Directing legend Martin Scorsese is, of course, best known for his gangster movies: Mean Streets, Casino, The Irishman, Gangs of New York, his Oscar-winning The Departed, and his masterpiece, GoodFellas, all explore different angles of the criminal underworld. Even lots of his non-gangster films like Taxi Driver and Bringing Out the Dead still have that same gritty criminal-element feel to them. And while most wouldn’t think of historical drama as his wheelhouse, Scorsese has actually made several great historical dramas, such as The Age of Innocence, The Aviator, and Silence. All of those films–really not in any way gangster movies–still delve into the darkness of the human heart and how it can crush not only one’s own soul, but also the souls of those in the protagonists’ reach. Scorsese’s latest, Killers of the Flower Moon (new to video on demand this week), is another great historical drama, focusing on a little-known tragic chapter of American history. Unlike those other historical dramas, though, Killers merges the gangster movie and the historical drama into something that draws good from both veins. It is a historical epic that, at its heart, is still a Scorsese gangster flick.
We start with an all-too-necessary history lesson; I, for one, had no idea about this story or setting. It’s the 1920s, and the members of the Osage Nation of Oklahoma have formed a wealthy society based on the discovery of oil on their land. This success breeds a combination of resentment and opportunism from the local white residents, who we often see as hired hands or as men attempting to find an Osage bride and thus obtain a life of ease living off their wives’ oil profits. We also learn that a series of murders and other mysterious deaths have started to strike the Osage.
One of these men, Ernest Burkhart (Leonardo DiCaprio) has returned from World War I to live with his uncle, William King Hale (Robert DeNiro), a rancher and man of influence in the area. King encourages Ernest to romantically pursue Mollie (Lily Gladstone), an Osage woman who’s family has substantial oil rights. Molly, who seems to be a bit wiser and unflappable compared to her sisters and others we meet, soon does fall for Ernest’s simpleness despite her showing that she should know better. Soon, King moves onto the next step of his plan: to have Ernest help in killing Mollie’s family members so he will inherit the oil rights. It turns out King has been behind the murders of the people he pretends to care about. As the body count piles up, Mollie becomes the next target of King’s plot. But, thanks to Mollie’s intervention, the relatively new Bureau of Investigation shows up to investigate the murders. The third act focuses on how Ernest deals with his competing allegiances to his wife and uncle. Where does his loyalty lie?
Because it’s a Scorsese movie, the initial impulse is to talk about the filmcraft. And it is excellent. Scorsese’s directorial touch is still there. The quick cuts to depictions of the murders are as blunt and brutal as anything you’d see in something like GoodFellas or Casino. The Oklahoma setting provides for an epic feel that calls to mind Silence or Kundun. The close-ups—many of which focus on DiCaprio’s dumbly smirking face, covering up the menace underneath—add depth and complexity. The creatives, especially cinematographer Rodrigo Prieto (who also shot Barbie this year), costumer Jacqueline West (Dune), and composer Robbie Robertson, the late guitarist of The Band, are all doing high-level work; the movie looks and sounds great.
Narratively and thematically, the film is compelling. It takes on really big themes like racism, injustice, and exploitation, but feels very intimate doing so. When the three-and-a-half hour run time was announced, there were plenty of shrugs. Scorsese gets to do whatever he wants, and no one says no. His 2019 epic The Irishman, went 15 minutes longer and felt every minute of those four hours. Killers, however, does not. One of my marks for a great film is that you aren’t really distracted by the run time. And I wasn’t. The story unfolds slowly enough to build drama but not so slowly that it drags. The film has something to say, but does spectacularly in doing so through its art and narrative.
Another huge reason the film works so well is that the three leads all give fantastic, though different, performances. DiCaprio gets to do “big-A” Acting. From his goofy grins with uncomfortably large teeth to his morally immature decision-making, DiCaprio’s makes Ernest both likable and loathsome, which is quite a trick. DeNiro is very much DeNiro, but it really works here. He puts on a pastiche of fatherly kindness I’ve not seen him explore before, which makes his evil all the more, well, evil. Lily Gladstone is getting the most buzz and awards recognition. The Oscar front runner has already won the Best Actress awards from the National Board of Review and New York Film Critics. Her Mollie is the moral and spiritual center of the movie, and she carries that weight well. Much of the performance is quiet and, in some ways, thankless; it’s very much the opposite of DiCaprio’s showiness. Her stillness makes those moments when she gets to act “more”—whether it be extreme grief or sickness—all the more effective. It’s a wonderful performance in a film built on wonderful performances.
Commentators have asked. whether Scorsese should have been the one to tell this story of another culture’s tragedy. I get that impulse. But, in a sense, he was perfect for Killers of the Flower Moon. Murder, betrayal, family, crime, greed…Killers really is a gangster movie. And nobody does gangster movies better.
Killers of the Flower Moon is now available to rent or buy on video on demand. Coming soon to Apple TV+.
(Photo credit: Apple TV+)