Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu follows up the Oscar-winning Birdman with another punitive plot, albeit a very different one. The writer-director, along with The Hole’s Mark L, Smith, adapts Michael Punke’s novel to pile misery on top of misery on his lead again in this Jeremiah Johnson by way of Sam Peckinpah gritty western. The Revenant is an endurance test for DiCaprio’s hapless frontier scout, and he deserves an Oscar nomination not only for the steely determination on show but for what must have been a particularly trying shoot. He’ll be in good company with Hardy serving up his best performance since Bronson.
Hugh Glass (DiCaprio) leads a party of frontiersmen seeking pelts in a wintry 1820s South Dakota. Set upon by marauding Pawnee, the survivors, led by Captain Henry (a solid Gleeson), are forced to abandon their boat and trudge inland. When Glass is mauled by a bear, Henry, fearing hauling the barely conscious guide across a mountain will slow them down, elects malcontent Fitzgerald (Hardy), the naïve Bridger (a terrific Poulter) and Glass’ dutiful son Hawk (Forrest Goodluck) to watch over him. But Fitzgerald murders Hawk and, thinking Glass is good as dead, forces Bridger to accompany him home. But Glass isn’t dead…
The Revenant’s two best sequences arrive early. The incredible opening attack on the party’s camp has Inarritu’s playful camera acting as relay, shifting from one character’s perspective moments before he dies before moving on to his killer, staying with him until he’s on the wrong end of a musket/hatchet/arrow before moving on again. The bear attack is simply astounding and a feat in special effects. While it never tops the shock value of these two breath-taking action scenes Inarritu does ensure that we’re with an impressive DiCaprio through every strained crawl and every moan through gritted teeth.
The Revenant first appears to be just a survival B-movie but there’s more going on. While Inarritu puts DiCaprio through the wringer the age-old battle of Nature vs Civilisation rages, exploring how humanity holds up in an inhuman world. To survive, Glass must be reborn as an animal (he actually rises from a grave) and with his open sores, unruly, snot-splattered beards, and matted, greasy hair, he looks more animal than man. He promises to stay beside Hawk’s body but the howl of an unseen wolf convinces him to move on – codes of honour and morals have no place here. He must close a wound in his throat (Rambo III-like) and sleep out a particularly frosty night inside the remains of a horse (Tauntaun-like). He watches impassively as wolves take down a buffalo calf. He catches a fish and doesn’t wait to cook it before chowing down. But the hero must balance the animal and the man; unlike Hardy’s villain, who clings steadfast to his survival of the fittest, Him Or Me mantra, Glass rediscovers his humanity with a heroic act later. The Revenant is meatier than it lets on.
But Innarritu doesn’t have all his way. With his hero isolated, and so hampered by a lack of opportunity for exposition to fill in some backstory via dialogue, Inarritu leans on dreamy Malickian flashbacks to Glass’ Native American wife (Grace Dove) to flesh Glass out. These moments are pretty but remove one from the moment – reminders of what’s driving him on when no reminder is needed.
But Inarritu, DiCaprio, Hardy and cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki (ensuring the wintry landscape is beautiful yet unforgiving and dangerous) should be in and about the awards.
