Frances McDormand, Woody Harrelson and Sam Rockwell in the Martin McDonagh movie ‘Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri’

Filmed in Sylva, North Carolina and set as the fictional town of Ebbing, Missouri, the Martin McDonagh written and directed movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) presents a darkly comedic drama. The film was released in the United States in November 2017 and the United Kingdom in January 2018.

(From left, Frances McDormand as Mildred Hayes and Peter Dinklage as James in the Martin McDonagh movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

Mildred Hayes, portrayed by Francis McDormand, draws attention to her daughter’s unsolved rape and murder by renting three roadside billboards. Hayes’ teenage daughter Angela, portrayed by Kathryn Newton, had been taken from her grieving and angry mother seven months before the beginning of the movie. Three disused billboards are rented by Hayes with a pointed message for the local chief of police: “Raped While Dying”, “And Still No Arrests?”, “How Come, Chief Willoughby?”

(From left, Lucas Hedges as Robbie Hayes and Kathryn Newton as Angela Hayes in the Martin McDonagh movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

Portrayed by Woody Harrelson, pancreatic cancer-stricken Chief of Police Bill Willoughby fails to apprehend the guilty following another earnest to do so. Alcoholic police officer Jason Dixon, portrayed by Sam Rockwell, finds a similar lack of success when trying to intimidate billboard renter Red Welby, as portrayed by Caleb Landry Jones, into taking the billboards down. Geoffrey, the dentist sympathetic to Willoughby as portrayed by Jerry Winsett, finds out in a dramatic way that pressuring an angry and grieving mother bent on obtaining some measure of justice will end in a comedically dark way.

(From left, Abbie Cornish as Anne Willoughby and Woody Harrelson as Bill Willoughby in the Martin McDonagh movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

Stressors and pressures of a personal and amplified within the community perspective follow from examples like the above. Mildred’s relationship with her son Robbie Hayes, as portrayed by Lucas Hedges, would become strained due to the billboards. Charlie Hayes, Mildred’s abusive ex-cop ex-husband portrayed by John Hawkes, reveals that he had turned down the couple’s now deceased daughter shortly before her death when she, Angela, had wanted to live with him once again.

(From left, Sam Rockwell as Jason Dixon and Sandy Martin as Jason Dixon’s mother in the Martin McDonagh movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

Drama in unexpected measure follows Chief Bill Willoughby’s death at his own hand, with the partial hand of that justice being administered through subsequent police chief Abercrombie. Clarke Peters portrayed Abercrombie. A convoluted circumstance of the drama extends the hands of justice through Willoughby, Abercrombie, Mildred Hayes and James, with James portrayed by Peter Dinklage, into a hospital room reconciliation with Red Welby.

(Caleb Landry Jones as Red Welby in the Martin McDonagh movie Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri).

Many senses of interpersonal debt, partial truth and emotional need that draws out depth for the multiple characters of this film preceded and follow the dynamics of the characters within Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. It takes leaps of character, and an emotional journey within a number of them, to lead the landing point of the movie to a misguided journey seeking satisfaction through emotion destined, through a proxy for feeling, destined for the state of Idaho. That past decisions have been revealed as unsatisfying, misguided and, despite being made with the best of judgments given partial information, does not deter the path left for Mildred Hayes and Jason Dixon at film’s end.

I grant Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri as directed and written by Martin McDonagh 4.25-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.

Matt – Wednesday, May 15, 2024

Aaron Paul, Jonathan Banks and Matt Jones in the Vince Gilligan movie ‘El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie’

Some six-years following the end of the Breaking Bad (2008-2013) television series, series creator Vince Gilligan gave fans of the series something that had been missing from the end of the original show. That something was a clear telling of what happened to character Aaron Paul‘s Jesse Pinkman, the student criminal to aid Bryan Cranston‘s Walter White in the building of the Heisenberg drug syndicate. The Vince Gilligan written and directed movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie (2019) puzzles out that story for us.

(From left, Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman and Jonathan Banks as Mike Ehrmantraut in the Vince Gilligan movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie).

The ability to leave his past, his captors and law enforcement behind is the goal placed in front of Jesse Pinkman from the outset of El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie. Beginning with a flashback to the immediate point that Mike Ehrmantraut and Jesse leave the crystal meth business of Walter White, we see the framing of this movie with the question for where Jesse should flea. Mike, portrayed by Jonathan Banks, advises against making amends for the past with the further suggestion to head for Alaska to make a new beginning.

(From left, Charles Baker as Skinny Pete and Matt Jones as Brandon ‘Badger’ Mayhew in the Vince Gilligan movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie).

In the present day, we see Jesse fleeing to the Albuquerque, New Mexico home of Brandon ‘Badger’ Mayhew and Skinny Pete, as respectively portrayed by Matt Jones and Charles Baker. Hiding the Chevrolet El Camino of Todd Alquist that Jesse fled his captors in, Jesse first is given the chance to sleep, shower and recover in the immediate aftermath of his captivity. Devising a plan to make it appear that Jesse would flea in Pete’s Ford Thunderbird while actually making an escape in Badger’s Pontiac Fiero, Badger heads south towards Mexico in the Thunderbird while Skinny Pete stays with the LoJacked El Camino. Meanwhile, Jesse makes his way in the Fiero. Jesse Plemons portrayed Todd Alquist.

(From left, Aaron Paul as Jesse Pinkman and Jesse Plemons as Todd Alquist in the Vince Gilligan movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie).

Told largely through flashback, we are at first presented to Todd Alquist’s apartment in an odd twist. Alquist actually springs Jesse from the duty of captivity and crystal meth production to address a uniquely personal situation that grew out of Alquist’s need to stash the money earned in the drug business. Addressing that distasteful business gives Jesse the knowledge that a large quantity of money will be stored at the apartment; knowledge of Alquist’s busybody neighbor Lou Schanzer becomes the secondary important knowledge piece that comes into play later when Jesse comes into contact with Neil Kandy and Casey. Tom Bower portrayed Lou Schanzer.

(From left, Scott MacArthur as Neil Kandy and Scott Shepherd as Casey in the Vince Gilligan movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie).

As the notion that nothing comes easy or with zero cost proved itself useful to the storytelling of Breaking Bad, the intersections of the Neil Kandy and Casey tales in Jesse’s desire to flea is perhaps the most clever and consistent to that style of any story within El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie. Neil and Casey, portrayed by Scott MacArthur and Scott Shepherd respectively, dovetail into the Ed Galbraith story quite nicely as necessary plot point in Jesse’s fleeing the greater Albuquerque area and Painted Desert, Arizona area. These storylines offer the creative tension and, ultimately, resolution to Jesse’s story that were arguably owed to the viewers of the original Breaking Bad series. Robert Forster portrayed Ed Galbraith.

(Robert Forster as Ed Galbraith in the Vince Gilligan movie El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie).

Shoutouts to individual characters from the original series, including asides, callouts, imaginings or subtle references to Walter White, Diane Pinkman as portrayed by Tess Harper, Adam Pinkman as portrayed by Michael Bofshever, Jane Margolis as portrayed by Krysten Ritter and Brock Cantillo as portrayed by Ian Posada, were all nice touches. I give Breaking Bad as written and directed by Vince Gilligan 3.75-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.

Matt – Saturday, November 18, 2023