The Hateful Eight

Quentin Tarantino’s relatively newfound penchant for erratic, overlong period pieces continues with The Hateful Eight, with the film’s pacing problems ultimately rendered moot by a narrative that grows more and more involving as time progresses. The movie follows grizzled bounty hunter John Ruth (Kurt Russell) as he and his latest capture (Jennifer Jason Leigh’s Daisy Domergue) pick up several stragglers and attempt to make their way to a small town, with problems ensuing as a blizzard forces the group to spend the night at a remote cabin occupied by a variety of suspicious individuals (including Tim Roth’s Oswaldo Mobray, Michael Madsen’s Joe Gage, and Bruce Dern’s Sandy Smithers). It’s clear immediately that Tarantino has designed The Hateful Eight to resemble the big-budget epics of yore, as the movie, which opens with an Overture and contains an intermission, has been shot using 70mm film and generally boasts a larger-than-life (and pointedly old-school) feel that’s generally impossible to resist. There’s little doubt, too, that the film benefits substantially from the efforts of a decidedly eclectic cast, with Russell’s typically scene-stealing work here mirrored by a roster of stellar periphery players that includes Walton Goggins, Demian Bichir, and Channing Tatum. The excessive runtime (187 minutes!), however, ensures that The Hateful Eight suffers from a first half that isn’t quite as riveting as Tarantino has surely intended, with the viewer’s initial efforts at wholeheartedly embracing the narrative stymied by a claustrophobic atmosphere – the majority of the movie does, after all, transpire within the aforementioned remote cabin – and a raft of somewhat needless bits of business. It’s just as obvious, however, that the film picks up with a vengeance at around the halfway mark, as Tarantino offers up a flashback and series of revelations that pave the way for an absolutely spellbinding final hour – with the movie’s newfound electrifying vibe heightened by a plot that becomes impressively impossible to predict. The degree to which The Hateful Eight eventually manages to enthrall does, in the end, compensate for the less-than-consistent opening stretch, and it goes without saying that Tarantino remains the foremost purveyor of larger-than-life and unabashedly flamboyant Hollywood fare.

***1/2 out of ****