The Ballad of Buster Scruggs

image source

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs is a western anthology film from the minds of the Coen Brothers. The tales that this movie covers include a singing cowboy named Buster Scruggs (played by Tim Blake Nelson) who just so happens to be the fastest gunslinger in the west, a cowboy played by James Franco whose attempt to rob a bank goes very wrong, a story about two traveling companions played by Liam Neeson and Harry Melling (better known as Dudley from Harry Potter), a prospector played by Tom Waits digging for gold, a woman named Alice who sets out for Oregon with her brother and is possibly intent on getting married, and a story about five strangers riding in a stagecoach together. For those who don’t know, I am a fan of the Coen Brothers. I’ve enjoyed practically all of their films that I have seen, including the likes of Hail, Caesar, O Brother Where Art Thou, and the remake of True Grit. I even liked their much-maligned Ladykillers remake. These are two talented filmmakers with their own unique style. I bring all of this up because even I didn’t really know what to make of this film. In many ways, I found this movie legitimately difficult to get through. The first major problem I have is that I don’t think this movie needs to be two hours and ten minutes long. This feels especially true when you consider that the first three of the six stories in this film cover roughly the first third of the movie. Some these stories do feel like they have fat on them that probably could have been trimmed down a touch. I wouldn’t mind some the pauses in the film if it had been one continuous story, but in my eyes, they feel unnecessary here. This feels especially true of the story entitled The Gal Who Got Rattled. It is the longest story in the movie, and  Don’t get me wrong, there is good stuff in this movie. Some of the performances work (primarily those of Liam Neeson, Harry Melling, and Tom Waits). On the other hand, James Franco’s performance in the film didn’t work for me. I actually like the guy as an actor, but he’s just not the guy you think of when you want someone who’s supposed to play a cowboy. I also found the first story, which is the film’s title story, to be annoying. This was largely due to Tim Blake Nelson’s performance, another actor I normally like in anything he’s in. I get what they were trying to do, but it just didn’t work for me. The film also looks nice, especially when you get some fantastic landscape shots in the film. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to like The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, at the very least. Ultimately, this is just one of those movies that I didn’t really agree wit the critics on.

4 / 10