Review of The Homesman (2014) by Lanky Man P — 26 Apr 2015

An old-school, hard-to-chew western, The Homesman is a bizarre and grimly realistic depiction of what the pioneer life used to be. Slow-paced and utterly depressing the movie is a mixture of good ideas and executions and some disappointing failures.

Focused on the strengths and weaknesses of women in the Wild West, The Homesman is the story of a brave woman Bee Cuddy (Hilary Swank) and a drifter (Tommy Lee Jones as Briggs) who embark on a dangerous and exhausting trip to deliver three mentally ill women to a minister in Iowa. Extremely slow paced in the first half and shockingly grim from the first minute, the ultra-realistic depiction of the hard life in the west is stunning enough to captivate the audience in the beginning. Sadly, the monotonous first half of the movie could nearly bring you despair if you are not from the patient type of viewers. Just when you are ready to give it up and turn off your DVD and TV, Tommy Lee Jones' delivery takes off in a direction that switches the attention from Hilary Swank to Jones himself. A simple emotional event completely turns the story and draws back the attention with its heart-breaking nostalgia and loneliness.

The Homesman is not a conventional Hollywood delivery or a predictable western. Slow-paced and somehow self-sufficient, it does not fully overcome its tonality and story-development problems, but manages to partially satisfy with beautiful cinematography, grim realism and exquisite performance of Tommy Lee Jones. If you are a fan of the genre, give it a try, but do not expect a typical Hollywood delivery.