was clearly one of the most progressive social communities in the Wild West!"Bone Tomahawk" is one of those films people will either love for its quirky, dark-humored mash-up of low-budget Italian pulp Westerns (with a touch of John Ford)-meets-late 1980's-cannibal films, or hate it for its somewhat plodding pace and horrific ending with one particularly unsettling death scene (not for young children, please). I liked this odd first-time writer/director S. Craig Zahler's twisted homage to two film genres that we would never expect to see intersect with one another. One thing I would change about the film would be its locations ( it was clearly shot in the foothills north of Los Angeles where it would be cheapest), where ground supposedly unexplored has obviously been recently plowed and graded by heavy equipment (complete with spoil pile mounds evident). A more appropriate and visually pleasing filming locale would have been in and around Red Rock Canyon State Park, only two hours north of Los Angeles; maybe it would not have been Monument Valley, but it would have provided a more convincing landscape.