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

Ben Affleck, Bryan Cranston, and John Goodman in ‘Argo’

Winning Academy Awards for best picture, best writing, and best achievement in film editing, the film Argo (2012) tells a story based on actual events depicted in a book written by a CIA operative and a 2007 Wired magazine article. The underlying events of the story traced back to a three year hostage crisis in Iran that began in 1979. Based on the fact that the end result was something I knew walking in, I found the movie better than it had to be.

(From left, Bryan Cranston as Jack O’Donnell and Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo).

Argo stars director Ben Affleck as American intelligence officer Tony Mendez, Bryan Cranston as Jack O’Donnell, Alan Arkin as Lester Siegel, and John Goodman as John Chambers. Mendez, O’Donnell, Siegel and Chambers were key members of the American effort to get six members of the American embassy in Tehran in the aftermath of the Iranian Revolution of 1978-1979. The film took pains to provide the historical context of the time, along with the series of bad ideas to get six Americans to safety.

(From left, John Goodman as John Chambers and Alan Arkin as Lester Siegel in Argo).

The six Americans holed up in the Canadian embassy in Tehran were Kathy Stafford as played by Kerry Bishé, Joe Stafford as played by Scoot McNairy, Mark Lijek as played by Christopher Denham, Bob Anders as played by Tate Donovan, Lee Schatz as played by Rory Cochrane, and Cora Lijek as played by Clea DuVall. Mark and Cora Lijek were a couple.

(From left, Kerry Bishé as Kathy Stafford, Scoot McNairy as Joe Stafford, Christopher Denham as Mark Lijek, Tate Donovan as Bob Anders, Rory Cochrane as Lee Schatz, and Clea DuVall as Cora Lijek in Argo).

Argo as a film was praised for its cinematic experience, as well as the acting in particular of Alan Arkin and John Goodman as film producers that helped bring the fiction of a film within Argo called the same thing. Historical complaints of note for the film included that the Canadian embassy’s part in the rescue was larger than portrayed, that British and New Zealand embassies had turned the Americans away,  and that the actual danger for the six American captives, Mendez, and Ken Taylor (as played by Victor Garber) may have been less than portrayed.

(From left, Victor Garber as Ken Taylor and Ben Affleck as Tony Mendez in Argo).

The story of the “exfiltration” of six Americans from Tehran, Iran in the midst of a political revolution in the late 1970s during the presidential administration of Jimmy Carter made for good cinema. I appreciated the movie at the time of its release, and I enjoyed it again upon watching the film just recently. My recommendation is that you watch the film. I offer the movie Argo 4.5-stars on a scale of one-to-five.

Matt – Saturday, June 13, 2020

Top 20 Movie “In Bruges.”

Top 20 Movie In Bruges (2008) ranks 11th in Matt Lynn Digital’s Top 20 Movies in ranked order listing. This gem as directed by Martin McDonagh holds the distinction with Calvary (2014) as the second movie in the Matt Lynn Digital movie listing to include a McDonagh brother as director. John Michael McDonagh directed Calvary, which starred actor Brendan Gleeson.

Gleeson co-starred in In Bruges as Ken, the senior partner to guilt-stricken hit man Ray as played by Colin Farrell. Bruges is the town in Belgium where ruthless boss Harry (Ralph Fiennes) banishes Ken and Ray to await further orders. It is through the cantankerous relationship between these two that we later learn why Ray is guilty. The hit that Harry sent these two went horribly wrong when Ray botches a hit on a priest by killing a young boy in the process of killing the priest.

The comedic brilliance of placing Gleeson and Farrell as Ken and Ray in Bruges is that the city itself is so full of history and vacationing possibility. Ray simply cannot bring himself into the mood of a trip of a lifetime because he’s so straddled with guilt. For Ray, drinking away his feelings is the only thing on his mind following the murder, beyond following the orders by Harry to sit tight.

The comic relief of the side characters brought into the story adds a degree of light humor that works well for being juxtaposed to the serious turmoil that Ray is experiencing. These characters later play a role in why Harry ultimately orders Ken and Ray to stay put. Namely, Harry aims to rectify killing the boy in the hit by bringing about Ray’s demise.

Like Calvary, In Bruges has a component of dark humor. Like Calvary, In Bruges is bloody, touches on religion, and deals in vengeance. Both movies are emotionally tense while aiming to hit you with ethical questions of a film noir variety that ask you to contemplate if morally ambiguous things can still be subject to a morality, even or especially after violating a basic tenet of something that we can grant is wrong…that murder is murder, and the act of accidentally killing a kid doesn’t abdicate murdering a priest.

In Bruges is our eleventh (11th) ranked film. I recommend that you see it.

Matt – Monday, March 27, 2017