Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (Martin McDonagh)

[DavidSeven]

I thought this was terrific.

I think some of the criticism of the film touches on my discomfort with a lot of modern criticism, in general. Namely, that if a film grazes a hot issue, it gets torn down for not exploring that issue in full force or for not fulfilling some arbitrary purism quotient. This is not a movie that's primarily about police brutality, nor is race a focal point. It's all context for a story that lacks any heroes at all and, indeed, actively wants to challenge the notion of heroism, in general. Both McDormand and Rockwell's characters begin flawed and become increasingly unhinged throughout the film. By the time these two come together, they are practically lost. A careful viewer will recognize their pact as a final, desperate, illogical and hopeless grasp to fill a bottomless void. It's problematic, and McDonagh clearly recognizes it as such. The brilliance of the film is McDonagh's ability establish consistently reprehensible characters while recognizing that sometimes life circumstances manage to draw our sympathy for even the most deservedly reviled. It's complicated and maybe a little messy. But I'll take something like this any day over something that's more pat in its messaging.

[MadMan]

Well crafted, really depressing, and also very hilarious, film. I feel that Rockwell kind of stole the movie, and I am glad he received a nomination.

[Rico]

It's enjoyable overall, but also full of major problems. Mainly I found it too over the top. These weren't characters, they were caricatures. At no point did I believe these people could possibly exist in the real world.

My eyeballs got a workout at several different points. In the flashback when Mildred yells to her daughter. "I hope you get raped!", when Mildred brings up the pedo priests, at every line spoken by Willoughby's wife, the whole cliche ex-husband with teen girlfriend, Dixon not noticing the building is on fire, Dixon throwing a man out of a window across from the police station and nobody giving a damn.

I did actually enjoy Dixon's overall arc. (Thanks to Rockwell's strong performance.) Though I wouldn't say he redeemed himself. He's probably a worse monster at the end of the movie than where he started.

[Dukefrukem]

God damn that one shot with Sam Rockwell.

[Ezee E]

God damn that one shot with Sam Rockwell.

The fire shot?

[MadMan]

The fire shot?

It has to be that one.

[Dukefrukem]

The fire shot?

Throwing the kid out the window shot.

[Peng]

That's such a visceral sequence, which makes me kinda detest how it concludes in the hospital scene all the more.

[Dukefrukem]

That's such a visceral sequence, which makes me kinda detest how it concludes in the hospital scene all the more.

Hated that scene.

[Ezee E]

Hated that scene.

A lot of scenes in this movie were in such a fantasyland that I couldn't fully embrace it in my opinion.

[Thirdmango]

I thought for sure Dunkirk would end up being my least favorite of the oscar best pictures but instead this takes the cake. I agree with a lot of what number8 has said. I think it's growing up and living in a very conservative state where I'm around the type of person in this film a lot. The type that say, "I'm not racist, I'm justified in my opinion that black people are bad at their jobs." And this movie sort of gives that idea that hey it's okay if a part of you is racist as long as the other part of you has some goodness or righteousness to you too. It's tiring how many of these people I know and will watch something like this and feel justified in their bigotry.

This was a weird film because at the core I liked the story, and I liked some of the moments in the film, and there were good performances, but man did I hate all of the moments of how bigotry was handled.

I feel like this movie would have worked slightly better for me if it took place in Ireland because it seemed to be an Irish sense of bigotry shot through the lens of the south.

[Dead & Messed Up]

I clicked Yay and I don't even know why. This movie oscillated between tolerable and frustrating for me most of the time. A few standout scenes and the good fortune to cast some of the best actors around mitigates some of the issues, but whoa mama did a lot of this feel hacky as fuck. Others have cited some of the most egregious moments (deer, orange juice, I HOPE YOU GET RAPED), and many touched on the lack of verisimilitude with Rockwell's racism.

The big thing that stuck in my craw there was Harrelson's supposition that the racism was just a facet of abandonment trauma, and that letter is what compels Rockwell to Try to Make Right. But we also catch a glimpse of his mother's casual racism, and we see his team at work laughing along with his racism, so this seems at least as much an issue of upbringing and systemic problems. It seems spectacularly false that Rockwell's self-improvement hinges on this misunderstanding not just of racism in general but what the text itself is showing us.

Which brings up a question. The film opens by calling him a torturer of a black man. Multiple times. By multiple characters. And the film steals away McDormand's sole black friend to a prison via a post it, keeps her there for a week, and then returns her in time to smile and ask how McDormand is doing. Why is the film so goddamn coy about the suffering that black people in this story endure?


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[Stay Puft]

[Pop Trash]

I don't get it.

[Dead & Messed Up]

I don't get it.

The "steamed hams" bit from The Simpsons has become a reference point for a ton of meme-ing and shitposting online, most often under titles like "Steamed Hams but it's..."

[MadMan]

I forgot about that episode. Good joke.