Killers of the Flower Moon

⭐ 9.5/10

(Originally written by Joseph)

This movie starts off with a very relatable character named Leonardo DiCaprio saying "I do love that money," and later admits he loves money because he's lazy. Immediately I was on this guy's side, and would forgive anything he would do to get that money afterwards.

I thought this movie was amazing, and I was actually pretty skeptical beforehand because Tim told me it had some Oppenheimer vibes. It's true. There is a lot of talking in rooms, and the latter half is about a court case. Unlike Oppenheimer, this movie is actually well written, has the built in advantage of not intentionally confusing the audience, and the court case is actually about the main conflict of the movie. Flower Moon is 3.5 hours long, but I never felt like it was dragging or boring.

I thought Leo was incredible as this slimey, sniveling, disgusting piece of human garbage, but I thought Lilly Gladstone was the star as his opposite. Quiet, composed and strong while she endured tragedy after tragedy. This is kinda the anti-Breaking Bad, having the opposite of the Walt/Skylar dynamic in which you find yourself cheering for the bad guy (unless you are a psycho). I loved Mollie and I would have cared for her and not have tried to kill her whole family. I kinda wish she had more of an active role in finding justice, but hey, it's a true story. Her stoic look at the court room, hearing about these plots, was an all-time look.

Aside from all this, I just don't think this movie had any flaws. Costumes, music, writing, acting, cinematography. Everything worked for me. The only thing keeping it from a 10 is that I didn't feel anything super strongly except for disgust, and I guess that's the point, but it's hard to want to give a 10 to a movie that doesn't elicit much for positive emotion. So yeah, thank you Martin. I believe in cinema again!!!