Hell Or High Water review: “Fearless and fulfilling…”

Hell Or High Water review: David MacKenzie follows up his prison drama Starred-Up with this impressive modern western from the writer of Sicario.

Our Hell Or High Water review is from the Cannes Film Festival, 2016.

Hell Or High Water review

David MacKenzie is gradually developing himself as being one of the most various, most exciting film-makers working today. After starting out with the likes of Young Adam with Ewan McGregor in 2003, before going on to the romantic drama Hallam Foe and then the hard-hitting Starred-Up in 2014, MacKenzie has dropped something quite different on Cannes with Hell and High Water, which plays in Un Certain Regard.

The film, set deep in the heart of west-Texas, revolves around two bungling bank robber brothers Toby (Chris Pine) and Tanner (Ben Foster), who must, over the course of a few days, get together around $40,000 to pay off debts relating to the estate of their late mother. The immediacy is down to the fact that the family ranch, which is due to go directly into a trust for Toby’s children, and which is full of untapped oil, will be repossessed if all of the debts are not paid off in time. Tanner, straight out of prison, has agreed to assist the more docile and straight-shooting Toby with some muscle to pull of the feat, before the banks step in and take their property. On the trail of the two brothers is Texas Ranger Marcus (Jeff Bridges), a law enforcement officer quite literally just a few hours from retirement and a solitary life rocking in a chair on his porch at home.

Hell Or High Water review

Hell Or High Water starts off not too dissimilar in tone to one of the other great crime capers that we’ve witnessed at Cannes this week, Shane Black’s pitch black comedy The Nice Guys. At the forefront of the story, we have two characters up to their neck in it, though clearly have no clue what they’re doing. Hell Or High Water, like The Nice Guys, has a very comedic element to it, and we were, on more than one occasion, laughing out loud at the calamities that both Toby and Tanner get up to over the course of the film’s 100 minute running time. Jeff Bridges too is in full caricature mode as the rugged cowboy ranger who spouts very comedic, though almost undistinguishable dialogue (a bit like his Rooster Coburn in the True Grit remake) which almost always ends in a witty one liner. There is however, more of a darker undertone running through MacKenzie’s film, which is cemented in the film’s bloody climax – and at certain points, truly shocks.

The film runs pretty tight, a very well paced effort with some fantastic cinematography of a Texas we may not recognise at first. Gone is the dusty, rusty cowboy playground, replaced with a greener landscape, all perfectly captured with Giles Nuttgens‘ camera. The screenplay is also very, very good – what would you expect from the gifted Taylor Sheridan, the writer responsible for last year’s award favourite Sicario.

Hell Or High Water review

Ben Foster continues on his gradual rise, another fine performance as the slightly warped Tanner, and Chris Pine channels his best Brad Pitt impression with the slightly more reserved Toby. Both are really good in this. Bridges is clearly having as much of a good time as his character and commands every scene he’s in with the slightly racist banter between Marcus ans his long-suffering partner Bear.

I had a hoot with this film – a very mainstream, very modern western that grabs hold of you for its duration. MacKenzie continues to deliver quality content in a career that is one to keep an eye on – purely for his brave choices and his fearless quality on taking on something completely different with each film he makes. A really decent and totally fulfilling modern-day crime/ cowboy movie.

Hell Or High Water review by Paul Heath, Cannes Film Festival, 2016.

Hell Or High Water will be in 2016.