"Rebel Ridge" 2024

"Rebel Ridge" movie review is one of the best action movies of the year

An inventive and tense action movie about an ex-marine in a rotten city.

Former Marine Terry (Aaron Pierre) has sold his car and a stake in a Chinese restaurant to pay bail for his cousin Mike (S.J. LeBlanc). The cousin has previously cooperated with law enforcement and turned in several gangsters, so he may not last long in jail. Riding a bicycle Terry is hit by police officers of the town of Shelby Springs and take away the bail of 36 thousand dollars. The money seems dirty to the guards of order, it would be necessary to sort out, but the former Marine has no time. By accident, Terry uncovers a corrupt scheme of police officers, who for a couple of years take away finances from citizens for minor offenses.

If you don't know who directed “Rebel Ridge”, the movie will hardly interest the casual viewer. The synopsis of the picture also seems too simple. The movie did not participate in festivals, but was released immediately on Netflix. However, it is still not worth passing by the action movie because of the name of the director. Jeremy Saulnier has established himself as a master of suspenseful cinema, having directed two remarkable thrillers, The Ruins of the Past and The Green Room. Both films were shown at Cannes. The director was then followed by shooting several episodes of the third season of “True Detective” and a less successful work “Hold the Darkness”. With “Rebel Ridge” Saulnier also not very lucky: first in the production interfered with the pandemic coronavirus, and then from the project in the middle of the process suddenly ran away from the performer of the main role of John Boyega. The director admitted that the movie actually managed to make the movie on the third attempt, and the budget rose to $ 40 million. Before Saulnier filmed much cheaper. The more striking is the successful end result.

“Rebel Ridge” bypasses the stamps of old-school action movies and shows the world a completely new action hero. We are used to that in sharp movies good guys are not ceremonious with villains, in no time breaking skulls and shooting to kill. Tall and pumped up Terry looks like a real killing machine. The Marine easily takes away the cops' weapons, uses choking holds and wrings his hands, but he doesn't want to take anyone's life. For the first half of the movie, Terry negotiates with law enforcement and does not want to escalate the conflict. The modern Rambo is against violence, but circumstances force him to defend himself. However, Terry does not look like an aggressor in any way and even shoots soft bullets not to kill, although the uninvited guest in Shelby Springs is ready to be killed at any second.

Saulnier criticizes the lack of money of police officers, which makes cops forced to steal from citizens and torture petty offenders. The director also draws attention to the fact that in small backwoods counties of America, the sheriff's power is virtually unlimited. The villain, played by Don Johnson, has built a small police state, in which he himself sets the laws. No one to help Terry is not in a hurry, the former Marine is forced to apply all the skills learned in Iraq in his native land, declaring war on corruption.

“Rebel Ridge” - an action movie without weaknesses. There is not so much action, but all the sharp scenes look inventive and fresh, and close to ambient tense music does not let you relax for a second. Perhaps some viewers may be put off by the complicated bureaucracy explaining the police officers' corrupt schemes. The other half of the audience will be satisfied with the deep elaboration of the script, in which the conflict is spelled out down to the smallest detail.

The only one who helps Terry turns out to be former drug addict and current court employee Summer (Annasophia Robb). The young mother, who has stumbled in the past, dreams of regaining custody of her school-aged daughter. The quarrels with the police Summer definitely does not need, but at the same time to pass by injustice office employee also in no way can not. In an old-school action movie, Terry and Summer would have been doomed to an affair and a couple of explicit scenes, but Saulnier makes the two characters full-fledged partners with something to lose and gain.

“Rebel Ridge” belongs to the rare modern action movie that can hardly be called silly. Saulnier elegantly combines sharp scenes with criticism of social and political orders. With each minute the story only gains momentum, and in the last half hour it is simply impossible to tear yourself away from the screen. It is definitely not worth passing by “Rebel Ridge”. It is quite possible that the action movie will be on the lists of the best films of the year, and certainly - pleasant surprises not the most fruitful for movie masterpieces 2024.