WATCH THE TRAILER HERE
Fresh off its Grand Jury Prize win at the Sundance Film Festival, writer and first time major film director John Maclean gives us a bittersweet tale of the Old West. Set in 1870 Colorado, the story centers on young Scottish immigrant Jay Cavendish (Kodi Smit-McPhee) whose come to America in search of his lost love, Rose Ross (Caren Pistorius), who likewise fled Scotland with her father. Traveling alone in the untamed wilds, circumstances bring him into contact with rugged frontiersman and bounty hunter Silas Selleck (Michael Fassbender), who wastes no time illustrating quite plainly how dangerous the journey westward can be. Choosing to take the young boy under his protection, of course for a fee, Silas leads his reluctant companion towards his ultimate goal of locating Rose. While showing Jay and Rose’s history together via flashback, Jay becomes seriously uncertain that Silas is the best individual to be traveling with, and so chooses to abandon him and strike out again on his own, only to end up showing how deep his naiveté truly is, and all the while being unaware that there is much more to Silas’ being present and the goal they are riding toward than he realizes. Back together with Silas, a new challenge comes into their path in the form of outlaw Payne (Ben Mendelsohn), whom shares a past with Silas. Once the real truth about Rose and her father emerges, it becomes not just a race to find them both, but to save them.
Sharing the same overall combination of intensity, harshness, levity, and dramatic presence found in modern Westerns like “Open Range” and “Unforgiven” but in a shorter, more tightly condensed form, “Slow West” delivers said elements in equal amount and quality thanks to the simplicity of its characters and how they are presented in the contest of the narrative. McPhee’s Jay is given some seriously hard lessons in the ways of frontier “justice” and lawlessness along with the realization that desperation can cause any man to become wicked in his choices. Fassbender’s Silas likewise shows a person driven by already having learned these ways himself, focusing mainly on simple, harsh survival, until Jay’s innocent views on certain aspects of life penetrate his colder attitudes and let him see there is more to existence. Additionally, Mendelsohn’s Payne, while really coming across like so many other baddies in so many other Westerns, still effectively exudes that evil quality that just makes you love to hate him. This is not a heroic John Wayne film, as the brutal moments of violence exhibited here are raw and unflinchingly real, yet not gratuitously so, only in choosing to illuminate the plight of wayward souls. And this feels like the reason Jay’s character was so needed to be foil in the midst of savagery and greed, even when his own sense of morality is sometimes compromised by necessity. A solid effort, great cast, beautiful open sky and landscape cinematography, and just another example of character-driven indie film magic.
As always, this is all for your consideration and comment. Until next time, thank you for reading!
