Hostiles – No need to hold on to your hats

If the film title ‘Snakes on a Plane’ told the audience everything they needed to know about the story, ‘Hostiles’ goes the other way entirely.  Is it set in space?  Or the Second World War?  Or is it about hostile bacteria invading the human body?  Well, despite its pretty much nondescript title, it’s actually set in the blood-thirsty days of 1892 and a battle-hardened soldier (Christian Bale) is reluctantly charged with the task of escorting some newly-released Native American prisoners across the country where the sickly eldest of which now wishes to die in his homeland.  Therefore the cast is divided into the group of soldiers and the group of Native Americans, who naturally butt heads more than once along the way.  This is largely because Bale’s elderly ‘prisoner’ was responsible for many of Bale’s former friends in the force.

This certainly sets up the story nicely for plenty of tension between the two groups, but – and I hope I’m not spoiling this too much – you can kind of see where the plot is going to go from the opening scene.  And, while we’re on the subject of the opening five minutes, I have to point out that it’s one of the most grisly and disturbing scenes I’ve seen in mainstream cinema in a long time.  For there’s another bunch of Comanche Native Americans on the prowl who are more than happy to scalp anyone – and that includes fellow Native Americans – who they come across.  They wipe out a local farming community leaving only Rosamund Pike’s character alive until the main cast stumble across what remains of her home.  So, you can probably guess that Bale’s team will have to bury his differences with his captives in order to survive the journey.

Now, Bale is no stranger to ‘carrying’ a film on his own and, I’m pleased to say after the ‘blip’ that was ‘Terminator: Salvation,’ he looks like he’s confident to do it once more.  This really is his film and I found him the most interesting of all the cast.  He’s a battle-hardened soldier who’s no stranger from murdering those Native Americans he’s now forced to protect.  However, as brutal as he is to those he deems ‘savage,’ he shows nothing but total respect and compassion to the ‘victim’ Rosamund Pike and he seems to anticipate her feelings with a degree of empathy that isn’t often seen when the character is supposed to be some sort of ‘grunt’ in the military.

The film looks great and the director has clearly taken a lot of care and attention to crafting each shot.  However, don’t expect the film to be that fast-paced.  Just because there are some moments of action and gore, the setting doesn’t lend itself to anything really ‘high-octane’ that’s on a par with other action scenes in today’s cinema.  Plus the film is long and, as much as I enjoyed it, the length may well put me off from watching it again any time soon.  I reckon if you cut about fifteen minutes out of the story (mainly in the final act) you’d have a much tighter piece that would still have focused on the characters’ journey as they are forced to grow together.

Don’t expect an ‘action/adventure,’ but do expect a slow-moving character piece in a ‘Wild West’ kind of backdrop.  Another good one for Christian Bale’s CV.

7/10 if I woke up on Groundhog Day and had to watch this again, I could live with that