When you think of genres that go together with horror you typically think of genres like drama, comedy and sometimes sci-fi, but never before have I thought of a horror western. That, however, is exactly what the film Bone Tomahawk is. You may be hesitant like I was when I received a text from my sister telling me about a “creepy western” that I needed to watch, but let me tell you it was nothing like what I expected.
This film is a horror western about a tribe of inbred, cannibalistic Native American’s who kidnap three people from a nearby settlement. In keeping with the theme of movies that build the creepy feel for a long time before throwing you into the action ( https://wickedlittleblog.wordpress.com/2016/03/30/bewitched-by-the-witch/ ) this is a film that definitely builds to a gore-filled climax.
The first half of the movie follows the trek of the town of Bright Hope’s Sheriff, played by the legendary Kurt Russell, and Arthur O’Dwyer, played by Patrick Wilson, and two other men on their trek to rescue O’Dwyer’s wife from this cannibalistic tribe.
The movie opens on two robbers murdering a group of travelers as they sleep, but they are scared off by the sound of approaching horses and they run to hide in an Indian burial ground. One of the men is murdered by a mysterious figure while the other makes an escape and shows up in Bright Hope eleven days later. The Sheriff (Russell) goes to check things out when this drifter rolls in and an altercation ends in him shooting the man in the leg. Mrs. O’Dwyer is brought in to help with the injured man’s leg because we find out that the town doctor is a drunk and is too far gone to do any sort of medical procedure.
Her husband (Wilson) is at home in bed attempting to recover from some sort of injury to his own leg from an accident at his job as a foreman. Mrs. O’Dwyer never comes home, however, and the Sheriff returns to the station the next morning to find an arrow stuck in the wall and a completely empty jail. His deputy, Mrs. O’Dwyer, and the drifter have all disappeared and they easily deduce that they were taken by Native Americans.
Mr. O’Dwyer insists on going with them to find his wife despite his injuries. A local Native American whom they consult with warns them to forget about it and stay put. He tells them that there is no way that they will survive a trip to the caves where this tribe lives.
They don’t listen.
This movie was rather slow moving at first, and I wasn’t sure if I was completely on board with it. Then the action started and it was some of the tensest moments of film I’ve ever seen. Not only does this film have the actual horror of this almost inhuman tribe of cannibals with absolutely no mercy, but we are also reminded just how incredibly difficult frontier life actually was in America. There is the very real, looming possibility that Mr. O’Dwyer could die at any moment just from a simple cut on his leg. We are also confronted with the tension of the settlers taking the land from the Native Americans and the very real threat of their retaliation the settlers faced.
I digress, however.
I will say if you don’t like gore DO NOT WATCH THIS FILM. The gore only lasts for probably twenty minutes of the entire film, but the gore in that moment is so intense that I had to turn my head several times and shield the eyes of the friend I was watching this movie with. If you can handle gore then absolutely watch this film. But I don’t want any of you getting the idea to watch this because of my blog and then you being hit in the face by cannibalistic Native American’s scalping a man and cutting him in half because I didn’t warn you.
What do you think about this odd mixture of genres? What do you think about gore in situations such as this? Can you handle it if it isn’t excessive?
Bone Tomahawk Wiki:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bone_Tomahawk
Bone Tomahawk IMDB:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2494362/
Bone Tomahawk Trailer:
I volleyed back and forth for awhile on whether to try and come up with a clever (or what I think is clever) title for this entry. I didn’t want to detract from the movie at all, and I was worried that a ridiculous title would take away from the seriousness of how much I loved The Witch. But I couldn’t resist and I broke down and I went with a silly title.
erything we came to know and love them for, then this movie is for you. OK, OK, so there are only two of them and they are from completely different generations of Disney channel, but it was still intriguing to see people I grew up watching in less than G-rated situations now in R-rated ones. It also really has nothing to do with the plot of this movie at all, and I’ve officially crossed the border into ranting, so I digress.
o watch this movie because of the fact that the lead actress is Ali Larter, an actress I adore. For those of you who were fans of Heroes back before the failed reboot may know her as Nikki/Jessica/Tracy/a whole other slew of characters or, for those fellow horror buffs out there, as Clear Rivers from the first two Final Destination films. I went into this expecting a poltergeist-fueled horror film with things that go bump in the night and voices coming through the TV.
Contracted is one film that I can, without a doubt, say has not attracted nearly enough attention from the general public. This film, written and directed by Eric England, was released in 2013 and was originally viewed at the Neuchatel International Fantastic Film Festival on July 7; it was later released in theaters and on demand. I discovered this film while searching through the horror movies on Netflix for inspiration for this very blog.
I tried desperately to come up with some sort of catchy and quick-witted line to open this entry with. I could not, however, come up with a satisfactory line to describe my mix of feelings about the Canadian horror film Hellions. Director Bruce McDonald makes a lot of decisions that you don’t expect to see in the horror genre that, at times, took the film to the next level and at other times left me confused and anything but scared.
Wicked Little Blog 