The Hateful Eight (2015)

Director: Quentin Tarantino

Writer: Quentin Tarantino

Composer:  Ennio Morricone

Starring: Samuel L. Jackson, Kurt Russell, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Walton Goggins, Demian Bichir, Tim Roth, Michael Madsen, Bruce Dern, James Parks, Dana Gourrier, Zoe Bell, Lee Horsley, Gene Jones, Keith Jefferson, Craig Stark, Belinda Owino, Channing Tatum, Arnar Valur Halldorsson, Quentin Tarantino

More info: IMDb

Tagline: No One Comes Up Here Without a Damn Good Reason

Plot: In the dead of a Wyoming winter, a bounty hunter and his prisoner find shelter in a cabin currently inhabited by a collection of nefarious characters.

My rating: 8/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

I'm a huge fan of Tarantino and I was really excited for this one because he's finally doing a full-on Western (well, sorta) and it's got Walton Goggins among other great actors.  I've been a fan of Goggins for years and I can't get enough of this cat.  He's great.  The cast is excellent which is par for the course.  Tarantino always gets top notch performances out of his actors.  Don't go into this expecting a Western in that you'll get to spend lots of time admiring the beautiful scenery of the American West and see lots of the things you'd normally get.  Nope.  Nearly all of the three hours is inside one cabin.  I didn't get to see it in 70 mm but watching it on a regular screen, it didn't seem to matter much as most of it is inside.  The story is fun and the last hour is where most of the fun and action is.  The film flies by and those first two hours go a long way in setting up the tension that builds to a climax for that last act.  When Zoe Bell pops on the screen she brings the smiles as wide as Montana and she's as adorable as can be.  She needs to have my babies...and act in more movies.  Jackson proves yet again how much he can bring to a movie.  He's great.  Walton Goggins has a much bigger role than I expected and, if I remember right, he's the only character with a discernible arc.  The ending is great and it's got Tarantino's sense of humor all over it.  I'm really looking forward to seeing it again but that might have to wait until the Blu-ray comes out.  One final note (as it were).  I read that Morricone was only able to provide the film with a theme specifically composed for it.  For the rest of it he offered Tarantino to use his unused orchestral score for John Carpenter's THE THING (1982).  For that film he wrote two score and Carpenter threw out the orchestral one in favor of the electronic one used in the film.  That's perfectly fine but Tarantino, in interviews, briefly mentions this but takes great pride in repeating that Morricone wrote an original score for his film which is barely true.  Then the other night the score wins the Golden Globe for best score.  I'm not sure about the rules of that award but only the theme was composed for the film.  Tarantaino picked up the award on the composer's behalf and raved and raved about it.  I just think the reigns need to be pulled in on the importance of the music so people know that it was mostly written for a film thirty plus years ago, that's all.  It was nice, though, hearing a score for a Tarantino picture that was more or less more consistent than the, albeit, great uses of miscellaneous tracks he's used before.