The Assassination of Jesse James

hindi dubbed karo

source: The Assassination of Jesse James

Masterful character study and motivationally driven lives which clashed at the wrong time in history. Performances were delivered by first class actors and direction. An underrated tense thriller of one of the most complex people in history versus one of the most average.

This was a very good movie and I would definitely recommend it but it is 2 hours and 40 minutes with it being slow at times. Still it has some great acting, musical score, cinematography with good directing. Casey Affleck has had a great year in acting with this movie and Gone Baby Gone. He gives such a deep, authentic and complex performance you could say he deserved an Oscar for it . He has what his brother Ben Affleck does not have, dedication to the character and the meanings and purpose they have within them. When I think about his performances and roles in both Gone Baby Gone and this really makes me wonder about myself and my character. Brad Pitt gave a very interesting performance as well but I still did not find it to be that great. At times he was a bit over the top but this is not to say that he was not good. What really transformed this movie was the cinematography and directing. The directing and cinematography really delivered on what the purpose of this movie is. It helped you understand the feelings, personalities but most of all the complexities of all the characters involved in the story. The cinematography and music fused together and really made me get a feel for the story and the movie. In a way this movie reflects our society today. The message of this movie was really deep and meaningful saying that everyone plays a role in society even if you don't like your role that is what you are. The public determines your destiny and image. It depicts gang life and how betrayal is the worst act that can be committed and in which loyalty is a must even if you know longer have relations with it. It shows how there always has to be a necessary evil or a scape goat no matter what effect it has on people because people do not want to blame themselves they want to blame others instead. This is movie happens to take place in the west rather than it being a western. This movie/story tries to tell us something that is deeply embedded in our minds and in our society. It displays what we think of ourselves is drastically different of the image of ourselves from other people.

1. The film has a good, quite authentic look to it - at least as far as props, costumes, sets, etc. The sound of the old, wood-frame houses was right on. The landscapes are obviously not where they are supposed to be, but that follows an old tradition in Westerns. Canadian locations have become very identifiable & are obviously not Missouri nor any adjoining states. 2. Brad Pitt made a good Jesse James. I know Jesse's photos quite well & was able to forget them. Mr. Pitt did his best to be enigmatic - I don't know if that was intentional in his portrayal of Jesse or simply because he didn't know how else he could carry on through this script. 3. The rest of the cast did as well as they could. Sam Shepherd seemed a bit old for Frank James, but then I always thought that Frank looked old for his age in the few photos that exist. 4. Now for the bad part - it is as slow moving as molasses in winter. 5. Almost every film that has extensive voice-over explanations has had post-production problems. When it's all been put together, they've found that the explanations are needed, because the film had become a muddle. Having been a professional genealogist who has researched Jesse Woodson James & family & who has worked with celebrities, I understand what they were trying to do with this. In an oblique way they were using Bob Ford as "stalker" ... as well as exploring Jesse's emotional-mental issues (which included drug use) & the various family connections that that are often neglected. It is rare that any film for popular consumption has mentioned the murder of Jesse's favorite cousin, Woodson Hite, by the Fords. It also often goes unmentioned that there was a lot of blood relationship amongst these various outlaw clans. Therefore, there were family issues, as well as the historical background that is more commonly known. I commend them for the attempt, but such an exploration was perhaps better left to print. Despite knowing most of the story already, I found it almost impossible to follow. Perhaps, the problem was that it simply could not retain my interest enough to follow it. Sometimes, a work that is very literary, with lots of explanation & internal action, but little real physical action, can be impossible to transpose to film. I suspect that is what happened. I really wanted to like this film, but sad to say, I didn't. Perhaps one day a mini-series will do justice to the complexity of these people & their era & will still manage to be entertaining.

I'm all for an oater. Huge fan of John Wayne, John Ford, Gary Cooper. And I'm all for a movie on Jesse James. I've got family from Missouri and relatives inappropriately named for him during the reconstruction. But movie gods, how long are we expected to watch one mentally unstable man wander around tormenting half wits? Here's how I think it's supposed to work: the movie is shorter than the book, and, when it comes to biographies and histories, the book is shorter than the actual event itself. And, since it's live action (this is the most important thing), we're supposed to be entertained. Compared to this, Lawrence of Arabia was a stroll, and Dr. Zhivago a short story. This movie was endless and DULLER than third-generation nylon stockings. All credit to Brad Pitt for successfully making this character thoroughly unlikable, since we know from Devil's Own he can make the bad guys look somewhat charming with a bad accent. And James' character here is the closest to reality - best since The Long Riders (and that was the best until now, far better than some of the laughable depictions seen in The Outlaw and the like). But with Jesse as one endlessly scary dude, I spent most of the movie waiting for the promised old west justice and wishing I had brought my own six shooter so I could put an end to my misery. No nice daffodils or tulips, no sand dunes - nothing to distract me while I'm waiting. And waiting. And waiting. Oh, and since there was nothing to wax lyrical about, I admired everyone's full mouth of beautiful clean teeth (there's historical accuracy for you). Since we all know what happened to Jesse, the only surprise is why I sat through the whole damn film.

Casey Affleck's has officially come into his own. Fantastic performance! Brad Pitt's performance complex and stunning as usual. Brad does not shy away from the real roles and proves time and time again what a brilliant actor he is. Roger Deakins shots are stunning, capturing the true beauty that lies within the Canadian rockies. The artistic shots through the old style glass is fantastic. Score is very unorthodox yet amazingly effective. The only downside to the film many say is the running time, but I admire that Andrew allowed for the performances of the actors to be the showcase. Many scenes with not a lot of background music, just the intense performances.

Though Jesse James through the newspaper accounts of his exploits and through the dime novels of the day was already a legend, his immortality was sealed on April 3, 1882 by the manner of his death. The lengthy title of the film tells all or at least the official version of the story. But was that accepted version the real story? For the first time the Ford brothers, Robert and Charley, get their due. As played by Casey Affleck, Robert Ford was a most complex character indeed. Ford is shown for what he was, a moonstruck kid who was brought up on those dime novels and idolized the legendary bandit. The fact that Charley was already riding with the James gang got him into the group. After the last job the James gang pulled and the only Ford was ever in on, the Fords kind of attached themselves to Jesse James. Of course the idol is no hero. Brad Pitt plays a most unheroic Jesse. Hints of Pitt's interpretation of Jesse's character are found in the classic portrayal of Jesse James by Tyrone Power. Remember when the laconic Henry Fonda as Frank James dresses Jesse down, tells him he's getting mean, meaner every day even with some of his own gang members? Power was showing signs of it, but we see Pitt as Jesse do some really brutal and cruel things. At the same time he's a loving husband to Mary Louise Parker and doting father to his two children. As good as Pitt is I think the acting honors go to Casey Affleck. His gradual disillusion with his idol is really something to see on the screen. He becomes really scared of Pitt for reasons I won't reveal, but were definitely sufficient to want him to get Pitt. We also get to see the Fords sorry aftermath. Things did not go so well for them. Bob Ford did not quite get the acclaim he would have liked as Jesse James became bigger after death than in life. Frank James as played briefly in the beginning is an odd peripheral character in this film. The James brothers did separate some months before Jesse's death. Frank is played by Sam Shepard who has an encounter with young Bob Ford at the beginning of the film and announces to one and all, the kid creeps him out. But Jesse likes having the kid follow him around like a puppy dog to his ultimate regret. The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford is a very good western and we sure don't see too many of them in these times. It's shot in an unusual color, almost like one of those sepia-tone films that were in vogue for a brief spell. The location shooting was done in western Canada and looks a whole lot more like Missouri then than Missouri does now.

This almost defines the oft-used term "elegiac Western". It has some of the well-worn themes of Westerns, such as the creation of Western myth vs. the cold, harsh realities. But for some reason, it never feels like anything else I've ever seen. It has a style more reminiscent of Michelangelo Antonioni than any of the great Western filmmakers. It's slow and likes to surround its characters with enormous landscapes that almost swallow them whole. But it's also not averse to close-ups. Director Dominik, who has only made one other film, Chopper, and it's been seven years since then, loves to concentrate on facial expressions, as well as body language (don't know if I've ever seen a film with this level of attention to body language, or maybe it's just not something to which I've ever been lead to pay much attention). The cast is uniformly brilliant. Brad Pitt and Casey Affleck are the titular leads, and neither has done as well. Affleck is a revelation. The supporting cast includes Sam Rockwell, Mary-Louise Parker, Jeremy Renner, Garrett Dillahunt and Paul Schneider. Andrew Dominik is the star, though. There have been plenty of successful Westerns over the past couple of decades, but I'd be hard-pressed to name a single one out that so beautifully and completely re-invents the genre. 3:10 to Yuma may well be the big money-making Western of the year, but I think history will recall it as being the year that The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford was released. It is the best film of the year so far, and will be hard to top.

"The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford" is a handsomely mounted, film-school like study of the last days of the infamous James' Gang by director Andrew Dominik. Growing up in awe of Jesse James (Brad Pitt), Robert Ford (Casey Affleck) finally gets to live out his dream of living side by side with his idol when his brother, Charles (Sam Rockwell) joins the gang. Young Robert quickly learns that the exploits of the murderous train-robbers are far from the exciting flights of fancy he grew up reading about in newspapers and dime-store novels. A series of cowardly acts in the wake of double-crossings and humiliations ultimately lead to the titular event. The style of the film is often visually arresting and downright disturbing, especially in the acts of violence, which leave the most gruesome parts slightly off camera, but are frequently shot and framed in such a way as to maximize shock value and leave an uncomfortable feeling of tension in the theater seats. Dominik sometimes relies too heavily on voice-over narration torn straight from the book upon which the film is based leaving us to assume that aside from dreadfully beautiful photography of passing clouds and desolate Midwestern landscapes, he wasn't always sure how he visually wanted to tell the story. This leads to a sometimes snails' pace as the plot unfolds, though the haunting Oscar-worthy cinematography from Roger Deakins and mesmerizing music score from Nick Cave and Warren Ellis eventually get under your skin even as the hands of the clock seem to move slower as if stuck in a pretty photograph of a nightmare. The acting in the film is superb from all involved. However, the performances often blur the line between caricatured scenery-chewing and emotional nuance (especially from Pitt and Rockwell). While there is some entertainment to be found in the lighter scenes of camaraderie amongst the gang members, the audience never really feels anything for the characters aside from sharing their sense of paranoia and fear knowing that around any corner someone will be betrayed and shot. The film also suffers from some scene stealing cameos from James Carville as the governor hell-bent on catching Jesse and the otherwise lovely Zooey Deschanel, who appears out of nowhere for a few moments about ten minutes after the film should have rightfully ended. When the credits finally rolled, I wasn't sure what to make of the film. There's some unforgettable imagery (my personal favorite being the almost surreal depiction of the cloth-masked robbers waiting in the dark woods as the train comes roaring down the tracks), and many commendable artistic elements to be found in the film. If the idea was to leave the audience feeling the era showcased was a tension-riddled and violently lonely existence, then the film succeeded wonderfully. Those seeking a more pure entertainment will most assuredly be left stressed and stretched to their limits.