Directed by David Cronenberg
Written by Josh Olson
Based on the Graphic Novel by John Wagner and Vince Locke
Produced by Chris Bender, W. C. Spink and David Cronenberg
Music by Howard Shore
Cinematography by Peter Suschitzky
Edited by Ronald Sanders
Costumes by Denise Cronenberg

Cast
Viggo Mortensen (Tom Stall)
Maria Bello (Edie Stall)
Ed Harris (Carl Fogarty)
William Hurt (Richie Cusack)
Ashton Holmes (Jack Stall)
Peter MacNeill (Sheriff Sam Carney)

No point in delaying with this review. Here it is upfront: this is one of the best films of the year and one of the finest achievements from a great director, David Cronenberg. If you can stomach an extremely brutal look at the effect of violence upon a family and an unflinching psychological portrait of a man facing his inner darkness, go see it right now. Right now, do you hear? Don't make me get my shotgun.

Okay, you’re still here. You want to read a bit more about this film, and that’s fine. I won’t spoil anything for you—I normally avoid spoilers in my reviews anyway. But that unfortunately means that I will have a more difficult time explicating just what makes A History of Violence such a superb and intelligent thriller. But if you take my word for it, I guarantee that you won’t leave the theater disappointed. Shaken, upset, and pensive, yes. Disappointed, no.

A History of Violence has much in common with one the best films of the previous decade, Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven. Because Clint Eastwood and David Cronenberg have worked primarily in different genres (Cronenberg specializes in science-fiction slanted horror like The Fly, Videodrome, and Scanners), this is the first film that has made me realize that the two men have a startlingly similar style and approach to moviemaking, a sort of cerebral understatement and character-oriented approach to epic human subjects. The setting of A History of Violence in a small Indiana town, its tight-jawed hero of few words, and its serious examination of the consequences of violent outbursts make the comparison to Eastwood’s oeuvre easy to make, so much so that I’m surprised I never noticed it before.

When Tom Stall (Viggo Mortensen), a small-town Indiana restaurant owner, kills in defense two psychotic drifters who hold up him and his employees, it looks like the movie is heading for a story about how the bloody incident changes the lives of Tom and his family when he inadvertently turns into a media hero. However, Cronenberg’s intentions and those of the graphic novel source material do not tend that way. For a few scenes after Tom’s act of defense, we wonder how this gentle and quiet man will handle the attention and misspent praise heaped on his actions, and how his loving wife Edie (Maria Bello) and picked-on teenage son Jack (Ashton Holmes) will deal with it. But then the film abruptly turns toward Unforgiven territory and starts turning the screws of suspense until the story reaches a clammy and shivery conclusion. A classic mobster black sedan pulls up at Tom Stall’s little coffee shop, and out steps Ed Harris decked out in black suit, tie, and sunglasses. The sunglasses are there to hide his scarred face and dead left eye. Obviously, this can’t be good. This “Mr. Fogarty” starts calling Tom by another name, “Joey,” a thug from Philly who scarred Fogarty’s face years ago. Tom denies he has any knowledge of this “Joey” person, but Mr. Fogarty isn’t taking “no” for an answer, and he starts to hang around the Stall family like a grim shadow. If Tom isn’t this “Joey” person, Fogarty asks him, then why is he so darned good at killing folks? The strain on the family from Fogarty’s presence starts to show: Edie suspects that Tom isn’t telling her everything, and Jack starts emulating his father’s behavior at school when he confronts the bully who makes his life hell.

At the core of the story is the question about how deep-seated violence is in a personality, and if it is possible to purge it entirely. More generally, A History of Violence addresses the nature of the persona. Can people willfully change who they are, and even if they can, does the person they once were still exist somewhere? Are you really ever capable of excaping from yourself? The movie brilliantly tackles the question both internally and externally, but never provides an easy answer…becauseone doesn’t exist.

Such heavy and intelligent drama places a great burden on an actor, but Viggo Mortensen works perfect screen magic with the part of Tom Stall. It’s a difficult role to play, with multiple places where a poorly judged performance or a note out of place could annihilate all sympathy for the character. Mortensen is pitch-perfect, and his delicate use of accents and tonal shifts in his voice is hypnotic and beautifully played. He also benefits from the performance of Maria Bello as his wife Edie. Usually, good-looking movie couples seem too artificial and posed, but Bello and Mortensen feel like a genuine and deeply committed man and wife. Their lovemaking scenes together are charged with realistic playful affection (the first time) and explosive violent lust (the second time).

Harris and William Hurt provide an interesting contrast as two dangerous gangster figures. Hurt provides a bit of relief as a mostly comic Philadelphia mobster…although the relief doesn’t last long. Harris, on the other hand, generates such patient menace that he’s scary as hell before he even gets through the restaurant door. He gets the film’s most memorable line when he explains that his damaged left eyes can still see a bit—except that the only thing it sees is the man who damaged it in the first place.

A movie with “violence” in its title would naturally feature some very graphic depictions of it. Although the actual moments of violence are quick and over in moments, Cronenberg provides some gruesomely clear views of the bloody aftermaths. Most movies shy away from such post-mortems, preferring to dwell on the moment itself and not its effect. Cronenberg chooses to let you see just what a human jaw looks like after a bullet has ripped through it  at close range. It ain’t pretty, but this is a rare film that can justify its gore on artistic and thematic grounds.

Similar to Unforgiven, Cronenberg’s film treats the violence in it as both catharsis and horror. When gunfire or crushing fisticuffs suddenly erupt, they provide the audience with a terrific release of tension and sense of retribution, since almost always horrible people are on the receiving end. But they also immediately cause revulsion and fear: violence solves an immediately problem, but it also compromises the integrity of the person who commits it and creates a string of new and worse problems. Like classic Shakespearean tragedy, “sin will pluck on sin,” and the bloody deeds keep perpetuating themselves until the point of necessary exhaustion. And whether A History of Violence is the type of tragedy that finally ends because there simply are no more people left to die (as in King Lear) or because a final violent act at last brings about the establishment of a new and secure order (as in Macbeth) is something you will have to find out for yourself.

In other words, see this movie.

I’ll say it again: don’t make me get my shotgun.

 Return to the Reviews Page     Return to The Realm of Ryan