First Cow

August 4, 2020 at 1:33 pm | Posted in 2020 | Leave a comment
Tags: Alia Shawkat, Drama, John Magaro, Kelly Reichardt, Movie Review, Orion Lee, Period Piece, Rene Auberjonois, Toby Jones

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It’s funny to think that I was actually excited for this film. I had seen a preview in the theaters some time in December or January. It looked like my sort of movie: a thoughtful, small budget, independent film. Perhaps, I was expecting great character development, acting, and storytelling. One of the things that draws me to smaller movies is the idea that the story can go anywhere, rather than in the standard formulaic arc. I didn’t exactly get what I was looking for. I do not mind slow moving, pensive films, but this one was mind-numbingly slow. We were ten minutes into the film before the first word was uttered. The film had very little dialogue and no soundtrack, resulting in a film that was filled largely with just background sound. Also, the titular bovine finally drifts into the film for a brief appearance about 30 minutes in, and she doesn’t feature into the plot at all until halfway through the movie. That is a long time to not know where this film is going, and it was hard to stay engaged. The story did start with a compelling enough mystery: two skeletons found buried on an island. But the ending made no sense; I understand why the one guy died, why did the other one? He seemed perfectly healthy when he lay down next to his friend. For the main hook of the film to not deliver is really problematic. Also, I couldn’t help but notice that the place where the bones were found was significantly different from where the men lay down. Am I to believe that it really changed that much in less than 200 years? Likewise, the dialogue did not sound authentic to me. This film presumably takes place in the latter 1800s, but some diction and slang did not sound authentic (did people use a term like “window of opportunity” in the 1800s?). I couldn’t help but think of Robert Eggers, who is a master at creating authentic period language in films like “The With” and “The Lighthouse.” This film also made some very strange casting choices. Two of it’s three known actors, Alia Shawkat and Rene Auberjonois, were both in brief roles where they didn’t have a single line. This must have been Auberjonois’s last film (he died in December). He’s a great actor, and yet he was hardly used, while larger key roles were often filled with actors of lesser skill. Toby Jones was the only established actor with a large role. In the end, there is just nothing here for me to recommend. Even for free, I think this will feel like a waste of time.