MOVIEREVIEWS
Lawless well within the limits
Blood-soaked prohibition yarn is a rather rudimentary cocktail
- Published: 19 Oct 2012 at 00.00
- Newspaper section: Life
Nick Cave, Aussie rock godfather, poet maudit and screenwriter of Lawless, extends his implications of a murder ballad into this gangster-Western set in Virginia during the Prohibition era. A throat is slit and stitched, people beaten up and burned alive, and an idyllic barnyard is turned into a sadistic abattoir, all presided over by Tom Hardy as the invincible moonshiner Forrest Bondurant and watched on by Jack, poor Jack, his puppy eyed brother played by Shia LaBeouf.
Lawless
Starring Tom Hardy, Shia LaBeouf, Jason Clarke, Guy Pearce, Jessica Chastain and Mia Wasikowska.
With the moonscape wilderness of Cave's native Australia in The Proposition _ his previous and much more delicious collaboration with director John Hillcoat _ replaced by the 1920s rustic nervousness of Franklin County, the writer's baroque passion for violence lifts Lawless above the well-thumbed playbook of gangsterish pose and revenge, but only slightly and cursorily.
This article is older than 60 days, which we reserve for our premium members only.You can subscribe to our premium member subscription, here.
