Man Vs. Nature

Movies: The Revenant

It's very likely that you've already heard all there is to hear about Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu's The Revenant and formed an opinion about it. This review probably won't offer many surprises. Simply put, The Revenant is overly long and somewhat boring. It has beautiful scenery and a compelling, solid performance by Leonardo DiCaprio that will inevitably land him a Best Actor Oscar this year, not so much for this particular performance, but for all the amazing work he's done since, well, What's Eating Gilbert Grape.

Some people were blown away by The Revenant, but I thought it was simply good. For one thing, the 156 minute running time is unnecessary. 20-30 minutes could have easily been shaved off the film and it would still be the exact same film. Secondly, I have to say that Leo's character, real-life fur-trapper Hugh Glass, is not all that interesting. Certainly, Glass's story is mind-blowing: he was mauled by a bear during a hunting expedition and left for dead by Fitzgerald and Bridger, two men commanded to watch over him. He survived the mauling and pursued the men for 200 miles. The film adds the (fictional?) plot line of Fitzgerald (played by Tom Hardy) killing Glass's half-Pawnee son, Hawk, which gives Glass extra motivation to survive. But apart from watching Leo's Glass hang on to life by the skin of his teeth, there's not a lot of...depth here.

On the other hand, Hardy gives an interesting and entertaining performance as Fitzgerald. He's the villain of the movie (second only to cruel Mother Nature, of course) but more incredibly self-centered than evil. My favorite scenes were hands down the ones with Hardy, as he manipulates the Bridger (Will Poulter) into leaving Glass for dead and teaches the young man some rather hard knocks of life.

Glass faces so many challenges that it's difficult to believe. After surviving the bear attack (which is a GREAT scene by the way), he avoids starving by eating marrow out of dead bison bones. He nearly drowns in a river. He is chased by Native Americans on horseback. He rides that same horse OVER A CLIFF, survives, and uses the dead horse's carcass as a sleeping bag of sorts so that he doesn't freeze to death. Now, I haven't read anything other than the Wikipedia article on Hugh Glass, but holy shit I don't know if I believe the guy rode a horse over a cliff and lived. In any case, I literally laughed out loud in the theatre when that happened because it seemed so ridiculous to me.

Leo wheezes and grunts as he toils and suffers through his journey. Apparently, he did a lot of suffering for the film in real life, working in freezing conditions and eating raw meat. He definitely committed to it and deserves all the awards he gets. Leo is known for his intensity onscreen, though I prefer movies where he has more than 10 lines of dialogue.

Ultimately, The Revenant is exactly what most people will expect it to be: a brutal film that juxtaposes the extreme beauty of nature with its extreme not-giving-a-shit about human life and comfort. The main thing I took away from The Revenant is that nature is a bitch that wants you to die. And when you're out in the wilderness, lost and injured as Glass was, you're just part of the food chain.

Grade: B-