The Hateful Eight (Roadshow)

The 420th film I have seen in theaters…

Tarantino Does it again!

Eight people are trapped in a mountain trading post during a blizzard in the old west. One man is shackled to a woman, a fugitive worth $10,000. There is a mole, maybe more, planted in this post. Their job is to bust her out. Will the “good guys” find him/them in time?

Samuel L Jackson is “The Bounty Hunter”, former Union Cavalry officer who hunts bounties in Wyoming. He is his usual awesome self in this. No one writes for Jackson like Tarantino. Like Christoph Waltz, he was meant to make movies with Quentin.

Kurt Russell is “The hangman”, a bounty hunter that always brings them in alive to be hung. A far rougher character than he usually plays. He is not a nice guy. His vomiting scene was amazing.

Jennifer Jason Leigh is “The Prisoner”. This is a performance to be remembered. Her work throughout this film, but particularly after Intermission was stellar.

Walton Goggins plays “The Sherrif”. He’s been around for a long time and this might be his best film role. I hope he continues the great work seen here. Scene stealer.

The great Bruce Dern is “The Confederate”. An old General traveling to Wyoming to have a symbolic funeral for his son. This guy can act his way out of anything, and is a worthy addition to this cast. I could not be happier at his late career resurgence since “Big Love”.

Ah, Tim Roth returns to Tarantino as “The little man”. Subtle performance throughout that also is amazingly well used.

The great Michael Madsen is “The cow puncher”. I love this guy. His personal demons tend to get in his way, but Madsen always finds his way back in amazing parts. Another great performance.

James Parks is the O.B. the stagecoach driver. A small role that works really well.

Demian Bichir is Bob, “The Mexican”. Fantastic performance. Excellent playing off of Sam Jackson.

Channing Tatum is also in this movie.

Although I could not find a picture from the film, it is ALWAYS great to see Zoe Bell on screen, here as Six-Horse Judy. She was the stuntwoman for Xena, and “The Bride” in Kill Bill.

Not as great as Inglorious Bastards or Django, but in the same league as those two. This is a different animal though, almost like Tarantino wrote a Broadway play, characters all in one room, or a couple of locations, for the entire film. A situation where his knack for dialogue can really shine.

The casting was perfect. The cinematography was beautiful. he even got Ennio Morricone to write his first music for a Western in 40 years.

70MM filming and Cinerama projection was a cool thing to do. The movie had an old school musical Overture, and Intermission to give everyone a chance to refill their cups (which i did at my booze friendly theater). They even gave out cool program books (also as things were done at Roadshow screenings back in the day)

I do wonder how some of those beautiful shots would have looked in crisp HD projection, but I cannot complain. It looked great in flickering 24 frames per second in ultra wide format.

It was a true experience, and the movie lived up to the extra bells and whistles.

A must see!

My Rankings