I've pretty much given up on Hollywood in the wake of this remake craze but I figured that David Croneberg was too wierd to be mainstreamed (*knocks on wood*, with the Brothers Grimm, it looks like Terry Gilliam has been beaten on the system; hope Tideland ends up being a better film) even with Viggo Mortensen starring in his latest film. Good reviews started rolling in after the limited release so I was enticed to go see it but unfortunately was forced to wait a week until it was released wide. Finally, today I managed to get out there and check it out so without further ado... my review for A History Of Violence.

The film takes place in a small town in Indiana and is centered around the character of Tom Stall played by Mortensen (in a recent interview with David Cronenberg in Fangoria, he noted that Mortensen was an actor first and a star second; I couldn't agree more since he is excellent in the film), an ordinary family man who owns a coffee shop in town (this is a departure from Croneberg's usual style since the main character is rather ordinary and identifiable rather than strange and twisted as most of his characters are). One day, two men come into a shop as it's closing and end up holding everyone at gunpoint in an attempt to pull off a robbery. Tom acts cooly, stands aside, and surrenders the cash register but when one of the men threatens to shoot one of the customers, he snaps and ends up killing both of the men.

After the event, Tom is hailed as a hero and begins to be harassed by the media whom he repeatedly tells that he needs to be with his family and is trying to get back to normal. One day, three men walk into the coffee shop and begin talking about Tom's triumph over the two bad men. Tom at first thinks they are reporters but then one of the men (played with a fantastic creepiness by Ed Harris) proceeds to call him Joey. Tom insists these men have the wrong person and finally convinces them to leave the shop. Later on, the sheriff tells Tom that the three men are mobsters who believe that Tom is someone else.

Up to this point, the movie has been fairly disappointing as it has seemed so ordinary as if anyone could have directed it. But from this point on, with additional confrontantions with mobsters and scenes of violence, the film adopts Croneberg's trademark wierdness as you begin to question Tom's true identity and becomes extremely suspenseful and entertaining. Two things that enhance the creepy feel of the rest of the movie is the fact that there is hardly any music throughout and the fact that a twist that would ordinarily be introduced at the end of a movie is introduced in the middle.

Cronenberg does not glorify violence in the film (except I was quite happy to see Tom's son beat the c**p out of a school bully who torments him in previous scenes). The violence is brutal rather than stylized and there are shots of painful, bizarre looking face wounds that only Cronenberg could imagine. For once, the violence in a film is actually quite shocking but not exploitative.

All in all, this was an excellent film. Very chilling, suspenseful, twisted, and entertaining. Get out there and watch A History Of Violence while you still can. It's one of the only good Hollywood movies I think you'll get to see for a while IMO.

Since I'm a bit busy, I'll post a larger review a little later. For now, let me just say that this movie shows why Cronenberg is one of my favorite directors out there.

A solid **** out of ****

Quoted from James McClung (except I was quite happy to see Tom's son beat the c**p out of a school bully who torments him in previous scenes)

I have to admit, I was kind of punching at the air when he was doing that. Though some were close to actually cheering. I thought it was one of the best scenes, quite well done. Such a simple thing, the tension built up in those few moments and exploded in an instance of violence perhaps even more extreme than the diner. The diner was self defense. It ended in death, but it was motivated. Violence begets violence. The beating was just nasty, he had enough and snapped, and beat the sweet living bejesus kittens out of the guy. The moment Bobby's buddy (played by Morgan Kelly, an actor I'm familiar with but most probably aren't as he's only been in a few smaller key Canadian things) gets that swift kick I knew it was all going down.

I finally got to see this...

It was absolutely amazing.  From beginning to end, it was weird, violent, thought-provoking, exhilarating...etc.  Fantastic performances all around, even from Maria Bello, who I was somewhat skeptical about after Assault on Precinct 13.  The extremely explicit and unsettlingly realistic violence had the audience cringing, and a few people left during the first sex scene, which was relatively explicit (though not much compared to Cronenberg's earlier Crash).  I was, in fact, fairly surprised that as much of this film got past the censors as it did, although I think that when a certain character gets shot with a shotgun, there was a shot missing.  It was an extremely mature film, but also had a sense of fun, especially in William Hurt's excellent performance as Richie.  

See it as soon as possible.