Rebel Ridge

Let me start with saying the film is good. It is well acted, well written, and decently paced. There's an argument to be made that the film could have been a handful of minutes shorter but without careful consideration and time I'm unwilling to give I'm unsure what would be cut.

My only gripe, because im a film sadist, is I wanted a bit more carnage. The film attempts to emulate others (like our beloved wick films or reacher), but it fails to reach the same level of hollywood violence we've come to expect from the genre.

Many may argue this is a good thing but it didn't tickle the part of my brain that I wanted it to. Terry, our protagonist is wronged so repeatedly during the course of this film that it would have made the Pope himself command genocide on the masses, yet we're made to believe that Terry is so honorable he couldn't be bothered to hurt another soul.

My only gripe with what was otherwise a great film.

Godspeed.

There's a lot more good than bad to this film. Yes its a well trodden path, but what isn't these days. This looks on paper as a capitalisation of the popularity of the Reacher series as a low budget movie with zero hints of John Rambo.

I hate the modern trope of rebooting licences with socially agreeable casting. And this doesn't honestly play like that. Aaron Pierre, i've not heard of prior, but he's done a good job of the given script. He'll do well from this i hope. Don, bless him, loves these roles. Brawl in cell block 99 was a bloody hoot. But we all want to see another Nash Bridges or age appropriate Miami Vice!!

Verdict. Watch it. If you do, they'll make more of the same. There's no budget for CGI, no superheroes, but the entire cast play out this hardcore version of saturday night 80s tv really well. Time not wasted.

With each work I watch, I become a bigger and bigger fan of Jeremy Saulnier.

What seemed like a potential for him to be a great director has already come to fruition, and we are witnessing it. Rebel Ridge not only adds another great work to the director's hall, but also shows his versatility.

John Boyega's abandonment of the project may have been a blessing in disguise. Aaron Pierre is magnetic and a force of nature in this film. His presence is felt throughout the story, even in the moments when he is not mentioned.

The film and Aaron perfectly execute this character, rich of complex emotions in a one-man army.

AnnaSophia is not far behind, in a realistic performance of a person driven by a purpose and a true sense of justice, in a work that does not hide from us how the path to truth can be dirty, aggressive and cause destruction.

With a fair length for the story, the film allows itself to breathe, but always progresses accordingly and shows enough flesh in its plot and characters to specify its duration and each character.

I want to congratulate Emory Cohen and Don Johnson for making me despise them from beginning to end in their portrayal of a pair of characters who are the antithesis of everything the protagonists represent, always pushing them to make new difficult decisions.

Overall, it's a great film, with an excellent cast and a story that prioritizes its human narrative over action, but also uses its combat peaks to demonstrate more nuances of each character.

Just finished watching this movie. Checked out some of the reviews, and as one often sees, a lot of people called this movie boring. There were some very similar themes to Rambo: First Blood. But I thought that this movie was really well done. The character development was really good, and the main character was calm, cool and collected for the majority of the film.

The action was great, not over the top, and very realistic. A younger me would have considered the movie slow and boring, but that's because all I used to want before was ACTION!!! The older me prefers the story and character development. There was some great turns near the end that I didn't expect. All in all, I thought it was a solid film. 7/10 for me.

Starts strong, likeable main character and a good villain.

The plot is a bit convoluted and you could cut out 30 minutes without losing anything important.

The biggest downside for me is the ending, it seems like they did not know how to end it and just throw in some stuff to wrap it up during the supposed climax. It lacks the impact that it needed to deliver satisfaction for the viewer. I can't explain more without spoiling it but it's underwhelming.

On a positive note the main character is likeable, if a bit one note, and the main villain does a god job of making you hate him.

The action scenes are okay, nothing amazing but watchable.

To summarise, I would not recommend this over many others that came before and did it better, but if you have 2 hours to kill and have watched the many other films with the same premise and want to watch another one, give it a go, it's on the bottom of the genre but it's passable.