#210: The Hateful Eight

Release Date: December 25th, 2015

Format: Streaming (Tubi)

Written by: Quentin Tarantino

Directed by: Quentin Tarantino

3 Stars

The Hateful Eight is like the sauce that splits, and no matter how much writer/director Quentin Tarantino whisks it, he can’t combine it. Boy does he try. You can practically taste his sweat dripping into the bowl.  

The story is set in Wyoming in 1877 and bounty hunter John “The Hangman” Ruth (a great Kurt Russell) is bringing a wanted murderer, Daisy Domergue (a scene-stealing Jennifer Jason Leigh), to justice in Red Rock, Wyoming to collect his $10,000 reward. Along the way they encounter a blizzard that has waylaid two different strangers who now desperately need a ride, a proud white Southerner named Chris Mannix (a shifty Walter Goggins) and Major Marquis Warren, a black former union soldier (played by Tarantino Hall-of-Famer, Samuel L. Jackson). Unable to make it all the way to Red Rock due to the storm, the wagon stops at Minnie’s Haberdashery for the night, which is being occupied by four other guests. It doesn’t take long for all eight guests to start questioning each others’ motives and identities before all hell breaks loose.    

I really like a lot of this movie, even though I think it’s a bit incohesive. Tarantino is playing with themes and textures here that he had never done before, which is interesting. The setting is incredible and immersive; you feel dirty by the time the end credits roll, like you might have some dirt and spilled stew on your pants.

And what a beautiful, symbolic ending when (without spoiling too much) one of the characters reads a handwritten letter from Abraham Lincoln to another one of the characters, who up until that point had been his sworn enemy. Here are two characters, diametrically opposed in just about every way, finding a common humanity. It’s pretty.   

Of course, the letter is bullshit, a counterfeit written by Jackson’s character, and the two men would probably still stab each other in the back if given a chance. Before their shaky alliance, the movie graphically depicts the bloody deaths of all sorts of sleazy varmints, racists, and generally bad hombres, all against the backdrop of the wild Wyoming countryside. What an astute representation of America. The symbolism works well.

I just wish that Tarantino’s tonal choices earlier in the movie worked as well as his ending. The movie is heavy with Tarantino-styled dialogue that borders on indulgent. He gets in his own way a bit here. And for some reason he adopts cartoonish violence in The Hateful Eight that’s kind of funny I guess, but mostly just clashes with the subject matter and the film’s realistic surroundings. Heads explode here like it’s a splatter film. Buckets and buckets of gooey blood galore. 

The Hateful Eight is not a swing and miss by Tarantino, but more like a single on a soft grounder up the middle. It’s destined to be one of his least talked about films, which means it will also have a small contingent of defenders. Knowing how self-aware Tarantino is about his own legacy, I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the exact reaction he was looking for.