Painted with blood and snow, Quentin Tarantino's 'The Hateful Eight' is a perfect portrait

Tarantino's 8th movie ' The Hateful Eight' is a inveigling tale of eight gunslingers trapped in a Wyoming cabin to evade blizzard in the mountains. A film which hugely relies on Tarantino's expressive story-telling as he toys with the idea of cowboys and lawmen indulging in a verbal and pistol-cocking blood-splashing duel. It is a nihilistic picture of betrayal and bloodbath with 187 minutes of promising aeonian experience.


A blizzard is chasing a carriage; a carriage with two occupants and a driver. Inside the carriage, John Ruth (Kurt Russel), the hangman is handcuffed to the prisoner Daisy Domergue (Jennifer Jason Leigh)  who he is taking to Red Rock to hang. The carriage is stopped in its tracks by bounty hunter Major Marquis Warren (Samuel Jackson) who is looking for a lift to Red Rock. The carriage (later occupied by sherrif Chris Mannix) is taken to Minnie's Haberdashery, a lodge inhabited by four strangers; someone among who Ruth believes to be a traitor sent to free Domergue.


Tarantino has scripted the story amazingly as he helplessly crams the racial political tension into the extravagantly smooth dialogue. However he has managed to achieve some nail-biting moments without viceral music. For instance, Domergue is handcuffed to the poisoned Ruth as she helplessly tries to grab a gun far away from her reach to defend herself from her attackers.


As a director, Tarantino makes the unputdownable film etch in your mind even as you walk home from the theatre. He has managed to bring everyone into the spotlight, armed with smart dialogues and credible acting. However Samuel Jackson happens to be the show-stealer as he overshadows his costars with his gritty and piquant portrayal of Major Marquis Warren.


A quirky story post The Civil War, The Hateful Eight can be relished and digested by hardcore cinephiles. For masala movie-lovers, Kindly avoid.

7 on 10 stars