The Dear Hunter.
121 Mins. Starring: Colin Farrell, Nicole Kidman, Barry Keoghan, Raffey Cassidy, Sunny Suljic, Bill Camp & Alicia Silverstone. Director: Yorgos Lanthimos.
Dear oh deer. It seems in today's world revenge is a dish brutally served colder than a operating table where someone now resting in peace used to lay in the clinical and calculated, captivating thriller and dark and disturbing pyschological horror of 'The Killing Of A Sacred Deer'. Vegans fear not. No deers where harmed in the making of this movie. Not even a Milwaukee Buck. But in this Cincinatti clinic some humans hurt some more in this hospital bedside, mild-manner that tries to examine the depth of the human condition under a microscope that just a regular X-ray just won't show in all it's gray matter. It looks like Irish actor Colin Farrell and director Yorgos Lanthimos really are each others 'Lobster' Phoebes. Because here this Doctor and director bring us a Greek like tragedy of unfathomable decision in the same tense and taught vein as the choice Meryl Streep had to make as 'Sophie'. And here after giving us a manufactured dating world, future fable and modern parable in the maddening oddity of the love in the face of boiling cauldron in 'The Lobster' (that really did display cruelty to animals...or was that humans?), they reunite as Farrell does with Australian Academy actress Nicole Kidman after Colin chose between here and the likes of Elle Fanning and Kirsten Dunst in 'Lost In Translation' director Sofia Coppola's classic remake of Clint Eastwood's act in 'The Beguiled' (coincidentally this is the first film this writer watched without a trailer tease since Colin and Nicole's last one and trust it from me it makes it all the more, fellow A24 picture 'Moonlight' like mesmerizing). But this time Farrell's decision making process is much more forlorn and born from love and not lust as all these perfect partnerships come together for a big-three picture. And one of epic, explosive nuclear family proportions matching those of the bible on your bedside table, as this raw wrath of revenge in bloodied surgical gloves really does go for the jugular of your every emotion and sense of being.
A movie of the year 'A Ghost Story' (also A24. A+ guys!) like, hauntingly beautiful operatic opening in blackness that seems to last for a whole aria (so much so that you may just leave your seat to tell the usher the screens on the fritz before this one reaches a standing ovation), cumilates into an out of nowhere surgeons eye-view of an open heart procedure that beats as yours palpitates. And from there you are as captivated as the stirring strings of this scintillating score to not look away for a second like your life, or the one of the one you loved depended on it. Now like too many cooks looking over a broth, we don't want to spoil the plot. But here's a little stock set-up. Colin's character is one of surgical precision like a sought after wrist watch with a metal strap thats water resistant at a depth more than 100 meters. Stay with us. Even if that's what his mind is on in time. This recovering alcoholic with a cider beard that is as the millennial girls say; "goals", has a case of malpractice on his hands after failing to save a patient whilst under the Jack and coke influence. Now despite looking out for the family his shaking hands tore apart, the son of the dearly departed wants more than a mentoring father figure even if that is his replacement ravaged goal for him and his widowed, weeping willow strong mother. Now in true old testament style this kid who barely looks like he has any hair on his arms (cue that deer hunting beard) blood-lust wants an eye for an eye. But he's never killed anyone before. But if you who know has I bet you can tell what's coming next? Or can you?! As plauged with the most purile and pathological problem a domestically disturbed husband and father could ever possibly have, Farrell is forced to perform a procedure so out of his power or even the heart of his bruised and battered (not to mention memory serves, alcohol soaked) soul to do so. And taking his own life by his own beautiful, surgical hands is so far from an option that it's not even considered. Yes this movie is insane on a maddening 'mother!' Jennifer Lawrence scale. Yes it is even crueller to boot. But his somehow beautifully bleak, weird wonder that's slashed lip kissing cousins with it's 'Lobster' pincer holder is gripping in its gravitas and its grounding, cut-throat nature with cold metal implementation.
Lanthimos has us from the "I'll explain this quickly" go before he takes his terrifyingly taught and twisted time with each turn of plot. In this harrowing hour by hour horror that haunts us like the open, one shot hospital corridor left and rights that show us how chillingly lonely this place and life really can be when your permanent residence ends up right here between the ice white changed sheets. Whether professional or personally in patient. Yorgos unamiously has us as the next, direct directing great of hidden meaning and destroying depths just like the arrival of the current best in the business in the form of the 'Enemy' and 'Prisoners' arresting Denis Villeneuve who has truly illuminated the mainstream with this years neon lights blockbuster best in the '2049' sequel of 'Blade Runner'. And here the closest thing to Kubrick today brings his favourite Irishman off the whiskey to show that the ever underrated Colin Farrell is ever one of the greats of our generation of acting. A far cry from the also android and sheep Phillip K. Dick rewrote 'Minority Report' and 'Total Recall' days of his electric dreams youth, Colin with this in collaboration with 'The Lobster' and 'The Beguiled' is at his bravest and best ever since he was 'In Bruges'. And for all the socially akward, clinical dialogue served in stunted monotone mannerisms for dramatic and nuclear home caustic effect in this distracted age, the weathered and worn character Colin Farrell brings to the forefront is the most evokingly effecting. Even with a fellow 'Beguiled' Nicole Kidman by his side. The 'Lion' Academy Award nominated actress who is about to be a Queen in the 'Aquaman' adaptation of the 'Justice League' has a career on cruise control right now in 2017. From the big screen to even the linings of the small one (see the smart phone screen standouts of native 'Top Of The Lake' and Renee Zellwegger's 'Big Little Lies' for truth proof), but here hauntingly heartfelt she's barely been better in this smaller but nore significant big picture. Mothering two children coupled together by madness in the stranger things happening to Natalie Dyer lookalike and 'Tomorrowland' actress Raffey Cassidy and new kid on the block for tomorrow Sunny Suljic, looking for a brighter day. But even though these kids are more than alright, it's 'Trespass Against Us' actor Barry Keoghan who really is grown as this fellow Irishmen goes from sharing an odd charm with Farrell to being his every nightmare in ways you wouldn't exepect at all. What starts as the most concerningly bizarre partnership turns into a thing thankfully a million miles from sexual, but intead something that really does f### with you even more. If you felt sorry for this kid Barry in 'Dunkirk' then after this you won't anymore. But boy is this young man even bolder and better than he was in Nolan's war for the bringing of our boys from the beaches. Almost convincingly too good. Perfectly peculiar like a Dane DeHaan or Charlie Heaton second coming of strange. He show steals from a classic caliber cast that even features a brilliant Billy Camp (who recently has done the rounds over the years with the likes of 'Lawless', 'Public Enemies', 'Black Mass', '12 Years A Slave', 'Loving', 'Midnight Special' et al) and 'Clueless' actress Alicia Silverstone bordering on 'Bates Motel' like motherhood stuck in one cameoing housebound, homecooked dinner and a movie scene that really does feel like 'Groundhog Day', but aren't you glad you visited again? But as this film finally comes round to a day by day, waking hour, sleepless night awakening end, friends Farrell and Lanthimos make a deer rifle killing. In something sickeningly twisted but cinematically sacred. And what a cross to bear that is. What a choice it is in this life my dear. TIM DAVID HARVEY.
Further Filming: 'The Lobster', 'The Beguiled', 'A Cure For Wellness'.
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