Martin Scorsese has a secret weapon. It’s not his knack for framing shots, or the way his camera flows through a scene like a floating eye, or his longtime collaboration with editor Thelma Schoonmaker and their shared genius for pacing. These are all justly celebrated aspects of the octogenarian director’s unparalleled filmmaking chops, but there’s another element that would infuse his work even if he were creating live theater on a street corner: Scorsese has a way with actors. Again and again in his films, some of the best actors in the world show up with their A-game, and then take it up a notch from there. This applies not just to the leads but to every performer onscreen. Killers of the Flower Moon, Scorsese’s 27th feature film, boasts a massive cast, most of whose names you won’t know, but every one of them nails their part. It’s a key element in the captivating spell this film casts, and it’s an essential component of the storytelling itself.
Set in rural Oklahoma during the 1920s, the story (based on David Grann’s book of the same title) involves a bleak episode of frontier history. When members of the Osage tribe gained headrights to oil discovered on their land, their growing wealth and political power drew the resentment of white settlers. A string of uninvestigated murders and suspicious deaths ensued before federal authorities got involved. The script, co-written by Scorsese and Eric Roth, follows the efforts of a sickly World War I veteran, Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio), to find a place for himself in the community with the help of his wealthy uncle, William “King” Hale (Robert De Niro). Hale initially reads as a teddy bear of a gentleman-rancher with Truman spectacles who performs hands-on empathy for his Native friends and neighbors. It’s not much of a spoiler to say that this kindly image doesn’t go untarnished for long.
DiCaprio, in the role of an uncharismatic dullard, traces a much more complex and intriguing character arc. Ernest, responding to Hale’s strategic encouragement, sets his heart on finding love and settling down with Mollie (Lily Gladstone), a strong-willed but demure member of an Osage family who is in line to inherit a great deal of oil wealth. Their relationship, through courtship, marriage and children, forms the heart of the film and acts as the center of gravity for all the horror and tragedy that ensues. This is a departure from the focus of the source material, and also a canny adaptation of what might otherwise feel like a police procedural.
Few other actors could pull off what DiCaprio does with Ernest, who cleaves his energies between sincere love for Mollie and craven capitulation to Hale’s unspeakable schemes to separate her from her money. Ernest resembles both principal characters of The Departed rolled up in one, a rat and a hero in the same flannel suit. His sloppiness gets him in trouble again and again, and he bows to whichever authority confronts him, whether it’s Hale, Mollie or the lawmen who are closing in. He quivers and slumps and struts around with his indignant jaw jutted out, transmitting boyish naïveté and a scoundrel’s insouciance, all of it creating a portrait of a man who simply can’t get out of his own way. He’s not brave enough to figure out the decent thing to do, but just clever enough to think he can get away with hoodwinking everyone ‒ including himself ‒ one more time.
Playing against this mess of a man, Gladstone infuses Mollie with all the gravity he lacks. She does more with a steady gaze than most actors do tearing apart a room. We can see that she sees through his self-deceptions, and yet love blinds her to clocking the much darker truth of what he’s up to. Here’s the payoff to Scorsese’s secret weapon: by centering the story on the complex relationship between Mollie and Ernest, rather than the book’s arc of investigation and institutional justice, the film turns on its performances, which are impeccable. Add to that Rodrigo Prieto’s lush and dusty photography, with Robbie Robertson’s subtle and propulsive score, and Killers of the Flower Moon acquires momentum and grandeur. The long runtime never drags, spurred along by Schoonmaker’s gutsy editing that socks one-two punches of violence exactly when you’d expect it but somehow still catching you off-guard, every time. Top it off with a surprisingly affecting cameo from the director himself and an inventive telescoping effect that both situates the story in American history and encapsulates it as an exemplar of true crime storytelling. That it’s all based on documented history is both horrifying and essential.
In its fascination with religious and cultural tradition, and respect for the members of communities of faith, the film exists in the tradition of Kundun and Silence, but the tragic romance at the heart of this film is something unique in Scorsese’s filmography. Maybe that’s the director’s real secret weapon: the capacity to surprise, with every film, as long as he keeps making them.
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