The Frame

Can we talk for just a second about how SAD I AM that I didn’t get a chance to see this in theatres? Thank you very much, Waco, for only having non-adventurous multiplexes, and Warner Bros., for doing a fairly inept job of marketing this film. Ah, well, it wouldn’t be an easy one to market, I grant you that. It has the trappings of a Western and does include a rather spectacularly shot train robbery, but it’s really a study of character and of heroes. Robert Ford, played with quiet intensity by Casey Affleck (who is turning out to be the most solid Affleck, at acting anyway), idolizes his distant relation Jesse James (Brad Pitt)–but most of his knowledge of James comes from the penny dreadfuls he’s read since childhood. He first wants to join the James’ gang, eventually to almost become James himself, finally to destroy the man who can’t live up to his legendary status. The film doesn’t sugarcoat anything that James did as a brutal outlaw, and it doesn’t need to put him forth as a positive figure. In fact, James is the enigma in the film, the negative space into which Ford projects himself. There’s so much to think about in the film that I’d need a rewatch even to unjumble my thoughts. As good as Affleck and Pitt are, the cinematography is possibly an even bigger star, and the film is so wonderfully directed that I’d pretty much vote newcomer Dominick to direct anything ever. (He’d be so perfect for The Road, incidentally, but John Hillcoat of The Proposition already has that job.) A number of people might argue that Assassination is too slow, but, like Affleck’s performance, it has a quiet intensity that builds slowly and releases slowly, perfectly matching the rise and fall of the story itself.
Superior