Review: The Revenant

The Revenant (15)

USA 2015 156 mins  Dir: Alejandro González Iñárritu Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Domhnall Gleeson, Will Poulter, Paul Anderson, Lukas Haas

Ain’t it grand that actors are prepared to suffer for our entertainment? Of course, we shouldn’t feel too sorry for them as they’re very handsomely rewarded for doing so. In addition to his vast fee, Leonardo DiCaprio now seems likely to walk away with the Best Actor Oscar that has thus far eluded him. A more enjoyable and visceral (it’s technically impossible to review The Revenant without using the word ‘visceral’) film than Alejandro González Iñárritu’s tricksy previous Oscar-winner Birdman, this loosely fact-based survivalist revenge western vindicates the director’s insistence on putting his cast and crew through the wringer by dumping us in the mud and snow alongside them to dodge bullets and marauding wildlife alike. The result is a gruelling guaranteed box office hit with rare crossover appeal. The popcorn crowd will thrill to all the edge-of-seat action while arthouse punters can stroke their beards smugly as they spot lightly worn references to the likes of those Herzog classics Aguirre, the Wrath of God (Leo’s boatload of survivors sailing downriver into the Heart of Darkness pursued by bow and arrow-wielding natives) and Fitzcarraldo (the swiftly abandoned attempt to haul wounded Leo over a mountain using a makeshift stretcher).

The story is pretty straightforward. Fleeing an assault by a disgruntled local tribe on an expedition led by Captain Andrew Henry (Domhnall Gleeson) along the Missouri River in 1823, fur trapper and guide Hugh Glass (DiCaprio) – an actual historical fella – leads the ragtag survivors to safety. Alas, he’s then brutally attacked by a protective mother bear. Fearing he’s a goner but unwilling to put him out of his misery, Henry offers hard cash to any volunteers prepared to stay behind with Glass’s half-Pawnee son Hawk to give him a decent burial when he carks it. Earnest, wet-behind-the-ears yoof Jim Bridger (Will Poulter) and gnarly, shifty, part-scalped John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy) accept the task. Fitzgerald clearly has no intention of fulfilling his end of the bargain and wastes little time in murdering Hawk in front of his father’s eyes and burying Glass in a shallow grave, pretending to Bridger that the kid scarpered and their charge succumbed to his wounds. But despite being hideously gored by his ursine assailant and barely able to speak, Glass perks up sufficiently to start crawling his way back to civilisation, bent on vengeance against the man who wronged him. A sub-plot has a Native American chief trading with dodgy Frenchmen while searching for his abducted daughter, which facilitates the mandatory speech about the rapacious white man in a film that doesn’t otherwise belabour its liberal conscience.

All bushy whiskers and manky teeth, totally committed DiCaprio certainly throws himself into the role, feasting on bones scavenged from carcases and raw fish scooped from rivers, cauterising his neck wound with a burning stick and enjoying a kip in a warm, freshly hollowed-out horse. If they gave gongs for thespian endurance alone, all the other nominees might as well not bother turning up. Iñárritu directs with masterful fluidity, conjuring up superb action sequences (the opening ambush, a breathtaking chase off a cliff, that extraordinary prolonged bear attack) with judicious use of CGI that enhances rather than distracts from the gritty realism, while skilfully elucidating the contrasting backstories of Glass and Fitzgerald. Moments of Native American mysticism occasionally threaten to stray into Oliver Stone territory, but that great cinematographer Emmanuel Lubezki also succeeds in capturing many hauntingly lyrical images, from misty snowstorms to a shooting star and a vast pile of cattle skulls. When The Revenant‘s final gong tally is revealed, don’t be surprised to find he has another Oscar to sit alongside the ones he bagged for Birdman and Gravity.