The Worst Film Ever

good back-story, and good acting

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

When you see the horrible opening sequence of the movie and you see the hate going around, you can't help wondering about the circle of violence. It creates new hate, new action and new fights amongst each other. It doesn't seem to stop. It's anything but black and white (no pun intended to any skin colors) but has quite some grey areas.You can see and you will be able to correctly guess the journey of Christian Bales story. His path, his way and how he perceives things. There is tension, which is obvious and from that tension a lot of interesting situation arise. Being able to do your duty, but also seeing a change in behavior. The movie has quite some brutal, explicit violence in it, but it also does a lot of things that may give you pause to think. It is not an easy movie to watch, not just because of that, but also because it is generally slow paced. This will not be everyones cup of tea ... actually with its raw and down and dirty nature it is anything but a cup of tea ...

That is vicious! That must have been at least an R rating immediately.Good mouth plan.Books, the smart phone of the Old West.Raisins and pickles for a month?! Oh my lord.A fort without walls?Very high attrition rate.

The opening scene is reminiscent of "The Outlaw Josey Wales", but instead of the male head of household surviving a savage attack by Comanche Rattlesnakes, it's the wife who bears witness to the brutal murder of her husband and three children. She alone survives the furious onslaught, later to be discovered by a traveling band of soldiers escorting a dying Cheyenne War Chief to his ancestral home in Montana's Valley of the Bears. It's fascinating to observe all the passion and nuance Rosamund Pike puts into her roles. She became a favorite of mine for her scintillating portrayal in "Gone Girl", while here she displays all the torment and grief of a woman confronted by the incalculable loss of her entire family.It's often observed that the modern day Western is dead, but films like "Bone Tomahawk" and "Slow West" prove that you can't bury the genre just yet. "Hostiles" achieves powerful resonance in it's portrayal of former warrior adversaries adjusting to the passing ways of the Old West. Set in 1892, the story follows Captain Joseph Blocker (Christian Bale) as he leads a small cavalry party northward on a mission to deliver a former enemy and his family to their territorial homeland. Cheyenne warrior Yellow Hawk (Wes Studi) appears to have buried his own personal animosities while having been held captive at Fort Berringer. His early offer of help to Blocker to survive a savage band of roving Comanches is eventually accepted in good faith after the shackled chief and his son Black Hawk (Adam Beach) fight valiantly to defend themselves and their soldier escorts. Throughout the film, the effects of a brutal past in the soldier life of both Captain Blocker and his Master Sergeant Tommy Metz (Rory Cochrane) are given over to brooding contemplation. The way each man deals with it tested along the way via various dangerous encounters. It's some of those thoughtful scenes in which director Scott Cooper chooses to steady the pace of the film to examine the conflict in the expressions of Blocker, Metz, and Roslaie Quaid (Pike). For that reason, some viewers will criticize the picture for being too slow or boring, but for this viewer, those moments offer the added dimension of personal, inner turmoil that makes the story so poignant.If there's an element I would criticize in the story it would be the apparently abrupt transition of Rosalie Quaid from shattered housewife to a functioning member of the Blocker party. Given the time constraints a director must face, it would have been difficult to effect such a change no matter what length the movie might have gone. What I did find encouraging though was the manner in which the picture concluded. It would have been far too easy and cliched for Blocker to effect an overt relationship with Ms. Quaid. The way Blocker boarded the Chicago bound train reflected his own conflicted ambiguity about leaving his violent and brutal past behind. I thought that was an effective way to end the story.One last thought. I always keep an eye and ear open for the names of Indian characters in films like this. In this case, most of them were not unusually descriptive. You had the aforementioned Yellow Hawk and Black Hawk, along with their family members Elk Woman and Living Woman. However I was pleasantly surprised to check the cast list and learn the name of the young actor who portrayed Black Hawk's son, Little Bear. It's Xavier Horsechief - I mean, really, how cool is that?

Dances With Wolves, Hostiles, Woman Walks Ahead, and Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee, and this film should all be viewed in order to get a fairly well-rounded picture of what actually happened in the late 19th Century with the removal of the Indians from their homelands. This one stands out as the best of all four because of the brutal honesty and the in-depth study of the main characters. With Dances With Wolves, many of us are tempted to utterly hate the U.S. Army and see them as evil paper-doll cutouts worthy only of burning, but the soldiers in this film are real people. They explain why they had to be brutal. Now we all know that war is wrong for any reason, and that there is always a better way to go about doing business with people perceived to be the enemy. However, once in the middle of it, what does one do when he witnesses firsthand a violent tribe of aboriginals doing everything they can to protect their homeland, which includes killing him and his fellow soldiers? He has no choice at that point other than to become just as violent. Well, maybe he does have a choice. Dances With Wolves (the Costner character) becomes an Indian. That is a possibility, but during this era one would have had to go deep into Canada to maintain the lifestyle. In any case, the soldiers in this film were burdened by what they had been told to do by the U.S. Gov't. There is one beautiful scene which fully supports the idea that God is still in control, and the person speaking the truth becomes the light for the whole film, the whole story.