I would most describe the film as a murder mystery western.
The film mainly takes place in a stagecoach stopover called Minnie’s
Haberdashery, where eight people seek shelter from a blizzard. But then the
characters begin to realize that one of them is not who they say they are and
this person may have nefarious intentions.
What I enjoyed most about the film was the acting. Tarantino
has always done a good job of writing great dialogue for his characters and
this film definitely contains that. Each character stands out and all the
performances were great. My particular favorites were Daisy Domergue (played by
Jennifer Jason Leigh, who received a Golden Globe nomination for this role) and
Major Warren (played by Samuel L. Jackson), though everyone else did a great
job. The acting was what kept the film progressing and they never blurred
together or fell into the background.
While I did enjoy the acting, the movie just didn’t “wow” me
like many of his other films. The movie is just over 3 hours, and there were
points when you could definitely feel that it was a long movie. Though the
length of the movie allowed for the slow build-up of events in the narrative,
it just felt really long. And because the movie mainly took place in the
haberdashery, much of the movie relied on dialogue and less on action and
scenes that didn’t really add much to the story, which did at points make me
feel like this movie was going to be a really long one. The slow story
definitely allowed for the building of conflict and the fleshing out of the characters,
which allows viewers to try and figure out who the murderer is, but other than
that, it just made me feel the length of the film.
Overall, I did enjoy this movie, I just didn’t enjoy it as
much as his other films. The film definitely felt long, and it took a long time
for things to happen. Though the slowness let characters be developed over
time, some of it could have been cut down. Don’t get me wrong, the acting was
great and it was an intriguing story, but I just can’t rate it as highly as I
would his other films. If you have never seen a Tarantino film before, I do
warn you to be prepared for scenes of bloody violence. The violence is not as
consistently present as it is in his other films, but it does begin to pick up
about halfway through. I recommend this film to anyone who enjoys Tarantino and
I would love to hear what you all think of this film and how it falls in your
ranking of Tarantino films, feel free to let me know in the comments below!
If you’re curious about my rating of this film in terms of
stars, you can check out my 2016 Film Diary located in the right sidebar.
