From Fri, 9 Sept
“It is not the violence that sets a man apart. It’s the distance he’s prepared to go.”
After collaborating on the 2005 western The Proposition, acclaimed director John Hillcoat and legendary singer-songwriter-screenwriter Nick Cave return with a tough Prohibition-set western about a family of hard-as-nails Ohio bootleggers at war with the law and rival gangsters. Lawless is the true story of the infamous Bondurant Brothers, “some hard-ass crackers”: bootlegging siblings who made a run for the American Dream in Prohibition-era Virginia. In this epic gangster tale, inspired by true-life tales of author Matt Bondurant’s family in his novel “The Wettest County in the World”, the loyalty of three brothers is put to the test against the backdrop of the nation’s most notorious crime wave. Boasting an all-star cast and standout performances, from man of the moment Tom Hardy as the monosyllabic heavy with a heart, Forrest Bondurant, and Guy Pearce as the psychotic lawman Charley Rakes, Lawless is a hard-edged, darkly funny delight from breathless start to brutal finish.
And the fruits of Hillcoat’s and Cave’s collaboration also deliver a hard-charging soundtrack — featuring Cave, Warren Ellis, Ralph Stanley, Emmylou Harris and Willie Nelson – which is worth the ticket alone!
