Review of Out of the Furnace (2013) by Sarfaraz A — 08 Jan 2014

Out of the Furnace - co-produced by Leonardo DiCaprio and Ridley Scott, co-written and directed by Scott Cooper. Starring Christian Bale - Casey Affleck - Forest Whitaker - Zoe Saldana - William Dafoe and WOODY HARRELSON. It was made over the budget of $22million - the efforts were generated at to bring to life mill. The making of this film was all about re-vitalize the small town of Pennsylvania, going as far, that Christian Bale had to wear tattoo similar to mayor John Fetterman, in homage to him.

Set in small town in Pennsylvania - Christian Bale is a worker at steel-mill, with ailing father and young brother Casey Affleck who served in Iraq-war. In a road-accident, a kid and her family in car get killed at the hands of Christina, who is sent to serve his sentence. Upon his release, his love-interest Zoe has married town's pacifist Sheriff played by Forest Whitaker - his father has passed away, his younger secretly engages in bare-knuckle fights, sponsored by William Dafoe to pay-off ruthless, barbarian, animalistic Woody Harrelson. After murder of Christian's brother by Woody - he is out to take revenge and leave aside his fair-rules.

Story is too dim and sounds more like, repetition of same old formula. It is aimlessly trying to leave an impression, to be typical "American film" by touching upon nature of some people with radical thoughts to maintain territorial influence, while sabotaging the law - but it is not where it wants to go. Only, Woody Harrelson and Christian Bale make their roles meaningful and do justice in movie that was not necessary to be made.

NOTE: This concludes my 1700 reviews, written so far.