Hell or High Water: Review
By John Vaughan | Sep 19 2016
Directed by: David MackenzieStarring: Dale Dickey, Ben Foster and Chris PineRuntime: 102 minutes[br]David Mackenzie’s Hell or High Water is a western-thriller laden with bitter frustration, and populated by characters who do what they can to survive (and will do even more to get ahead). It follows the haphazard robberies perpetrated by brothers Toby (Pine) and Tanner (Foster) as well as the Texas Rangers, Marcus and Alberto (Jeff Bridges and Gil Birmingham) set on catching them.These characters share a common desire for significance in their small-town circumstances; they must see how far their shadows can stretch before the sun says “enough” and burns them up for good.Intensifying the smallness of the town in the opening shot, the camera pans slowly, almost lazily until a woman who, not two seconds ago we saw lean against a wall, smoking in the shade, is set upon by two masked figures as she enters the bank. The sudden violence foreshadows the rest of the film– fate seems keen to show its fangs.We don’t learn of Tanner’s time spent in prison until twenty minutes into the film, where he recalls shooting his father, a hint of nostalgia entering his eyes. Family ties can be constricting in this film, reeling him back to child-like tentativeness when he peers inside his deceased mother’s room.This film is something of an older, gloomier, dust-eyed brother to The Place Beyond the Pines: father-son relationships, bank robberies, all brought to submission by whatever hand realigns the stars. Here, however, that hand is moved by malice, and little can be done to assuage it.Each character has an individual purpose, an ambition in life, a path less thorn-crowded than the one that fate has given them. It is the futility of their attempts to reach their goals that proves most upsetting; in one gripping scene, a waitress digs her nails into a wad of allegedly stolen $20 notes, explaining through gritted teeth that she needs it to keep a roof over her and her daughter’s head.