Brimstone [Blu-ray] [2017]

This is a very dark story which was a hard watch, but kept me gripped throughout. Guy Pearce is excellent as always and Kit Harrington, played another loveable character. Dakota was good as the lead along with some other lesser know interesting characters. All in all a solid film if you can stomach it!

I saw a clip of this film on Facebook so decided to watch it, there are parts that were very difficult to watch and there were parts that show how strong and brave the female character was, It is a sad ending but the cycle of abuse was broken, I think this film should be watched in the day not late at night don't think I would be sleeping tonight lol

There have been some unusual and innovative Westerns recently ("Hostiles", "The News of the World", "The Sisters Brothers", "The Homesman") all taking a fresh look at the genre and using it to tell very human stories. "Brimstone" could have been in this list, but just misses out, I think, despite having a strong and important theme: the silencing of women's voices. The protagonist, Liz (Dakota Fanning), has no tongue. She literally cannot speak.Brought up in an extreme Dutch Calvinist sect by a tyrannical father, she's seen her mother forced to wear a scold's bridle for speaking out and has had to wear one herself. As a child, she has her tongue and is able to talk, but she's punished for speaking her native Dutch. Following her mother's suicide, she's been "married" to her father and raped by him. Running away is the only option, and she does that - ending up in a brothel where, again, women have no voice. Her best friend commits the "crime" of arguing with a customer and is punished by having her tongue sliced off.I don't want to give away too much, so I'll halt the plot resume here and focus on why I don't think this film quite made the grade. Sadly, it's because of Dakota Fanning's performance despite the fact that she's a fine actress. Her character, Liz, is played as an adult woman by her and as a young girl (called Anna) by Emilia Jones. Emilia Jones should have been nominated for an Oscar for her performance - it's harrowing, honest and terrifying. Not only that, but at this stage of her life, Liz/Anna has her tongue and can speak. Later, post-tongue as it were, Dakota Fanning is playing a role where she has no speaking part and no dialogue to get her teeth into. All she can use to communicate is sign language (to her husband and daughter) and facial expression. I didn't feel that she was able to bring this off effectively enough to convey the enormous inner suffering that her character must have been feeling, and this undermined the movie for me.However, Guy Pearce and Kit Harrington did sterling work. Guy Pearce, as Liz/Anna's hard-line, minister, father, descended into madness progressively as the film unfolded. I'm a big Guy Pearce fan - I think he's one of most under-rated actors of real talent working at the moment - and he did his best with this religious fanatic monster. Kit Harrington makes a sadly brief appearance. His is one of the most sympathetic roles in the movie and I'd like to have seen more of him.So, would I recommend "Brimstone"? I would, cautiously, because there's a really interesting film trying to get out. But, I'd have to caution you that there's not much relief from unremitting gloom and misery. It's a journey into human suffering in a society undermined by Calvinism, remoteness, cruelty and madness.

Wild West movies can cover many ethnic people's in many different society's and religions. This movie gives an excellent view of what life was like then and definitely why the suffraget movement was needed. Brilliantly acted and displayed.

Please watch this movie, but when you have time and not in a mood for a light hearted story.

The cinematography is very good. The story/plot is interesting [but is weakened by he totally pointless inclusion of a subplot that introduces two wounded cowboys/outlaws, in to the mix], and is delivered in a four time shifted chapters, which is effective. Sadly the acting is merely adequate. Regrettably the costumes, sets, and overall feel of the film is all wrong; it is all to pristine and clean; consequently it completely fails to be convincing.The sound a vision quality of this product are very good.

I wasn't expecting such a good movie. It was disturbing as to what Joanna's father was doing to her and her mother but as a tower of strength in Joanna, she fought back and this movie shows how strong a woman can be.

This is a film about violence against women told for the male gaze. As such it teeters over the edge into violent porn. The (female) nudity was unnecessary. The explicit violence went too far. The sexualisation of children even by a baddie was distasteful. The women were permitted no agency - they were just victims. Anyone that fought back was punished or killed. Even the heroine couldn't be allowed to successfully stand up to male authority. I'm not sure what this film was trying to say, but it's unbelievable that even back in the day there was so many evil men and so few good ones, or that women had so little agency, or that the rule of law and church was so corrupted. It also felt extremely fragmented, as though chunks of the story were missing. eg how did the girl fall in love with the robber - they hardly interacted. The boy turns from a brat into a brave and sensible little dude but we're not given enough time to see his character develop before he's dispatched. Why did she have to impersonate her friend rather than just go as a substitute under a different name? (Friend died so I came instead.) I wouldn't recommend this movie tbh.