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HOLD THE DARK
Director: Jeremy Saulnier Cast: Jeffrey Wright, Alexander Skarsgård, James Badge Dale, Riley Keough, Julian Black Antelope, Macon Blair, Peter McRobbie, Tantoo Cardinal, Maureen Thomas MPAA
Rating: Running Time: 2:05 Release Date: 9/28/18 (limited; Netflix) |
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Review by Mark Dujsik | September 28, 2018 It's easy enough to explain what Hold the Dark is about: It tells the story of the hunt for a succession of animals—wolves at first and humans soon enough. As for what the movie is About, that's much more difficult to deduce. Macon Blair's screenplay (adapted from William Giraldi's novel) splits its time between two protagonists. One is a military man named Vernon Slone (Alexander Skarsgård), a native of a small and remote village in Alaska, who returns home to seek revenge for the killing of his son. The other is Russell Core (Jeffrey Wright), an author and expert in behavior, who is summoned to the village by Vernon's wife Medora (Riley Keough). Her son was seemingly taken and presumably killed by a wolf, and Russell is hesitant to fulfill Medora's wise—to hunt and kill the wolf. He believes in the natural order of things, and "The natural order doesn't warrant revenge. Vernon is of a completely different mindset. When the truth of his son's death comes to light (a genuine surprise), he takes out his rage and vengeance on anyone and everyone who gets in his way or whom he believes is responsible. Vernon's story comes across more strongly here, if only because it deals with a series of visceral moments of violence—definitely not for the obscure appeals to spiritualism that try to explain his nature. Director Jeremy Saulnier continues to show that he is unique among modern filmmakers in the way he portrays violence. It is sudden, desperate, and inhumane, such as a young cop, with a gun pointed at his face, cowering and turning his head or another young cop, facing a machine gun, being unable move himself to safety. Russell's story, accompanied by a detective (played by James Badge Dale) from a nearby town, is primarily about following the aftermath of this violence. The two men, who know and have seen a lot about the darker side of nature and humanity, are at a loss to come up with comprehensible answers for the horror they're witnessing. Hold the Dark doesn't have many answers, either, which is primarily the point. It's evocative in terms of its stark locales and its vague examination of whether people are defined by their own natures or by nature itself, but the movie's insistence on such open-ended questions keeps us at a distance. Copyright © 2018 by Mark Dujsik. All rights reserved. |
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