The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (2018)- BFI London Film Festival 2018

Review

132min

Genre:       Comedy, Drama, Musical, Western

Directors:   Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

Cast:         Tim Blake Nelson, James Franco, Liam Neeson…and more

Writers:     Joel Coen and Ethan Coen

-Synopsis-

The Coen Brothers and Netflix bring us a unique Western anthology, a compendium of six stories set in the 19th century American frontier, chronicling the old American West in trademark idiosyncratic style, beginning with the all-singing, gun-slinging titular character.

As Netflix have evolved from streaming platform to producers of award-winning original content and a motion picture studio in their own right, even becoming a marketplace for major Hollywood studios with distribution cold feet, they’ve made a concerted effort to tempt filmmakers with an environment of creative freedom and the promise of final cut. Now the streaming giants have landed one of their biggest fish, seducing the Coen Brothers with the chance to take a selection of their unseen short stories and turn them into a full feature in their own inimitable style—giving us a unique cinematic anthology of the old American West . . . with decidedly mixed results.

Tim Blake Nelson kicks everything off in style and stars as the eponymous ‘Buster Scruggs’, a notorious gunslinger with dulcet tones and a sunny personality but a ruthless streak whose fame catches up with him, with James Franco taking the reins of the next story as the aspiring bank robber who rides his luck as long as it lasts, followed by Harry Melling and Liam Neeson in the tale of a disabled travelling performer and his manager, who face tough times and hard decisions. Tom Waits then picks things up as a Paul Bunyan-esque prospector tirelessly toiling the forests for the promise of gold, followed by an unlikely romance of convenience between Zoe Kazan and Bill Heck on a wagon trail across the prairies, rounded off by Tyne Daly and Brendan Gleeson in a haunting tale of judgement on a fateful carriage ride across the west.

When you consider that ‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’ was originally planned as a multi-part TV series showcasing twenty-five years of disparate stories conceived by the Coens, but then reworked into a single anthology feature, the film’s fluctuating mood and scattershot narrative begins to make much more sense. Joel and Ethan Coen essentially weave together a sextet of unlinked stories and semi-parables . . . which by nature flirt with nihilism, sewn together by the hearty fibre of the old American west, illuminating the harsh and blackly comical realities of that life in trademark Coen style.

But in this case variety certainly isn’t the spice of life, as the film kicks off with a melodic opening gambit so strong it could qualify as one of the best short films we’ve ever seen, threatening to usher in a violent and comedic country & western musical, but then gradually and drastically changes tack as the stories tick over, making us pine for the beginning and wish for the end well before the film’s 132 minute runtime is over.

As you might expect from a pair of master filmmakers, ‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’ is a masterfully crafted film, wonderfully scored by regular Coen collaborator Carter Burwell (The Big Lebowski, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri), and as visually arresting as any of the majority of Coen pictures shot by the great Roger Deakins, with Bruno Delbonnel (Amélie, Big Eyes) stepping in to capture the majestic but unforgiving beauty of the 19th century American plains and prairies, forests and deserts.

Yet much of the film’s technical prowess, wonderful idiosyncrasies and its glorious opening are squandered as it moves along and the stories tick over, with about half of the tales coming off uncharacteristically devoid of character and humour, even proving rather dull and without narrative resonance. By the very nature of short stories, and in this case short films, there’s no time or space to save what doesn’t work, and no way to avoid it affecting the piece as a whole, killing the momentum of the film by asking the audience to reset after every one, but leaving long periods which fail to captivate or entertain, and which pull us out of the experience entirely.

Perhaps Netflix and the Coens’ initial instinct would’ve served their stories better, allowing for a limited series which could have given the more promising tales further room to shine and avoid being burdened by the rather forgettable ones, and giving the eponymous singin’ gunslinger the stage he deserved.

In the end though, despite the masterful cinematic craftsmanship and a delightful start, on balance this is a rare miss for the sibling master filmmakers—in terms of narrative, character and story—from a directorial duo who even in their less illustrious outings always manage to leave a mark and captivate. . . or at the very least entertain throughout.

The Bottom Line…

Expertly crafted and wonderfully adorned, ‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’ makes an auspicious start but then steadily squanders it with a series of short stories which miss as much as they hit, ultimately serving up a rare narrative disappointment from the Coen Brothers which fails to leave an indelible mark—leaving us wondering whether the first plan of a Western anthology series might have done more justice to their vision.

‘The Ballad of Buster Scruggs’ is out on Netflix on the 16th of November.

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