Director: Jeremy Saulnier
Year Released: 2018
Rating: 2.0
Russell Core (Jeffrey Wright), a writer, is asked by frazzled Medora (Riley Keough) to help find her son, whom she claims was "taken" by wolves (one of Core's areas of expertise), but when Core finds the boy's strangled corpse Medora flees - elsewhere, her husband Vernon (Alexander Skarsgård) is back in Alaska after serving in the military, hears about his deceased child and goes after Medora, taking out everything in his path (he's Rambo ... only Swedish). Like Wind River, I think Saulnier and screenwriter Macon Blair (who appears as on of Vernon's "friends") are trying to comment on Native Americans and their alienation from the rest of society, but any attempt at philosophy is muddied by the nonstop gore: content is secondary to nocturnal chaos. Perhaps the moral for Core is what William S. Burroughs once said: "Never get in the middle of a girl-boy fight." As for Saulnier: his view of humanity remains bleak and unpleasant, with little room for joy (he can't wait to shoot up most of his characters) ... but hey, at least he's consistent.
