The Time Is Now?

Leonardo DiCaprio is 41 years old and has to date amassed 36 acting credits in 26 years. Now of course as is always the case in these matters the early credits tend to be of the tv variety and whilst it was not his first film role (that honour goes to Critters 3) Leo's breakthrough role came in the form of 1993s Whats Eating Gilbert Grape.

Since then there have been a number of exceptional performances in the likes of The Basketball Diaries, Romeo and Juliet, Gangs of New York, Catch Me if You Can, Inception and so on, and yet to date he has been unable to bag himself an Academy Award despite being nominated four timesleading upto this years nominations. He has even won the best actor Golden Globe on two occasions and been nominated for the Oscar for the same role but still managed to come up short (the Globes are usual a good precursor to where the Academy will send their votes).

His fifth nomination has just been announced for his performance as Hugh Glass in The Revenant, for which he has just won his third Golden Globe, and many are again tipping him for the big one although personally if I were picking an actor to nominate from this film it wouldn't be DiCaprio, I'll explain why shortly.

There will of course be spoilers from this point onwards.

The Revenant tells the story of Hugh Glass who was a pirate/trapper/hunter etc in the earky 19th Century. The basic plot sees Glass get mauled by a bear and then left for dead in the wilderness by two others from his party. Unfortunately for them he survives and drags his severly injured carcass across land until he reconnects with the rest of the party and of course wants revenge on the two men who left him behind, in particular John Fitzgerald who is played by the ever reliable Tom Hardy.

Now the tag line for The Revenant is that it is based on a true story whch as a rule puts me off a film from the getgo as the artistic licence taken by the film makers to make reality more entertaining is usual quite jarring, especially when you research the story and get to the real facts of the matter. A prime example of this would be American Sniper which is a perfectly servicable film which loses some of its appeal when comparing the movie to what really happened.

The Revenant is of course no different as the real story of Hugh Glass and his remarkable story is expounded upon and 'improved' to make for a better viewing experience. For example, yes Glass was mauled by a bear and yes he was left in a shallow grave by two men named Bridger and Fitzgerald but he never had a son and so never suffered the torment of watching Fitzgerald murder his boy before his very eyes. Now of course it's obvious why this particular plot point was added so that Glass has more reason for wanting revenge than simply being left behind by individuals who were simply looking out for themselves rather than concerning themselves with the survival of a man that they believed was going to die anyway.

In fact Glass didn't even exact revenge of either Bridger or Fitzgerald as when he caught up to them he forgave them both but then this would not make for a particularly Hollywood ending now would it?

The embellished plot aside however The Revenant is a fantasic movie.Director Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu (who also directed my favourite film of 2015 Birdman) has crafted a work of art. The scenery is stunningly beautiful and its all real as Inarritu felt that using green screen would not produce real enough performances from his actors. Speaking of which DiCaprio has claimed that in preperation for this film he ate raw buffalo meat and slept in an animal carcass which is method acting to the nth degree.

Now I said earlier in this review that for me Leo was not the stand out performer in this movie but that isn't to say that he is not as usual great, it's just that in my opinion Tom Hardy is better though I'm sure there are many who would disagree. DiCaprio doesn't have alot of dialogue in this film which of course makes his acting further stand out to compensate for the lack of words but I think he was better in Wolf of Wall Street for which he was nominated for an Oscar in 2014 and probably should have won although he lost out to an exceptional performance by Matthew McConaughey in Dallas Buyers Club.

So to me it kind of feels as though the Oscar buzz is more based around the fact that DiCaprio is one of the best actors to have never won an award rather than because his performance as Glass is better than the other nominees, not that there is necessarily anything wrong with that it's just that I feel as though Hardy has been overlooked because of this push to give Leo the Oscar he should have already had by now.

The Revenant has also been nominated for best director which I would like to see go to Inarritu as after his win last year for the aforementioned Birdman it would be cool for him to do the back to back double, a feat that has only ever been done once before by Joseph L Mankiewicz in 1950 and 1951 for A Letter to Three Wives and All About Eve respectively.

With all of the above being said The Revenant is as I have already said a fantastic film, it is brilliantly directed and masterfully acted. It is also incredibly brutal in places, the bear attack in particular is hard to watch despite knowing that the bear isn't real, and this is coming from a fan of horror movies who doesn't consider himself squeamish in any way, I guess thats a mark of how well done it actually is.

If I had to nitpick at all I would say that the character of Glass seems to have an ever changing state to his physical wellbeing. At one point he's at deaths door, then hes to a certain extent recovered and then goes back to be on his last legs again. Like I said though this is not a big deal and when you consider that the real Glass actually pulled off travelling at least 80 miles across country following a bear attack (sometimes its reported as being anything upto 200 miles) it makes the up and down nature of his ailments easier to ignore.

So in closing I would have to say that I highly recommend The Revenant as you won't see many better films this year and in scoring it I will give the film 8 out of 10. Yes this is not as strong as a 9 but with the attention on DiCaprio rather than Hardy and the slightly overzealous Oscar buzz, plus the fact that this is not a immense a movie as Birdman I feel that an 8 is a very strong score to give this film.