I didn’t like it. I know it has many good points going for it, but it’s not (entirely) what I was expecting. There was no mystery at all and the dialogues were rather plain for my taste, that’s why I didn’t like it.
I knew it would by somehow splatter because it’s a Tarantino movie, so even if the blood-vomiting/heads-exploding scenes were a bit over the top it was nothing really unexpected, but I would have appreciated it if someone had washed the woman’s face from time to time; no gentleness had to be involved, but they could have thrown some water and a towel on her face.
What I liked was the idea, the whole thing happening in the same confined space, inside a shop in the middle of nowhere, surrounded only by the snowy Wyoming mountains; also, the cast, the lights, the set, there nothing I had a problem with in the technical aspect of the film, but to me the dialogues were a bit plain, meaning that during the time before the actual splatter nothing really happened and nothing was really said.
At some point I was hoping that it would become a bit thrilling to find out who was who, but it wasn’t.
The hateful ones were really hateful, although I thought there would have been fewer characters: who were the eight? The major, Ruth, Bob, Gage, Osvaldo, Daisy, and it’s six. Another hateful could be Jody, Daisy’s brother, although he shows up much later, and it’s seven. Who should be the eighth one? Chris? The general? OB? Or should the eight be the first eight we see? The major, Ruth, Daisy, Chris, Bob, Osvaldo, Gage and the general? It’s indeed eight, but why are Chris and the general among the hateful, because they fought in the war among the losing side?
Anyway,
my favourite moments all include Daisy, although her image was rather hideous, her face was always covered in blood, ‘really’ covered I mean, and her front teeth were broken leaving a big hole there.
Ruth spoke too much without really saying anything interesting, Gage barely spoke a word but also barely did anything at all. The movie was set right after the civil war’s end, so that’s what they are all talking about half of the time.
The general is from the south and killed a lot of black soldiers which is why the major hates him and wants to kill him, still his long story about how he tortured and killed his son was really long... it was obvious from the start what would happen, that he wanted the general to pick up the gun so he could have an excuse to kill him, but it really went on for a long time... and there’s still a little doubt whether that story is true or not, did he really meet and kill his son or he’s making it all up to provoke him and kill him? We see images of the man walking naked in the freezing snow and giving him oral sex before being killed, but that doesn’t mean it really happened, maybe it’s just what he’s making the general imagining; knowing the major, it could be a lie, we know he lied about Abraham Lincoln’s letter, a lie that as he put it, allowed him to ‘disarm the white men’, like Ruth who agreed to give him a ride on his coach and then asked to see the letter. So everything’s possible.
Ruth was a bounty hunter like the major, but he never killed his preys right away, he took them alive into town to watch them being hanged. Which is what caused all the troubles.
Osvaldo said he was a hangman, Gage said he was going to spend Christmas with his mother, Bob said that Minnie (the rightful owner of the place) had gone to visit her mother with her husband leaving the place to him for a while.
OB was simply the coach driver, and Chris said that he was going into town to be appointed the new sheriff.
They have to spend two or three days together in that place until the snow storm ceases; Ruth doesn’t trust them so he takes everybody’s guns but the major, since they made a pact to help each other.
At some point, when everyone is distracted by the major’s story on how he killed the general’s son, Daisy sees someone poisoning the coffee pot. She smiles and says nothing, watching Ruth drink it. OB drank too, and soon both of them start spitting blood, copiously, and then both die. Chris was about to drink it too but he stops. At this point the major points his guns to the four man still standing, while Daisy is on the floor, handcuffed to Ruth’s corpse, her face full of the blood he spit on her.
The major gives a gun to Chris, since he was about to drink the coffee he can’t be the one poisoning it.
The major knew Minnie and her husband, he saw many signs already that something had happened, and now also says that Minnie didn’t like Mexicans and would never have left her precious shop to Bob, so he shoots him dead saying that he killed Minnie and her husband.
He threatens the other two with killing Daisy if the poisoner doesn’t confess, and Gage confesses, but at this point someone hidden in the basement shoots the major from below. Osvaldo shoots Chris and Chris shoots him, and both are left badly injured.
We see now what happened before their arrival. Another coach arrived: Jody, Gage, Bob and Osvaldo together. Quite soon they killed everyone inside (Minnie and her husband, plus Gemma who worked there and also Judy and her man, the ones driving the coach) sparing the general because he adds a touch of credibility, a bit of colour to the scene.
The major and Chris are the only ones with weapons now, so they make the mysterious man come out or they’ll kill Daisy. It’s Jody, her brother, they are in a gang together, and of course he comes out and they smile at each other.. and then the major shoots him totally squashing his head and his brain and blood all fly on Daisy’s face. Daisy tries to convince Chris to let her go, saying there are other men from their gang ready to kill him; Chris and the major shoot dead Osvaldo and Gage who had taken a gun hidden under a table.
Now left only with Daisy, she keeps trying and Chris hears her out, making the major worry: he’s without bullets now, so if Chris wants to shoot him there’s nothing he can do, but Chris is only amused by Daisy’s words, he doesn’t believe her at all, and also there’s the fact that both him and the major are mortally wounded. Chris would like to shoot her, but the major doesn’t want her to die like that. He says she was Ruth’s prisoner after all, and she should die like he wanted, and Chris is after all (almost) a sheriff, so they hang her watching her die, then they’ll die too.
Cast:
Daisy-Jennifer Jason Leigh
Major Warren-Samuel L. Jackson
John Ruth-Kurt Russell
Bob-Demian Bichir
Osvaldo-Tim Roth
Joe Gage-Michael Madsen
Chris Mannix-Walton Goggins
General Smithers-Bruce Dern
OB-James Parks
Jody-Channing Tatum
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