Survival Of The Visual Poetry?

While I’m sure there are a few reading this right about now that are familiar with Alejandro González Iñárritu’s past works, most noticeably with Babel back in 2006, I think it’s fair to say that the general consensus of us were introduced to Iñárritu through his 2014 filmic piece of Birdman, a film that at the time, was going head-to-head with The Grand Budapest Hotel in terms of the award nominations. If you’ve seen Birdman, then it’s not surprising to understand that it is a film that implements the continuous-long takes, provided by Emmanuel Lubezki, which in turn succeeds in creating this extensive and realistic approach which places the viewer in a ‘trapped’ perspective; a perspective that gazes upon Michael Keaton’s character struggling to maintain control of the situation that he is in. In the case of Iñárritu’s latest piece of The Revenant, while it’s unquestionable to deny that this film admirably goes down as being a visually striking artistry that leaves you both in awe of the vast beauty of the gritty environments and questioning how Iñárritu constructed some of these sequences, it would be criminal not to mention the performances of Leonardo DiCaprio and Tom Hardy who both equally offer up interpretations of characters that leave you tense within your seat, even when neither of them say anything. 

Set in the early 19th Century and inspired by true events, The Revenant captures one man’s epic adventure of survival, anguish and revenge. In an expedition of the uncharted American wilderness, frontiersman and fur-trapper Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) and his son Hawk (Forrest Goodluck) join a pelt gathering expedition which gets attacked by the Arikara Native Americans, forcing them to flee to a U.S. fort. While Glass, along with Captain Andrew Henry (Domhnall Gleeson), try to venture back to their base of operations, he is soon mauled by a grizzly bear while hunting for food, and is horribly wounded. Glass’s weak condition from the bear attack, forces some men to stay behind and care for him including the roughneck John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy) and the young and inexperienced Jim Bridger (Will Poulter). After being betrayed by Fitzgerald who not only kills his son, but leaves him in the wintry dirt to wither and die, Glass survives and ventures off into the wilderness. Relying on his insurmountable anger, his passionate love for his family and his passion to live, Glass must navigate and grind through the vicious winter in the hope to find a relentless pursuit to live, and to seek redemption…

While it is well known that The Revenant gained some notoriety in mid-2015 for it’s production problems, thus regarding this film as one of the most challenging shoots in the history of cinema, all of those ‘problems’ that Iñárritu had certainly pay’s off with it’s undeniable grittiness which heavily evokes tense moments for the audience to witness. One of the main formal elements that Iñárritu uses in successfully doing this and making this film such a success in my eyes, is the cinematography executed in pristine fashion by Emmanuel Lubezki. Even though I am someone who studies film at university level and have seen films of the recent and distant past that use the lens of a camera in ways that seem hard to fathom, The Revenant, along with other unique and notable films that employ innovative camera-work, undoubtedly has some of the best camera movement I have seen in modern-cinema. Don’t get me wrong, While Iñárritu in his last film of Birdman very much so adopted this cinematic feature of using the continuous-long-shots to create this realistic atmosphere following the main characters successes and struggles within the context of the film, one of the criticisms that I had with Birdman was how, for me, it was disorientating in segments of the film in the simple fact that the story of that film was situated in one location of the theatre. When I reflect upon Iñárritu’s fresh release of The Revenant, there definitely does seem to be some variety of Lubezki’s camera work other than relying upon the long-takes. This is very much epitomised in the opening sequence of this film as we are introduced with images from a dream; snippets of memories showing a peaceful life which evaporate very quickly in loss of life which transitions away to 2 minute segment of the camera tracking the flow of water and the forest which quickly turns into an action sequence involving the frontiersman and the Native Americans in which the continuous shot is enabled; showing different points of views as the scene goes along. That first sequence, along with other notable scenes within the film, set’s the tone for this gritty story perfectly. It sets up this story of harrowing circumstances through images that are visually pristine and while on the front-foot, it’s a film that is about survival, death and shocking acts of violence which will leave you tense and slightly nervy in your seat, it is a film that cancels out those segments with sections that simply display the scenery of the film which serves to be a good balancing tool as the narrative progresses. While this film that I’m going to mention isn’t anywhere near the poetic beauty that The Revenant has, this balance of seeing the ugly violence and this complexity of man vs. nature, heavily reminds me of Lubezki’s past work of Children of Men (2006) which also employed this blend of long-takes and static shots to bring about this balance within it’s narrative of peace and violence. What was even more impressive to see alongside the cinematography, which all-in-all left me in awe of the shots they were pulling off which left me questioning “how did they do that?” which I mean with sincerity, was the fact that Iñárritu managed to construct this lengthy film with 100% natural lighting. There’s no studio lights used in this film. What they mainly use is very much simplistic methods of lighting, such as fire, the sun, they used real shadows cast by the forest and the tree’s and with saying that, it again hallmarks back to this films grittiness; not just within the constructs of the narrative, but also how they filmed this metaphorical beast of a film.

Beyond the style however, is there any substance to this film? There are attempts where Iñárritu deploys surreal and dreamlike segments which, understandably, doesn’t all ways make sense. Not to disregard the big films that don’t have this within their contexts, but some of the best films often have stories where you have scattered pieces of information and you as the audience watching this film play along, have to figure out what these bits of information are all about. As DiCaprio is crawling around in the dirt and is trying to survive, which is happens to him consistently throughout this film, he often blacks out and has these strange dreams where he’s haunted by events of his past and it has to be said, that it doesn’t always come across very clear; it does come across as pretentious sometimes. What could make this film jarring and perhaps boring for some audiences, is the actual length time being a stretching 2 hours and 30 minutes which for any type of genre film, can be a tad too long. It has to be said that there are part of the 2nd of The Revenant can get a little repetitive with DiCaprio’s character going through the wilderness, which then cuts to a visually stimulating establishing shot, which can lead to a dream sequence that Glass is traumatised by.

Having said that however, it would be criminal to not mention that alongside the successful formal strategies of this film, the performances of both DiCaprio and Tom Hardy can’t go unnoticed. Similar to that of the long-takes and the natural lighting used in this film, the acting and the opposition between DiCaprio and Hardy was very pleasing to see as they both, again, added to the raw themes of this film. This is more applicable with DiCaprio portraying Glass since the majority of the time, he is pretty much grinding through the wintry landscape and is involved in scenes which bring unexpected reactions. A good example of this, without spoiling too much of the film for you all, is a part of a film in which we see DiCaprio’s character rabidly eating a fish that he just grabbed out from the water; essentially becoming the long-lost brother of Gollum. What was also noteworthy about DiCaprio’s performance was his dialogue as most of it pretty much consists of him saying nothing at all, battling the elements, or speaks in a different language. Overall, while in my opinion DiCaprio could get the best Actor nod at the Oscars this year, even if he doesn’t, this performance will be a part of string of successful roles that DiCaprio has played in recent years and is proven to be one of the best actors around due to the fact that he’s committed to each project he’s apart of, as shown in this film. His counterpart in Tom Hardy equally however should be getting praise as well since his performance didn’t remind of a typical Tom Hardy performance; for the majority that we see of him, he is an illusion of what we expect from him and should be getting the same lime-light as DiCaprio. Having not purposefully not doing any research before I went to see this film, it was surprising to see the British duo of Domhnall Gleeson and Will Poulter in this film as well, which is a good thing to see for both actors and perhaps the British film industry? It was surprising to see Gleeson especially since he was also present in the latest Star Wars film and a month later, he appears in The Revenant and it has genuinely been one busy year for him; being in so many film roles which you don’t often see from most recognisable actors.

Having spoken about the films genuine grit and visual beauty which balances well with the Western story motif of revenge and redemption that we see between the two main characters, this film never truly flinches as it embarks to be as real as possible. Although I have already spoken about the opening scene of this film, of how it epitomises what The Revenant is all about, I can’t simply end this review without mentioning the popular discussed scene involving a grizzly bear and how much of an achievement that sequence is as, for me, it goes down as one of the better scenes I have seen in this current age of cinema. I know that’s kind of bold statement to say, considering that anyone could mention other scenes from others films that outclass this specific scene in terms of acting or mise-en-scene etc, but in terms of sitting in the cinema in which you are tensed up watching a man essentially fighting and out-smarting a grizzly bear, this segment of the film definitely makes the list of being one of the most tense parts of any film. I could go on to mention ‘how Iñárritu constructed this sequence’ and so on, but it would be injustice to do this as I have no idea how they this. What I was also impressed by, and this goes for most parts of the film as well, is the intricate and subtle use of CGI and how it smartly adds to this realistic aesthetic that Iñárritu was going for. The actual bear for instance, is something that I thought was well constructed, especially since it’s a roughly long-take in which we see the bear from all angles.

By summarising all that has been said, The Revenant definitely is the definition of a recent film that imbues visual poetry in the most primal form. It’s a film that stands to be an improvement from Iñárritu’s previous work of Birdman in the simple fact that the cinematography, crafted by Lubezki, is more varied with tracking-shots and static shots which help really create a visually stimulating film that is mesmerising to look at in the cinemas. What makes the visuals bitter-sweet, are the performances that we mainly see from DiCaprio and Hardy as they bot set up this gritty narrative theme of revenge in a gritty and tense fashion. It’s a rarity I think for most people going to the cinemas these days in which people leave thinking, ‘how did they do that’, and The Revenant is an exception to the norm as it’s a film that I recommend you all, go and see…

And on that note, it’s time for me to end my first film review of 2016. As always, thank-you to everyone who’s stopped by reading this review and have enjoyed reading what I have said about The Revenant. If any of you have an opinion on my review or of the film itself, then you’re more than welcome to post a comment down below in comments section. Before I depart, I would like to talk about one thing which is about this Blog ‘The Rabbitte Perspective’ potentially being in the U.K. Blog Awards 2016. Unfortunately, I do have to say that ‘The Rabbitte Perspective’ didn’t make the final cut for the awards and, you know, that’s okay. While I could be disheartened about the fact that I didn’t make the final cut, for one, I kind of knew that I would have needed a miracle to get to that stage since there are many popular U.K. Bloggers out there, and two, I’m just genuinely appreciative of the fact that people had voted for me and I can’t thank-you all enough for the support. I think that’s all I have to say now, thank-you once again for checking out my latest film review of The Revenant and thank-you for those who voted for me for the U.K. Blog Awards, it really means a lot. I’ll be back next week with the review of Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens FINALLY!! haha. Until then, have a good week and Adieu!!

★ ★ ★ ★ ☆ – Alex Rabbitte