Hell or High Water - Love Letter to a Throwback

When you think of seventies cinema, there are certain films that help define the era by their sheer rebelliousness - Badlands, Mean Streets, Dog Day Afternoon, Thunderbolt and Lightfoot, The Last Picture Show - films where authority was not only distrusted, but where the law was a gray area you punched through when you'd been pushed too far by those in control. It was an amazing era, and those fond of it often wonder if films of that stripe would ever come again.

Make no mistake, Hell or High Water is one of the best American films of the year, and if you missed it in theaters, it’s on home video now, so do not let this amazing slice of adult awesomeness slip through your fingers. If there’s any justice, it’s a Best Picture nominee, hands down. 

Set in modern-day Texas, Hell or High Water grows out of the dust of the Western outlaw genre. Two brothers, Tanner (Ben Foster) and Toby (Chris Pine) are starting up a string of low-rent bank robberies across small towns in west Texas. They don’t seem to know what the hell they’re doing. All they know is that they need to raise enough money to keep the bank from foreclosing on the family ranch – and while these two are breaking the law, the real villains in Hell or High Water are the banks. Banks who offer to “help” struggling farmers with a reverse mortgage, knowing they’ll never be able to get square, cross-hairs set the entire time on getting their land – period.

Focusing purely on smaller, untraceable bills, the brothers’ activity soon draws the attention of the Texas Rangers, led by Marcus Hamilton (Jeff Bridges). Bridges is on the cusp of retirement, and where lesser men would avoid being drawn in, Bridges' measured, irascible curiosity can’t leave anything alone, especially a very specific, modest crime wave that seems to be following a careful recipe. Bridges and his partner (Gil Birmingham) have a great dynamic, where annoyance and fondness have blurred into a begrudging co-dependence. 

Ben Foster’s long been a live-wire supporting actor doing amazing work in film and TV, from Six Feet Under, 3:10 to Yuma, Thirty Days of Night to The Messenger. He’s an electric, uncontained presence, and he nabs a role here that really lets him step forward in a terrific character dynamic with the always reliable Pine. These are two fantastic actors who play a complex sibling relationship. They’re at opposite ends of a moral spectrum, but when push comes to shove, they’ll each draw cards from the others’ deck as the situation demands.

Directed by David Mackenzie and written by Taylor Sheridan (Sicario), Hell or High Water has the same fondness for character, realism and dialogue that would make Elmore Leonard proud. Indeed, if you’re at all a Leonard fan, Hell or High Water is bound to have roped your attention by now. The tone and sense of place evokes films like Lone Star and No Country for Old Men. In this new west, outlaws still brandish iron, but as much of modern America has come to learn, when the adversaries are financial institutions, patience and planning are likely to trump good aim every time. Very highly recommended.