Bone Tomahawk

S. Craig Zahler, 2015

IMDB

4/5

Bone Tomahawk is going to appeal to viewers that aren't necessarily into the Western genre. It's a pleasant surprise, the great writing grabbing you right away and not letting loose until the end. The violence is going to surprise you. The gore is going to startle you. The performances are going to inspire you.

There are things that were done in this film to the human body that I didn't necessarily want to see at any point in my cinematic journeys, but regardless of seeing said cannibalistic atrocities - this film was an absolute thrill. These are the best films; the ones that sneak up on you. The ones that you weren't bombarded with marketing day in and day out. Everywhere you looked: billboards, television commercials. This is a pure indie shot on a $1.8M budget and somehow managing to cast Kurt Russell, David Arquette, Patrick Wilson, Matthew Fox and an UNRECOGNIZABLE Richard Jenkins. Jenkins was really the exceptional performance in this film. It took about 20 minutes of screen-time to recognize him. There's not much to the story, really. A group of a men set out to rescue a local man's wife and a sheriff's deputy from a tribe of "savages". A template for a lot of standard Western fare, but boy is Tomahawk different.

Zahler does a fantastic job of getting you to despise the brutal tribe that attacked the small town of Bright Hope. You are begging for vengeance, praying for a positive outcome. And when you finally confront the unforgiving Troglodytes, they make the film almost feel like a Western Mad Max or something. There are so many movies that have been made that have these disturbing moments in them. Irreversible, Requiem for a Dream, Human Centipede, Funny Games. They take you so far that you don't want to revisit them again. There's nothing beneficial to go back to. But Bone Tomahawk is interesting, because some of the images shown are on par with some of those barbarous moments in the aforementioned movies. But Bone Tomahawk is a movie that I will almost certainly want to revisit at some point in the future.

Plagues and Pleasures on the Salton Sea

Chris Metzler & Jeff Springer, 2004


3/5

The Salton Sea was a rapidly growing tourist destination. A accidentally created man-made oasis in the California desert, it looked as if it were going to be another Palm Springs. Unfortunately, the engineers didn't foresee the increased levels of salinity caused by agricultural runoff, or the varying water levels which would eventually flood the area. This would ultimately cause a fish die-off, which didn't exactly smell inviting. The vacationers stopped coming, and by the 1990's the only people who remain are nostalgic retirees and eccentric loners.

John Waters does a good job in narrating this quirky documentary. The archival footage of the Salton Sea really paints a vivid picture of an exciting vacation spot. The remaining residents are left with nothing other than distant memories of a thriving local economy, and all that remains are salt-encrusted abandoned buildings. The images of the corroded building skeletons feel apocalyptic. The current community, who look like people who got lost on their way to Burning Man, don't exactly give you the sense that your home would be safe unlocked. From the nudists to the urban dodgers who wanted to escape the L.A. gang-violence, the rough-talk and vulgarity doesn't appear to be a family-friendly environment. There is not one view of an educational establishment or grocery store. The unofficial mayor greets passer-bys by mooning them. There doesn't even seem to be a police presence. When you see building lots on sale for as low as $400, it seems as if they are just giving away land now, and even that price feels inflated. Unfortunately the innocent 1950's water-sports has given way to teenage keg-parties and opportunistic desert-thieves. The wet-paint on the motel sign has dried and decayed. All that remains is the scattered arrangement of RV's on the cracked desert landscape. Sonny Bono tried to save the area but his untimely-death only seemed to reinforce the Salton Sea's inevitable demise. Some optimism remains of the Salton Sea being restored, but I am not one of the believers.