Bone Tomahawk

Dir: S. Craig Zahler

2015

*****

I'd heard whispers that S. Craig Zahler's 2015 Western Bone Tomahawk was impressive but I wondered really how good it could be with such a limited release, indeed, no cinema I knew of screened it and it went straight to DVD pretty fast, which is never a good sign. Always trust the whispers. Bone Tomahawk is awesome, really awesome, one of the best films of 2015, of the decade so far even and you of my favourite westerns of all time. It is somewhere between The Searchers and The Hills Have Eyes in story but more like True Grit and From Dusk Till' Dawn in temperament. The mix of Western and horror has been done before and while I'm not opposed to a bit of Cowboy vs Vampire action (all for it in fact) it has been done and not always in the best possible taste. There is an element of horror in the way life was in the old west anyway without the need for Vampires, Zombies or Demons, getting shot simply for looking at someone funny is terrifying, at least you have a chance against the unholy and the undead (all you need is Priest, a bit of sunshine and a good horse). Natives were a huge threat also if you were to find yourself in their territory (just as it was the other way around). The film works by treading well covered ground, ticking all the boxes of what makes a Western great. This is predominantly a Western too rather than a horror film clumsily picking the cowboy genre as a simple theme. We have the respected Sheriff (a brilliant performance from Kurt Russell that beats his role in The Hateful Eight Hands down), the older lovable Deputy (played by the scene-stealing Richard Jenkins and is now one of my favourite character of all time), the Lone gunman (an impressive and unexpected triumph from Matthew Fox) , the holy man (the best performance from Patrick Wilson by a country mile) and the stranger (David Arquette in his best film to date). It also co-stars cult favourites Sean Young and Sid Haig. Like the aforementioned From Dusk Till' Dawn it is a film of two halves. The sense of dread and danger is always there but the true horror is never quite expected. The script is one of the best I've heard in years. It is sublime from start to finish, giving the film a rich and comprehensive Western feel. It's never predictable, utterly captivating and full of intrigue. I can't fault it. I have no doubt at all that Bone Tomahawk is a future cult classic, I was thrilled from beginning to end.