Laura Dern is a fairly useless rookie criminologist along for the ride. Kevin Costner plays escaped convict Butch Haynes, and Clint Eastwood, as Texas Ranger Red Garnett, is assigned to bring him in. It wasn’t trying to go for action in the conventional sense, rather it chooses to take its time to really explore what a world of violence can do to a person, and how it might change our attitude towards it.Audiences expecting an action-packed/lawman-gets-his-man/adventure from the first Costner & Eastwood pairing will be greatly disappointed with the depressing and morally imperfect film A PERFECT WORLD. Today it’s been reevaluated as it should to be as one of his very best, if not his very best.Ī Perfect World is the type of film that sneaks up on you as to how deep it really is, which is perhaps why people missed the point in its first release. Though Eastwood was just coming off of an Oscar win the year earlier, A Perfect World mostly went unnoticed save for a few film critics who sang its praises. As he did with Unforgiven, Eastwood’s tone is that of melancholy and regret, almost as if he’s trying to strike up a dialogue with the audience and getting to the core of his own relationship with violence. However, at the time he made A Perfect World we can sense Eastwood’s tone shifting from inhumane and brutal, to thoughtful and introspective. Eastwood knows a thing or two about using violence himself as his early spaghetti westerns and Dirty Harry films would glorify it. We saw the anti-hero criminals born out of the gangster films of James Cagney and Humphrey Bogart, and we see how if they only weren’t born on the wrong side of the tracks, things could’ve been different for them. The idea of violence begetting violence is nothing new in movies, as it goes all the way back to when they were first made. “A Perfect World is the type of film that sneaks up on you as to how deep it really is.” But we see how his love for Butch grows making the finale very difficult to watch as all films like this must end a certain way once the authorities catch up with them. Lowther doesn’t give us a cute kid performance, and he’s asked to take part in some rather dark episodes throughout the film. Phillip almost acts as Butch’s salvation, at one crucial moment saving him from himself, and it’s a heartbreaking act of bravery on his part. Throughout all of this, Phillip acts somewhat as a conduit for the audience, observing Butch, and admiring him, but also seeing what violence has made him. One instance occurs when Butch reacts to a mother talking sternly to her daughter and son in the car for spilling a drink, then in another scenario, he almost goes off the deep end when he witnesses an old man slapping his grandson repeatedly across the head. We don’t really see Butch quick to anger or rage, but we do see him react in the moments where he sees children in danger. Eastwood is very curious about the nature of violence as it applies to Butch, someone who could’ve ended up on the right side of the law if his youth wasn’t tarnished by abuse. Yet it goes down a much darker and messier path than anticipated and this goes back to Butch’s past. The unique thing about A Perfect World is how it seems to lead us down a route we have seen before about the father/son dynamic of a young man and the stranger he meets. However he doesn’t mean to harm Phillip, in fact he starts to build a real close bond with him. We get the sense that Butch is not really a bad guy, but he isn’t all that good either. Meanwhile, Phillip is attacked by Pugh, causing Butch to kill him, leaving the two alone on the road and on the run. It isn’t soon after that Texas Ranger Red Garnett (Eastwood), learns of the prison break and, pursues the fugitives with the help of Governor appointed criminologist Sally Gerber (Laura Dern), and an F.B.I sharpshooter (Bradley Whitford). “The unique thing about A Perfect World is how it seems to lead us down a route we have seen before about the father/son dynamic of a young man and the stranger he meets.” Butch stops him, but not before stirring up the neighbours, and in order to escape they take the mother’s small son Phillip (T.J. After stopping into a nearby Texas town, Pugh goes into the home of a single mother who is also a Jehovah’s Witness and attacks her. The film begins with Haynes escaping from prison with another inmate, a psychotic man named Pugh (Keith Szarabaijka) who shares a cell with him but mostly tags along for convenience.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |