What does one naturally associate with that most enduring and traditional of genres, the stalwart of American cinema that is the Western? For many, it is the violent exuberance of the European visionaries behind the so-called ‘Spaghetti’ Western, which survived to this day in the films of Quentin Tarantino. For the puritans of this world, the measured craft and sometimes questionable social propaganda of the likes of John Ford comes to mind. Sundance offering “God’s Country,” starring Thandiwe Newton in the lead role, extends to its audience a subversion of the Western’s traditional aesthetic.
Described by our own Playlist review as a “tenderly realist neo-western” imbued with an “activist-tinged” sensibility, “God’s Country” uses its breathtaking Montana landscape as the canvas on which an understated appraisal of the modern American social condition is painted, as opposed to the genre trappings we have come to expect from such a setting.
Here’s a brief synopsis for “God’s Country”:
When a grieving college professor confronts two hunters she catches trespassing on her property, she’s drawn into an escalating battle of wills with catastrophic consequences
Adapted from the James Lee Burke short story “Winter Light” by director Julian Higgins (also responsible for a 2015 short film adaptation of the same name) and screenwriter Shaye Ogbonna, “God’s Country,” in juxtaposition to its wintery mise en scène, is scheduled for a September 16 release and will star, alongside Newton, Joris Jarsky, Jefferson White, and Jeremy Bobb.