The Hateful Eight (2015), R, ★★★

Poor Bruce Dern with Russell and Leigh yelling. 

Quentin Tarantino is one of the most versatile filmmakers in the industry and he takes a story into another level of excitement. Pulp Fiction is the quintessential movie in his filmography as far as I'm concerned with balancing the humor and violence in such original fashion and style with a great cast. He also takes another genre and spins it backwards to become an original Tarantino film such as Jackie Brown with the blaxploitation genre, Kill Bill Vol. 1 & 2 with the martial arts genre, Inglourious Basterds in its WWII genre reinventing his own history and Django Unchained in its spaghetii western genre. He has made another spaghetti western with some Reservoir Dogs type of dialogue and story, however, his direction is a bit self-indulgent this time around with his style but it is a fun spaghetti western with original characters having their spotlight.

The movie is divided into six narrative sequences but I will not reveal much about the climax.

In 6-8 years after the Civil War in Wyoming, Major Marquis "The Bounty Hunter" Warren (Samuel L. Jackson) attempts to hitch on a stagecoach when transporting three corpses to Red Rock for a reward. On the stagecoach, he is let aboard by fellow bounty hunter, John "The Hangman" Ruth (Kurt Russell, escorting a fugitive, Daisy "The Prisoner" Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh), alive to collect a $10,000 reward to see her hang.

Also approaching and boarding the stagecoach is Chris "The Sheriff" Mannix (Walton Goggins), who is coincidentally wanting to hitch a ride to Red Rock as he supplies some anecdotes regarding the Mannix Marauders and the War. When they arrive to Minnie's Haberdashery, a stopover for stagecoaches, Bob "The Mexican" (Demian Bichir) says he's looking after the place for a week when his sister, Minnie, is visiting family which causes some suspicions for Warren. Also, we meet Oswaldo "Little Man" Mobray (Tim Roth) who is the hangman, Joe "The Cow Puncher" Gage (Michael Madsen), a quiet cowboy who is on to visit his mother for Christmas and Sanford "The Confederate" Smithers (Bruce Dern), who is an aging former Confederate General. Ruth is suspicious that one of them is going to try to ambush him and release Daisy. Who is it?

Samuel L. Jackson as Marquis "The Bounty Hunter" Warren. 

This is a particularly interesting Western movie with some humor and typical stylized and gory violence we see from Tarantino. However, this is one of his heavier-dialogue movies in his canon and some of the comedic dialogue goes a long way because I felt like that Tarantino stretched the dialogue too long to satisfy the three-hour length. To be honest, I felt that the movie was overlong because of the first half and the unnecessary flashback to satisfy Tarantino's signature filmmaking and overall, it becomes a bit self-indulgent.

This movie is a like a chess game because most of the characters have played villains so we may not know who will be the person who's going to ambush Ruth and Daisy. I'm not giving anything away but one of the actors does a great job of switching his accents around to fulfill his character and trick audiences into thinking maybe he is the person ambushing. However, the ending cheats and I left the movie a bit confused and underwhelmed by the result because we await the standoff, the violence and the dialogue. But, there is not much at stake. It's basically a Clue mystery except with blood.

The cast is excellent as always. Samuel L. Jackson shines as the General reciting some pretty predictable but funny Tarantino dialogue which matches the tone quite well. Kurt Russell, Demian Bichir, Bruce Dern, Michael Madsen are pretty good. Tim Roth is quite tricky with his role that it almost made him a standout. Jennifer Jason Leigh is quite great as a criminal and is the MVP as some sort of serpentine that is holding out in the first half but lets it all out in the second half in blood. She may get an Oscar nomination for her devilish role. And, Walton Goggins delivers some of the best dialogue with great fun.

Even though I was a bit disappointed by the result, it is still an entertaining Tarantino movie. There is some suspense when we near the second half, however, this is the first time that I felt like that the violence was cartoonish and a bit uncomfortable as the heat factor between the characters kick in. But, the movie has some dark humor, surprising elements that we did not see coming and likable characters that we can talk about when talking about the best characters that Quentin Tarantino has written. It is enough to recommend you to see but you will feel a bit let-down by the result as I was but I had a good time.

***