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Movie review: “The Assassination of Jessee James by the Coward Robert Ford
BY MAGGIE SCOTT
“The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford” captivated readers as a psychologically penetrating study of James and his groupie and killer, Bob Ford. Director and writer Andrew Dominik has turned Ron Hansen’s novel into a leisurely potent film epic.
The good years of lucrative robberies and defiance of the law have run their course and Jesse is surrounded by a cadre of men with questionable loyalties and agendas. Nineteen-year-old Bob Ford (Casey Affleck) has made his way in 1881 to the Missouri camp of his hero. Giving Jesse’s brother “the willies,” Ford’s shifty adoration for the outlaw is poorly concealed, as are his obvious shortcomings of character. Although for years he’s devoured all accounts of Jesse’s career with thrilled devotion, soon after joining the gang, when confronted with the reality of Jesse’s lack of compunction for murder,
Ford seeks mercy for a man looking up the barrel of Jesse’s gun. While Jesse’s aura is as strong as ever, his life has become more of a run from the law than confrontations with it. Paranoia is increasing for Jesse and for the idle men who are entertaining thoughts of claiming the bounty on Jesse’s head, knowing full well that if you “do Jesse dirt behind his back, he’ll come after you with a cleaver.”
Machinations of kith and kin complicate things for Ford and for Jesse, who while ruthlessly winnowing out perceived traitors, appears to be redirecting his life to one of peaceful obscurity. He’s back with wife and children and leaving the welcome mat out for Ford, who lets his belief that he was “destined for great things” warp his hero-worship into personal glory masquerading as public service.
Jesse knows it takes more than a gun for a nobody to be a somebody, but that is a truth Ford will never know. Ford’s transformation (and Affleck’s amazing performance) eclipses the subtle power of Pitt’s portrayal of James.
A narrator straight out of the Ken Burns documentary mold is a jarring note in an otherwise mournfully mesmerizing portrait of a dark moment in the waning years of the American frontier.
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