StarCat/CatStar

simply trying to defend their lands from the white men who have taken
everything from them.
The brutality just mirrors the natural world around it, as every man
operates, ultimately, as a force of nature in their own right. Just as avalanches
topple trees, or wolves dispatch bison, men topple one another just as naturally.
Every force of violence is given the unflinching sincerity they command. Arrows,
teeth, bullets, maws, hatchets, knives, claws, fire and water all cause their own
destruction, and no detail is spared.
While the scope and scale of this film is so thematically broad – nature,
spirituality, torment, sacrifice, the cost of vengeance, survival, the beauty and
brutality of the wilderness, man’s place within the world and the way that we act
as a destructive force just like any other –the narrative focus is so contrastingly
intimate, that both seem to only serve one another. Glass’ journey is one of a
private grief, still haunted by visions of his lost village and family, still grappling
with his inner demons.
Everything that occurs within the film is ultimately a framework for Glass
to work through these issues, and yet, by the end of the film, questions are left:
does vengeance satisfy? What does it take to mend a broken spirit, to make whole
again a broken man? When is the deepest pain allowed to heal, and what begins
that process? Are loss and its pain simply natural, and is pain itself a part of the
natural world?
Iñárritu has firmly established himself as a unique and ambitious director
with few peers to stand amongst, and continues to explore the human condition in
his own way. Few directors are capable of communicating so many themes, and so
many thoughts, through almost purely visual storytelling, and let alone make it
so compelling. With the assistance of Lubezki, Iñárritu forms a portrait stunning
in its scale and painstaking in its detail of a wilderness we may never experience,
and of a man who may never free himself of it.
Full of images that rival that of Planet Earth and driven by a performance
of a lifetime from Leonardo DiCaprio, all pulled together by the unparalleled
direction of Alejandro Iñárritu, The Revenant stands as a truly powerful and truly
beautiful film about nature, man’s place within it, personal grief and suffering,
overcoming obstacles and the persistence of the human spirit. Through its wider
focus on nature, it crafts a delicate and intimate personal examination of grief,
loss, and pain. When someone no longer fears death, what do they become? Can
healing happen, once a certain line has crossed? These are answers Hugh Glass
may learn, but not during our time spent with him. Regardless, what has been
achieved here is a towering work of art, one that gives far more than it takes, and
continues to show that Iñárritu is an ambitious and capable artist in a medium
that he has a complex understanding and command of.
Author bio: Josh Sczykutowicz is a young writer from central Florida.
Most of his work can be described as dark, alternative and literary fiction.
He has been published in Flash Fiction Magazine, ExFic, and Polychrome
Ink, among others. You can Like him on Facebook and follow him on
twitter @jsczykutowicz1 and tumblr at
http://joshsczykutowicz.tumblr.com/.