Jesse James was a legend; an ideology that both haunted and possessed the American people in 1881. Robert Ford was a nobody. That is until he murdered Jesse James. Director and screenwriter Andrew Dominik paints a unique portrait of a legend that remains just as much a mystery now as it did back then.
In reality Jesse James was an outlaw, unleashing waves of terror as he and the men he recruited robbed banks and trains. But to the public he also represented hope, a symbol of freedom in an increasingly controlled world.
Brad Pitt who plays Jesse James paints an enigmatic figure. At times he's an untouchable legend, arrogant and aloof, and yet we also see his susceptibility to outbursts of emotion that reveal the tortured and broken man underneath. Brad Pitt doesn't just play Jesse James; he is Jesse James.
Robert Ford on the other hand, played by Casey Affleck, is a young man caught in the reflection of his idol. His is a tragic case of worshipping his hero only to find that the real life Jesse James doesn't match the legend he's created in his own mind.
Affleck portrays Ford brilliantly, revealing a young man who fails to come to terms with the falseness of his dreams and unable to cope with the reality that Jesse James is after all only human, prone to the same mistakes, fears and emotional hang-ups as everyone else.
This is less a western and more a psychological drama as both men struggle to suppress their demons amid the repressive surrounds of Missouri. Visually austere, the landscape flicks between wheat coloured prairies and snow covered lowlands. It's a world both harsh and beautiful; a contrast not lost by the characters.
Whatever caused that fateful day in 1882 when Robert Ford turned a gun onto his idol, we'll never know. That's lost in the winds of time. However what this film does do is breathe passion and life into the characters that helped shape American history.
Four-and-a-half stars out of five
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