Lawless (2012)
Directed by John Hillcoat
In 1931, the Bondurant brothers of Franklin County, Virginia, run a multipurpose backwoods establishment that hides their true business — bootlegging. Middle brother Forrest is the brain of the operation; older Howard is the brawn, and younger Jack, the lookout. Though the local police have taken bribes and left the brothers alone, a violent war erupts when a sadistic lawman from Chicago arrives and tries to shut down the Bondurants operation.
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4 films that influenced Lawless
What critics say influenced Lawless
Kevin Costner’s sign off to The Untouchables, “I think I’ll have a drink”, may be the last word on prohibition, but in keeping with the philosophy of the humble soak, there’s always time for another.
But if the film will boost Hillcoat’s stock as a commercial director, it is lacking in both the poetry that infused The Proposition and The Road and the mythic quality of many other retro ‘30s gangster pictures from Bonnie And Clyde to The Untouchables .
With a set-up like this, I was expecting “The Untouchables” in the hills.
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford (2007)
Directed by Andrew Dominik
Themes Plot
Notable are John Hillcoat's The Proposition and Andrew Dominik's The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford -- as well as Hillcoat's The Road .
With visions of “ The Public Enemy ,” “ Bonnie and Clyde ” and even “ The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford ” dancing in its head, the Prohibition-era drama “ Lawless ” winds up being equal to none of them -- even if it holds its own as a modestly respectable genre exercise.
Convening a sturdy cast from three continents — Americans Shia LaBeouf, Jessica Chastain and Dane DeHaan, the Englishmen Tom Hardy and Gary Oldman and Australians Mia Wasikowska, Jason Clarke and Guy Pearce — Hillcoat essays a period crime drama that is meant to summon comparisons with Bonnie and Clyde and Public Enemy and, from an earlier time in America’s outlaw history, with Andrew Dominik’s The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.
And then there's the no-nonsense editing by Dylan Tichenor (2010's " The Town "), methodical but commanding, taking the time to focus on the people so that when they're met with violenceas when Jack is brutally beat up on his front lawn, or when Forrest comes close to death at the end of a knife one still, snowy nightit stings all the more.Now in his mid-twenties and growing convincingly into adult roles, Shia LaBeouf (2011's " Transformers: Dark of the Moon ") has never been better than he is as Jack Bondurant.
The rural scenery and surrounding nature, the latter changing vividly with the seasons, is evocatively photographed by Benoit Delhomme (2011's " One Day ") as if he's time-traveled back eighty years to capture the world in as plausible a manner as possible.