Review of the week

Title: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford

Director: Andrew Dominik

Cast: Brad Pitt, Casey Affleck, Sam Rockwell

Certification: R

There are certain characters in history, on whose lives, so many films have been made that it has rendered them almost unwatchable. Jesse James is one such character. According to Wikipedia, that unmatched and now rather accurate webopedia, there have been 18 films made about the criminal (with four being made in the last 10 years).

So when director Andrew Dominik decided to make film number 19, he knew he had to have a foolproof plan. Thankfully he did.

With Brad Pitt playing Jesse James, star wattage was assured. All he then needed was a suitably cowardly Robert Ford, and in Casey Affleck he found a perfect poltroon.

The story focuses on Jesse James’ life after the disbanding of the original James Gang. What’s left is a ragtag (and frightfully petty) band of aspiring train robbers and yellowbellied hangers-on that is kept in tow only by the knee-buckling levels of fear Jesse conjures in them.

Sam Rockwell plays Charley Ford, brother of Jesse’s would be assassin. And it is Charley who becomes Jesse’s right hand man in the final sunsets of the infamous outlaw’s life. Unbeknownst to him, Charley would also hold the lynch pin that Jesse would so prod him to pull.

Robert Ford, frustrated by the constant accusations of cowardice, immaturity and ineptness — leveled by, among others, Jesse — is never a key member of the Gang (although, ironically, it is his action [sic] that has the most profound effect).

Brad Pitt is very good as the paranoid, and mentally distraught James: His passion is as ferocious as his bouts of melancholy are dark.

But it is Affleck who is the real star actor of this film. His sneaky eyes and slimy smile epitomise the cunning of a man well-heeled in the ways of trouble-dodging. His blasé attitude towards the preservation of anyone else’s skin but his is so realistic, that I’m surprised no one has taken a potshot at him yet.

‘The Assassination of Jesse James’ may have some solid acting, and a decent script (also courtesy Dominik) but it needed more…it needed some magic. And the Merlin that answered the call was Coen Brothers’ staple, cinematographer Roger Deakins. Deakins’ work speaks volumes of the man’s prowess behind the camera. He was the man behind the gorgeous looks of films such as ‘No Country For Old Men’, ‘Jarhead’, ‘Fargo’, ‘O Brother Where Art Thou!’ and ‘The Shawshank Redemption’.

If it wasn’t for Deakins’ sublime vistas, and light play reminiscent of Freddie Young, ‘The Assassination of Jesse James’, would have been a moderately good film. But as it stands, it’s a very good one.

Rating: 3 and a 1/2