Board Meeting………..
To say THREE BILBOARDS OUTSIDE EBBING, MISSOURI (director Martin McDonagh, 115 mins) is the most absorbing movie of the year goes nowhere close to doing it justice. It is also in turn the angriest and darkly funny, shockingly violent and intuitive film in recent memory and at a time when American popular culture is dominated by fake news and the likes of the Kardashians, there could not be a more uncomfortable yet compelling journey into the heartlands, even if making the trip means watching through fingers put over your face on a number of occasions.
Frances McDormand, no stranger to offbeat roles since her brilliant portrayal of a pregnant Minnesota police chief in the Coen Brothers ‘Fargo’ (winning her an Oscar, likely to be joined by a second for this performance at the Academy Awards on Sunday), plays a mother grieving for her daughter who has been raped and murdered seven months before, the crime going unsolved and slipping toward the cold case category. Taking matters into her own hands she hires three vacant billboards on the outskirts of Ebbing, that carry the statements, (‘Raped While Dying,’ ‘And Still No Arrests,’ ‘How Come Chief Willoughby?’) intended to prompt determined action from the police in finding the killer.
Her actions polarize local people. The young manager of the billboard advertising company is sympathetic and so too is her best friend, but the local priest visits her home initially to offer comfort, although in truth it is an effort to persuade Mildred (McDormand) to remove her messages, while a trip to the dentist, who is a close friend of Chief Willoughby, results in a violent clash that ensures he will not be holding a drill for sometime. From her own family, a teenage son and hugely dislikeable ex-husband, she receives understanding but no support for her actions as they both contend it will not bring Angela back.
The Ebbing Police Department are stirred into a response but for the most part they are a racist, corrupt and hopeless bunch, described by Mildred in a local radio interview as ‘too busy torturing black folks,’ to bring the murderer to justice. But Chief Willoughby, played with deft understatement by the superb Woody Harrelson, is a man apart within the force. He is understanding and not without sympathy for Mildred’s situation but at the same time dying from cancer and despite wanting nothing more than to find the culprit, maintains a lack of DNA evidence rather than the ineptitude of his men resulted in the investigation leading nowhere. Despite her frustration and anger there is a sense Mildred believes him, although the standing of the police is routinely damaged by Willoughby’s cohort, Deputy Dixon (Sam Rockwell), who is immature, senselessly violent, a veritable firecracker of a loose canon whose only redeeming feature is his loyalty to the Chief. The performances of Harrelson and Rockwell are well deserving of their Best Supporting Actor Oscar nominations and either would be a worthy winner.
Three Billboards was written and directed by Martin McDonagh (already an Oscar winner for the short film ‘Six Shooter’ in 2006) who interestingly enough is English, so from the position of an outsider he has conjured a portrayal of rural America that is hugely unflattering but also profoundly convincing. All small US communities cannot be like the fictional town of Ebbing, but with barely a likable character in the piece it looks a damming indictment.
Beneath her foul mouth, outbursts of violence that occasionally turn physical when dealing with her son and one of his classmates and a cruel line in flippancy, it is hard not to sympathise with Mildred whose world has been shattered with the loss of her daughter, the cause she has taken on giving her life purpose and direction in the cruellest of circumstances. In her brilliant depiction, McDormand makes absolutely no concession to glamour – untidy hair, not a stroke of make-up and unflattering clothes all serve to make Mildred Hayes the most convincing character to appear on the screen for a very long time.
The ending leaves the viewer to draw their own conclusion and whether you deem it bleak, heroic or vengeful will be down to personal choice. Whatever you decide will not detract from the dark, painful, but engrossing excursion made to Ebbing, Missouri.