Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE: Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)

This is topic Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017) in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.

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Posted by Mark Ogden (Member # 43) on 11-22-2017, 06:54 PM:

At the City Cinemas 3 Theaters, New York City.

*****

The screenwriter of the terrific 2008 movie In Bruges returns as writer/director of this uncompromising, deeply profane, balls-to-the-wall and very politically incorrect but very entertaining picture. Frances McDormand is excellent as the distraught mother who uses billboards to harangue the local police chief over the now-cold investigation into her daughter’s brutal rape and murder. The chief, played by Woody Harrelson, is in turn frustrated by the lack of leads, his oafish deputies, and his own approaching demise from serious illness. Unfortunately for both of them the grieving mother didn’t really think through the repercussions of her actions when the billboards went up, leading to trouble from a racist mama’s boy cop, and from other locals (including, in a hard-to-watch scene, a dentist who gets her in his chair).

It’s a really good movie, similar in tone to last year’s Hell Or High Water but even better written and performed. I’m not much on Oscar predictions, but I don’t see how McDormand doesn’t have this one sewn up, and if I had to bet there will be at least nominations for the screenplay and picture as well. Highly recommended, and if you have never seen In Bruges, see that too.

Posted by Jonathan Goeldner (Member # 4854) on 11-22-2017, 08:26 PM:

deeply profane is an understatement - I was very entertained by this.

Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 12-22-2017, 06:31 PM:

CINEMA: Regal Warren East, Wichita, KS
AUDITORIUM: 6, SEAT: D6
PRESENTATION: Warren 21 Regal Roller Coaster Recline-o-Vision
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: Chatty sister chatting with equally chatty elderly couple next to her through the whole fucking feature
RATING: Three stars (out of four)

Sister: "THESE are the seats we should have had for Star Wars."

Elderly Guy (with wife, stumbling in late): "IS THIS D4?"

Sister: "I think so."

Elderly Guy: "WHAT DO I DO NOW?"

Sister: "Push that button."

Elderly Guy: "IT'S MOVING! I DON'T THINK I DESERVE THIS AMOUNT OF LUXURY IN LIFE!"

Sister: Neither did I...for about half a second."

Pretty sure they were lifelong friends by the end of the feature.

THE PLOT: A woman rents some billboards. Wackiness ensues.

Watch this, then go home and watch Winter's Bone. As you wonder to yourself if rural Missouri could possibly be like this, allow me to assure you that it is. It absolutely is.

Posted by Adam Martin (Member # 641) on 12-22-2017, 09:57 PM:

quote: Sam Graham
As you wonder to yourself if rural Missouri could possibly be like this, allow me to assure you that it is. It absolutely is.

As I watched it, having been to most of rural Missouri, I thought to myself it felt more like Iowa than Missouri. Without the corn. [Big Grin]

This is my #2 movie of the year.