The Highwaymen (2019) Review
Alternate Title: How Bonnie and Clyde Died
Run Time: 2h 13min
Plot: Two old and poor men, who were chewed up by the American political system, go on a hunt to kill Bonnie and Clyde, who were chewed up by the American justice system.
Tl;dr Review: It’s a slow burner. Don’t expect a lot of action or a lot of drama.
When to Watch: Preferably in the afternoon. Better when you had a long day and just want to watch something that doesn’t require much attention.
With Whom to Watch: It’s a movie to watch alone. It’s family friendly, but it’s so slow that your friends, family members, or SO might want to give up half way through.
Full Review: First thing first, don’t get discouraged that it’s so slow. You have to understand the time period this movie is set in. It’s in the 1930s when technology just started to gain momentum. Crimes were much simpler, so was catching criminals, relatively. So, expecting any contemporary crime TV series level drama and suspense would be a wrong thing to do.
The movie is about a couple of Texas Rangers, who are out work, hunting down Bonnie and Clyde. But it’s not about Bonnie and Clyde. You get some exposition about their past, but that’s it. For the most part, you don’t even get to see their face; let alone most of their exploits. So, don’t expect it to teach you about anything other than how they died. But one of the wonderful things this movie does is that it doesn’t glamorize the criminals, despite Bonnie and Clyde being hugely popular, in their day and in today. Sure, the movie masterfully showed Bonnie and Clyde’s popularity, and the kind of celebrity status they enjoyed among people at that time. But it also condemns their act of wanton destruction and murder. And I believe it took a lot of restraint and maturity to do that when glorified criminals are all the rage in contemporary entertainment.
But may be that’s because of the nature of the movie. It’s one of those hard-boiled stories. Where everything is based on reality, no sentiment exists anywhere, the characters are gritty, and the tone is very mature and natural. I mean they don’t show any sentiment for Rangers, neither for the antagonists. From that point of view, the story is good. But still I have to say it’s nothing to write home about. And the pacing of it so terrible! You can basically start the movie from the 32 min mark (the movie is 2h 13min long), and it’ll still make complete sense. Not to mention it suffered in the dialogue department. It’s so boring! Yes, for the sake of naturalism they may have abandoned embellished dialogues. But you can still be entertaining while being natural. If they just upped the ante in their dialogue choice, it’d have been a far better movie! That’s why I recommended it after having a long, tiring day; cause it doesn’t take that much of your brainpower.
As for the positives, the acting was really good. Yes, when you have Kevin Costner and Woody Harrelson covering 80% of the movie, it’s expected. The cinematography was really pretty, that’s another redeeming factor for the movie. Some of its shots are really beautiful! Something that you don’t expect in crime dramas. Another aspect that I liked about the movie is that even though it’s set in 1930, it doesn’t feel claustrophobic. I don’t know if you ever experienced it, but movies set in olden time periods can often feel very claustrophobic; like you want it to end as soon as possible. It wasn’t the case with this one.
So, the final question — is it worth watching? Not really. Unless you’re interested in knowing how Bonnie and Clyde die, this movie doesn’t have that much to offer. The story is not told from their perspective, nor is it about their exploits. Apart from the hard-boiled nature of the story, it doesn’t have much to offer.
Final Score: A mishandled movie/10
